Republic Horrors: The Serial Studio's Chillers
Date: 2014-01-30 05:00:00+00:00
Description: When fans and scholars look back on the horror films of the forties, several studios immediately come to mind. Universal, of course, normally heads the list since it was the undisputed home of horror, with a fear franchise that included the likes of "Frankenstein," "Dracula," "The Wolf Man," "The Invisible Man," and "The Mummy. " But there exists another body of work in the same genre that has remained generally unavailable for TV viewing for over 50 years. The studio that made these horror films, Republic, didn't specialize in this type of fare. Its bread and butter came from serials and west

REPUBLIC HORRORS:

THE SERIAL STUDIO’S CHILLERS

Brian McFadden

Republic Horrors: The Serial Studio’s Chillers. © 2013 Brian McFadden. All rights reserved.

An early Republic Pictures Logo.

Kohner, Madison & Danforth

To my wife Pat, for her generous gift of love and the spirit of joy she brings to my life. Also to my brother Paul who has shared my love of Republic Studios since our childhood.

The author wishes to express his gratitude to the late actor Don Porter, who was kind enough to allow me to interview him many years ago. Porter, who starred in such genre films as Night Monster and She-Wolf of London, discussed the pressures that he and Evelyn Ankers, as well as others under contract at Universal, faced back in the forties. His input helped me better understand why Ms. Ankers decided to freelance and make her Republic debut in The Fatal Witness.

I would also like to mention a man who became a legend for his award-winning work in theater and films, yet was gracious enough to meet with me back in 1979 to discuss his humble beginnings as a staff songwriter at Republic. Jule (pronounced “Julie”) Styne would go on to gain tremendous fame with hit songs such as “People” from “Funny Girl,” but he always remembered his Republic days fondