The comedy and tragedy of life in “Phantom of the Range” 1928

Long considered to be inaccessible in the United States although existing in several formats in Spain and South America (including an original 35mm print at Instituto Valenciano De Cinematografia in Valencia, Spain), “Phantom of the Range” 1928 is one of those Tom Tyler silent films that entertains, combining an American western landscape along with Keatonesque, Greek theatre, and Shakespearean elements into a smooth, cohesive plot. The provenance of this FBO silent film on Youtube is from 16mm and VHS copy elements combined together. Uploaded to Youtube on August 2, 2017, one week before what would be Tom's 114^th birthday, “Phantom of the Range” takes both a dramatic and comical look at the life of a cowboy would-be actor would-be cowboy stranded in a small western town.

“Phantom of the Range” opens with a dramatic scene: Duke Carlton (Tom Tyler), the woman who loves him (Marjorie Zier), and her father. A verbal fight takes place, and the older man shoots Duke dead. The woman is distraught, and in turn, turns a gun on herself, literally dying in Duke's arms. No intertitle card is necessary for this part: the father's facial expression and lip movements clearly convey what has he done to lose his only living family member. As the scene closes out, the viewer observes this to be taking place on a theatre stage, a piano player providing music, and the curtain coming down. The actors come out and take a bow. Sitting in the front row of the audience is a starstruck young lady by the name of Patsy O'Brien (Duane Thompson), her little brother Danny (Frankie Darro), and her grandfather Tim (Charles McHugh), owner of a milk cow ranch. The close proximity of Patsy and her family, not to mention their frequent attendance to Duke's performances, suggest there will be a relationship between the two of them, perhaps sooner than expected, which will be very beneficial to Duke throughout the film.

The viewer is next taken to the town center of Prattsville, where Duke's acting troupe is temporarily stranded due to financial reasons. Duke is standing on the front porch of the Grand Hotel in this small western town, dressed in his best suit and looking around, when his fellow acting troupe member Vera Van Swank (Mitzi Morgan in the Spanish version of this film) (Marjorie Zier) comes out and has a few words with Duke, asking why they have been working as actors in small towns instead of larger cities. In return Duke tells her that once she can act in the “comedy of life” she will be considered a great actor, worthy of being able to make it to big city acting jobs. Vera/Mitzi touches Duke's arm, which he gently removes, one of her many advances that he rebuffs throughout the film. Being stranded in what seems an out-of-the-way place to the couple, Duke can resort to cowpunching if he has to, even though he finds it a step backward in his life, after working so hard to move up in life to a more socially mobile career, acting. Temporarily distracted, Duke happens to see Patsy with her family pull up their horse-drawn wagon to the general store after they unload heavy milk cans full of their product. Once the task is done, Tim and Danny go inside the store, while Patsy's eye catches Tom on the porch of the hotel. She walks over to him, staring, totally star struck, pleased to be able to finally meet her hero. She gestures towards him by raising her arms, placing her clasped hands beneath her chin, with a demure smile. Duke engages her in casual talk. Patsy thinks Duke's performance was marvelous, but Duke says his most recent stage act as a cowboy is nothing compared to his performance as Hamlet – here, he is trying to impress her, acting in a common social situation. Then he tells Patsy his acting troupe is next headed for Chicago, then New York, London, and Paris. Just like he told Vera/Mitzi, he is indeed acting in real life here, engaging with a fan who is a pretty girl, and clearly enamored of him.

Meanwhile, Patsy's grandfather is speaking with another man by the name of Walter Corbin (James Pierce) who has made an offer to purchase the O'Brien milk cow ranch. Corbin becomes irate when Tim O'Brien tells him his ranch is not for sale, and in turn pushes the elderly man hard enough so that he falls onto the ground. The event transpires right in front of Duke, and even though he is dressed in his best suit, complete with a fashionable cane in hand, proceeds to take on Corbin in a fistfight. The two men brawl on the street while a crowd gathers, with Patsy and her family egging Duke on. The crowd dissipates, and Patsy is proud of the way Duke handled Corbin. For Duke, this is the right moment of opportunity when Patsy offers him a job working on their ranch, once he tells her that he is retiring from acting. A career on the road and being stranded has taken its toll on Duke, and he longs for something different, not to mention needing money to pay a debt. Tim immediately makes Duke an offer up front in cash to pay for the acting troupe's hotel and costume trunk bills. The O'Briens are happy to make Duke a temporary part of the family, with Patsy being especially happy since she has fallen in love with him. More importantly, Duke and Danny instantly become buddies, the little boy having a role model that he could look up to.

Duke Carlton arrives at the O'Brien ranch dressed as a cowboy, a button-down shirt, scarf, jeans and boots, arriving upon his famous horse, Flashlight. Not only does he look the part well – it was after all his previous career – but he is enthusiastic with his new job, with part of the enthusiasm coming from his new found relationship with one of his devoted fans. What can possibly be a better motivator for Duke, than being in love with his new boss? Unfortunately for him, the road is rocky from the beginning: as soon as Duke learns he was hired to help milk cows and tend to all tasks in the production of milk products including churning butter, he balks at the idea of working with milk cows. Duke even tells Patsy that he is a cow puncher, not a milking machine. He is apologetic, even walks away, although grateful that she offered him a job on her ranch. At this point Duke is hoping that he might be able to get another job as a cow puncher in Prattsville. But all of a sudden, Duke changes his mind again, possibly to save face with Patsy, but really out of his love for her. He is willing to give this job a chance, milking cows, after all, what does he have to lose?

It is not long before Duke soon discovers that milking cows, as with anything else, he must act the part. For one thing, he cannot seem to sit on a stool next to a cow without having its tail whack him in his face. Then there is the problem of his actually milking the cow; no milk is coming, and he does not have a clue how to manipulate the udders, even after Patsy does a demonstration for him. On the verge of giving up, Patsy instead has him clean the stables. But that too proves to have its challenges: Duke cannot stand the smell of the stables, so he grabs a clothespin and attaches it to his nose before he starts pitching hay. Danny comes out of the house, sees Duke and starts to laugh, for the sight of his hero with a clothespin on his nose is nothing short of hilarious. None of this is funny to Duke, who considers everything that has happened to him so far to be a tragedy. Duke is not speaking in the modern sense of the word tragedy, but in the Aristotelian sense; furthermore, he is aware that trying to milk cows – something he has never done before – was in fact a humbling experience. Duke appears dejected, but summons enough positive energy to exlain to Danny that he is probably better off being onstage in a theatre, instead of acting through life. As Shakespeare wrote in “Hamlet”:

How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable,
Seem to me all the uses of this world!

While speaking to Danny, Duke finally removes the clothespin from his nose, sucks it up, and continues pitching hay in order to get at least an honest day's work done. The viewer next sees Duke sitting in front of a butter churn, all by himself, Keatonesque in expression and trying to be fully involved with the task but once again, as with milking the cows, is emotionally divorced from what he is doing. Patsy appreciates Duke's efforts to some degree, and her encouragement of him is more out of love than anything else. He did not permit his pride from taking the job on the O'Brien ranch to begin with, and as he fell in love with Patsy, the lady of the ranch, still wanted to make good with her family, repaying their kindness and generosity in his time of need.

Corbin however still has his eye on acquiring the O'Brien ranch and shows up at their front door, thinking that he could at least get elderly Tim to sign the papers simply by talking to him, and not have him spend too much time reading the document. Patsy sees Corbin and asks him why the interest in her family's property. Duke joins Patsy, and they get Corbin to leave, which he does, only to rendezvous with Vera/Mitzi since she is in on the ranch deal. Being smart, Duke catches on, and seeks her out himself, only to be shown a letter regarding the $100,000.00 offer for the O'Brien ranch. Duke and Corbin engage in a major fistfight in Corbin's office. Corbin is knocked out cold, and Duke leaves on horseback headed for the O'Brien ranch to prevent its sale. Vera/Mitzi follows Duke all the way back to the O'Brien ranch with ulterior motives on her mind: to procure the sale of the ranch. She heads over to the ranch, opens the front door, and makes a beeline for him in the living room, draping her arms around his shoulders. But Duke rebuffs her, and Vera/Mitzi tells Patsy that she and Duke are married and have children. Just as Duke told her on the porch of the Grand Hotel in the center of town, Vera/Mitzi is acting in the comedy of life, and pulls it off too well, well enough for Duke to be angry with her. Patsy is horrified at hearing this news and demands to know the truth about Duke's marital status, for she loves him very much, hoping to eventually marry him. Duke denies being married to Vera/Mitzi, is asked to leave the house, and heads out the front door, beckoning to Danny to follow him. Soon Duke is hot on the trail of Corbin's henchmen, getting involved in a few more brawling fistfights, rescuing a man tied to a tree, and wraps up the final chapter of the film in high speed pursuit, preventing Tim O'Brien from selling the ranch to Corbin.

“Phantom of the Ranch” is divided into five parts, or acts, as a theatre performance might be, from the very beginning of the film; there is no separation of Tom Tyler as actor playing an actor between his final stage performance which unexpectedly ended his acting career, and the plot of the film. What seems unusual is the fact that the opening scenes are identical to the last scene in the movie with one exception: instead of being shot, and his lover committing suicide, Tom as Duke Carlton ends up living happily ever after with Patsy O'Brien. Duke's acting at real life in “Phantom of the Range” is pulled off so well, he could have well been a real-life Hamlet in the making, a hero borne out of a tragic figure, someone who was playing a fool acting in the comedy of life. Duane Thompson is Tom's love interest, and the couple previously teamed up in FBO's “The Desert Pirate” (1927). What “Phantom of the Range” explores are one of the many unlimited possibilities of what roles one plays when meeting with a favorite actor. This theme was to be recycled in Tom's silent film “Terror Mountain” (1928) where he played himself, although in a different setting, the snowy mountains of California.

Since he portrays a small-town theatre actor in “Phantom of the Range”, someone who dreamed of making it big, Tom Tyler comes across as the type of actor who could just as well have shared the stage with big names from earlier centuries, such as David Garrick (18^th century) or William Grattan Tyrone Power (early 19^th century). Tom was not RADA trained although his acting could certainly pass for it. When he was in his teens, Tom's desire was to be a dramatic actor like Hobart Bosworth or Eddie Polo, according to the article “The Sucker Who Succeeded”, by Dorothy Calhoun, in the July 1928 issue of Motion Picture Classics magazine. Oddly enough, Polo was known as “Hercules of the Screen” during his silent film years, having made a series of western film shorts, exhibiting his physically demanding stunts. If Tom Tyler's desire was to be an actor like Eddie, he sure came close to it, possibly even one better; with the advent of sound film, Polo's career ended, relegating him to bit roles where he was usually uncredited.

Tom Tyler's physical stunts are nothing short of spectacular, when he mounts Flashlight from the rear with extreme ease, the handful of fighting scenes, most notably the one where he is fully dressed in his best suit. Directed by James Dugan and written by Frank Howard Clark and Oliver Drake, “Phantom of the Range” remains an important find despite its lack of professional restoration, music accompaniment, and English intertitles. “Phantom of the Range” is just one of Tom Tyler's many silent films which holds a special legacy in Hollywood history, and is of interest to the wider hero/superhero archetype film community due to the upcoming “Shazam!” movie and the frequent reference to his portrayal of Captain Marvel in recent news stories. For these reasons, “Phantom of the Range” is a silent film that shows the depth of Tom Tyler's acting ability, and is enjoyable and entertaining at the same time.

Happy 114th Birthday Tom Tyler

Today, August 9, 2017, marks the 114th birthday of Tom Tyler. RIP, you have not been forgotten.

Collectibles: Tom Tyler on the De Beukelaer and Cloetta Drick Örn Cacao movie star cards

A De Beukelaer film star card

Two of the most popular European movie card collectors sets produced in the 1920's and 1930's were by the De Beukelaer (Belgium) and Cloetta (Sweden) companies. De Beukelaer eventually produced a total of thirteen sets of film stars, the first twelve sets containing a hundred cards each, while Cloetta manufactured a total of 330 cards in their set. Tom Tyler was lucky enough to have appeared on a card made by each company, both which are highly sought after by film star card collectors.

The De Beukelaer film star cards consisted of a real photo of the actor or actress, had blank backs and were produced in Belgium for biscuit (cookie) packages. One package of biscuits would contain a film star card which could be collected and traded. There were a hundred black and white cards in the first set in the early 1930's, with other sets being continuously produced through the late 1930's. Each film star card was small, 1 1/16 x 1 15/16” in size. According to the official De Beukelaer film star list, the Tom Tyler card is numbered 17. It should be noted that the name  De Beukelaer does not appear anywhere on the individual movie star cards themselves. De Beukelaer has been baking cookies since 1870 and is still in operation today.

The Cloetta Drick Örn Cacao movie star cards were manufactured in Sweden around 1920's or 1930s, in black and white, similar in size to the above cards at 1 1/8" x 1 15/16".  This product was a chocolate drink targeted towards children; the words Drick Örn Cacao translate to “Drink Eagle chocolate.” There were a total of 330 cards in the Cloetta film star card set, with Tom appearing on card # 84. Unlike the De Beaukelaer cards, the Cloetta cards had the company and product name labeled on the back of each movie star card. Founded in 1862, Cloetta is a confectionary and nuts company.

Luke Plummer: the real star of "Stagecoach"

Much has been made of Tom Tyler's performance as Luke Plummer in “Stagecoach” (1939) by both fans of the movie and film critics, even though this John Ford western was an A-list vehicle for John Wayne. There is a reason for it though: much of Tom's acting technique from his silent film period  proved to be a benefit to his role as Luke, even with his few spoken lines in the movie, his bare minimum of online screen time well used to capacity. It is not just acting mileage, however, but more likely due to Tom's extensive acting career during the silent film period that earned him accolades in “Stagecoach.”

“Stagecoach”, at 96 minutes long, is fast moving, due to the directorial work of John Ford. Yet the most lingering scene in the movie is near the end, from the time Tom Tyler appears as Luke Plummer in a saloon playing poker, waiting for his showdown with the Ringo Kid, until he takes to the streets, ready to take out his enemy. From the time Luke deals out the final hand begins the surreal chapter “Stagecoach”: two black aces and two black eights, neatly placed upon the poker table, the puff of cigarette smoke dissipating from around his hard, angular face, and steely gaze temporarily making contact with the camera while his girl stands behind his chair, his source of moral support, when he gets news of who is in town to see him, Ringo Kid. Luke temporarily leaves his card game, becomes nervous and anxious, sauntering over to the bar for a drink to help him relax. It is Tom Tyler's facial expressions and body language that become the star of the movie, the periodic pans of his face, revealing exactly what he is feeling during the entire time he is onscreen. Most notably, standing right at the bar and glancing at the door of the saloon every time it opens, his nerves on edge become more apparent, as he tries to drown them away in his drink. Soon the time comes when he must leave the bar which is met with

hesitancy from Doc Boone (played by Thomas Mitchell) and take to the streets to deal with Ringo Kid. Luke attempts to leave the saloon with rifle in hand when Doc Boone threatens to have Luke indicted for murder if he steps outside; Luke responds with a comment on dealing with him later after he and his two brothers Hank (Vester Pegg) and Ike (Joe Rickson) take out Ringo Kid. He gives up the rifle and exits the saloon, standing out in the middle of the street under the window from the hotel rooms above the saloon. His lady is by the window and thoughtfully tosses a rifle down to Luke who catches it and says “Thanks” although no matching audio is heard; the scene on the street, as with inside the saloon, is mean to be as silent as possible, the scene relying upon Tom's silent film acting ability alone.

Luke and his two brothers stand in the middle of the dirt street which is dimly lit by lights, shadows alive with suspense. Out of nowhere comes a cat which runs across the men's path, and gets shot at although it appears the bullet missed the cat. The Plummer brothers walk slowly, Luke's brothers a step behind him, their nerves of steel returning, when Ringo Kid finally comes within sight – and Luke takes a shot at him. Unfortunately for Luke, Ringo Kid had the advantage of being hidden in the dark, dropping flat to the ground while firing three shots, while Luke somehow makes it back to the saloon, opening the door, a rather thin grimace on his face and walks towards the camera, eventually collapsing dead in front of the bar. The long, drawn-out walk before dying became a trademark in Tom Tyler's film career, notably repeated again in “San Antonio” (1945) where is shot in a similar manner by Errol Flynn.

Tom's role as Luke Plummer is smoldering, facial expressions revealing killing machine potential despite flawed nerves. The facial stubble on Tom's chiseled face adds to his tough-guy appearance yet also adds a degree of sexual allure. Even though Luke Plummer has a lady of interest in “Stagecoach”, he does not let her keep him from doing what he must do, at one point where he pushes her away from him at the bar. The last thing he needed was to be subdued by a woman, regardless of how much he loves her. Like in “Powdersmoke Range” and “A Rider of the Plains”, the intense scenes with Tom's one-on-one encounters with forces of control and how

In "Powdersmoke Range"

he deals with it, eventually taking matters into his own hands stand out the most. While these two films are most comparable to “Stagecoach” in terms of acting performance, it is worth noting that two of Tom Tyler's later silent films made in 1930 - “Canyon of Missing Men” and “Call of the Desert” also display similar characteristics of intense scenes on Tom's part, and even though he was not the leading man in “Stagecoach”, his scenes as Luke Plummer do indeed bear the hallmark of leading man acting. The main question here is this: would Tom Tyler have been just as suited at playing Ringo Kid, with John Wayne in the reversed role as Luke Plummer? Had “Stagecoach” been a silent film made ten years earlier, the answer is probably yes. The main reason for this is, of all the main credited actors in the cast of “Stagecoach”, Tom Tyler was the only one who had an extensive background as a leading man during the silent film years. Following is a brief breakdown of the acting careers of the other cast members of “Stagecoach” up until the time it was made (with thanks to IMDB):

In "A Rider of the Plains"

John Wayne was four years younger than Tom Tyler and played mostly “extra” roles in silent films for four years from 1926 to 1930.

Claire Trevor missed the silent film years by being born in 1910.

Andy Devine often had bit roles as character actors from 1926 to 1929.

John Carradine started making films during the talkie period at 1930, again, starting out with bit roles.

Thomas Mitchell made one film in 1923, as a character actor in a minor role, and did not resume his film career until 1936, devoting those in-between years to the theatre.

Louise Platt, born in 1915, made her first film well after talkies became the norm, in 1938.

George Bancroft was a supporting role actor, whose silent film career dated back to 1921.

Donald Meek was a Shakespearean stage actor, making only two silent films, one in 1923, the other, in 1929.

Berton Churchill, another theatre actor, made only four silent films in supporting roles between 1919 and 1929.

Tim Holt, the son of silent film leading man Jack Holt, made one silent film as a child actor in 1928.

As compelling as Tom's performance as Luke Plummer is, a comparable one would be that of Agnes Moorehead as the old lady living in a farmhouse all by herself in the Twilight Zone episode, “The Invaders.” Unlike Tom who has a few spoken lines in “Stagecoach”, Agnes' role is completely silent without any dialogue, relying upon body language and periodic sounds of pain and anguish when she is attacked by the six-inch tall aliens, turning in one of the best performances of the critically acclaimed television series. Even though Agnes was born in 1900, she got her start in acting on the radio using her voice, eventually making her first movie in 1941, “Citizen Kane.” It goes without saying that being able to act using facial expression and body language alone to convey meaning and give depth to a role requires considerable talent, in Tom's case, right up until the moment he is shot, resulting in a dramatic death scene in the saloon.

In 1995, “Stagecoach” was included in the National Film Registry at the Library of Congress for its cultural and historical significance. To fans of the movie, genre, and Tom Tyler, “Stagecoach” is memorable for its glimpse of life in the Old West, and the ease of immersion of interest in the film itself. As a western, it is considered the best, and a springboard for those who wish to become more familiar with Tom Tyler's film career in westerns.

Tom Tyler: Not the “ideal” Tarzan

One role that Tom Tyler was considered for his career, but did not quite make it, was as Tarzan. A number of actors have portrayed the Edgar Rice Burroughs character created back in 1912 onscreen (Tarzan made his debut in the pulp magazine, All-Story Magazine), which include Elmo Lincoln,  Herman Brix, and Johnny Weissmuller. One MGM film director by the name of W. S. Van Dyke thought about including Tom in the roster of stars who portrayed the famous jungle man, but changed his mind in favor of another popular actor at the time.

According to “The Tom Tyler Story” by Mike Chapman, Van Dyke was looking for the right actor to play Tarzan in the upcoming 1932 film “Tarzan the Ape Man”. Tom Tyler apparently tested for the role and was declined, due to his “not being muscular enough for the role” (p. 83). Van Dyke wanted Brix as Tarzan but apparently the actor was recovering from an on-set injury while filming “Touchdown!”(1931). Olympic swimming champion Johnny Weissmuller was selected instead, and made “Tarzan the Ape Man” a smash hit that year for MGM. Due to the film's popularity, Weissmuller appeared as Tarzan eleven more times on the silver screen.

Perhaps it is because both Brix and Weissmuller look similar facially, and have the sandy hair in addition to the tall, athletic physiques (both Brix and Weissmuller were 6'3”) that make them look suitable as Tarzan. To be fair, it might be worth comparing the role of Tarzan as a Tom Tyler possibility to that of the lead male star in Murnau's “Tabu” (1931). As with “Tabu”, Tom was also passed up in favor of Murnau's desire to go the purist route, employing Tahiti-born actors for this film. The main question is this: If Tom Tyler was originally selected to play a South Pacific Islander – and he was – but not Tarzan, then why?

In "Valley of the Sun"

On the surface, the reason of “not being muscular enough for the role” does not sound logical, at least by Hollywood standards, considering the fact Tom Tyler won the American Amateur Heavyweight Weightlifting Championship in 1928. That was only a few years before casting for “Tarzan the Ape Man” began. In photographs of Tom from that time period, he may have looked like an ideal Tarzan, but on film, it is possible that he did not look like an ape man of the jungle. That is not to say Brix, Weismuller, plus the other Tarzan actors looked like ape men; if anything, these two particular Tarzan actors of that time period were tall, muscular, attractive men. Tom Tyler probably could have pulled off the lead male role in “Tabu” had he been hired by Murnau at the time – he did after all make a great Native American in “Wagon Tracks West” (1943) and “Valley of the Sun” (1942). Had Tom been in “Tabu” he most likely would have had to wear a loincloth. So again – why not Tarzan?

In "Wagon Tracks West"

It is entirely possible that Tom, in looking at his film appearances between 1931 and 1932, which include three film serials (one which happened to be “Jungle Mystery” (1932)), plus twelve feature-length films, looked too “metrosexual” for a role like Tarzan. Granted, that term did not exist back then,   even though early marketing key words to describe Tom included “Adonis” - not just physically but facially. Unfortunately Tom Tyler never had the opportunity to portray the Grecian Adonis onscreen – or any other young male Greek figure from mythology even though he would have been the perfect choice, given the opportunity. So instead of Tarzan for Tom Tyler, a couple of Native American roles  are the next best thing we have on film to appreciate him by.

Spanish titles of Tom Tyler films

The Avenging Rider

While the Hollywood name Tom Tyler became internationally popular during his silent film career, he seems to have held a special position in Spain. It may be that his onscreen characters personified the ideal man in Spanish culture, beating up the bad guys, tenderness when interacting with the ladies, and upright values. As a result of this, Tom became a pop culture idol, his movies not only being routinely adapted into the Biblioteca Films booklets published by El Gato Negro in Barcelona, as well as the Los Films del Far-West published by Las Grandes Obras Modernas, also located in Barcelona. Tom Tyler was also one of the lucky Hollywood stars to have a fan fiction series of twenty-one booklets aptly titled “Aventuras de Tom Tyler El Rey de los Cow-Boys.” It is worth mentioning that a 35mm print of Tom's silent film “Phantom of the Range” (1928) is held at Instituto Valenciano de Cinematografia in Valencia, Spain.

Obviously, Tom's films released in Spain also had Spanish titles. Below is a partial list of his movies, the English title, and the Spanish title:

Silent films:

Let's Go Gallagher (1925) - Vamos, Gálager

The Wyoming Wildcat (1925) - El Gato-montés de Wyoming

The Cowboy Musketeer (1925) - El Cow-boy Mosquetero

Born to Battle (1926) - Nacido para el Combate

Wild to Go (1926) - Dispuesto a Todo

The Masquerade Bandit (1926) - El Bandido de Carnaval

The Cowboy Cop (1926) - El Vaquero Policía

Lightning Lariats (1927) - El Valiente de la Pradera/Lazos Como Rayo

The Sonora Kid (1927) - El Chico de Sonora

The Cherokee Kid (1927) - Veloz Como el Rayo

The Desert Pirate (1927) - El Pirata del Desierto

Phantom of the Range (1928) - El Fantasma del Rancho

The Texas Tornado (1928) - El Huracán de Texas

The Avenging Rider (1928) - El Culpable

Tyrant of Red Gulch (1928) - El Valle del Misterio

Trail of Horse Thieves (1929) - Los Cuatreros

Gun Law (1929) - La Ley del Revólver

Note: “Lightning Lariats” has two different titles: one from the Biblioteca Films booklet, the second one from Cine Mundial, April 1927.

Talkies:

The Man from Death Valley (1931) - El Honrado Salteador

Two Fisted Justice (1931) - Al Que a Hierro Mata

Galloping Thru (1931) - Deluda de Sangre

Meet Beans the Dog

Those who are familiar with Tom Tyler's early silent film work for FBO are no strangers to the main members of the cast: Tom himself, his co-star Frankie Darro, Tom's horse Flashlight, and Beans the dog. Beans was often cast as belonging to Frankie, for what can be more natural in a wholesome western than a red-blooded American boy and his pet dog? It certainly seemed ideal casting by the FBO producers at the time, and it was a combination that worked well, drawing consistent audiences every week as soon as a new Tom Tyler film was released to the cinemas across the nation.

Buy a pup and your money will buy
Love unflinching that cannot li

- Rudyard Kipling

from Motion Picture News, March 11, 1927

Beans is described as being a “dog of doubtful breed but uncommon intelligence” and a “marvelously sagacious dog” in a film review of “The Cowboy Musketeer” in Motion Picture News, December 26, 1925, his earliest mention by name in a Tom Tyler silent film. Prior to “The Cowboy Musketeer”, Beans was simply referred to as “...a dog, a little tad, a pretty girl” in The Richmond Item, Richmond, IN, April 24, 1926 for the movie “Let's Go Gallagher”, and is referred to as part of a threesome “...a child, a dog and a horse” for a film review of “The Wyoming Wildcat” in Motion Picture Magazine, February 1926.

from Motion Picture News, Nov. 28, 1925

Beans was an extraordinary dog actor, for he had what it took to keep up with Tom and Frankie during the many exciting on-film chases and fight scenes, often cheering on his heros from the sidelines in the latter. Beans also had the opportunities on film that other dog actors have not. For example, how lucky could Beans have been to patiently sit and listen while Tom reads the story of King Arthur to him in “The Sonora Kid”? Or watch the hero beat up three men at once, as in “The Texas Tornado”? Beans was one winning dog actor, definitely on a par with Frankie Darro as a boy actor. But his film career did not end with Tom Tyler and Frankie Darro. After his contract with FBO, Beans continued to appear in movies. He appeared with Eddie Dowling “The Rainbow Man” (1928) and with Lew Ayres in “Heaven on Earth” (1931). In all regards it sounds like Beans had a notable career as a silent film animal actor, memorable for his many outstanding performances. One thing is for certain: Beans was as enjoyable to watch on film as Tom Tyler and Frankie Darro were.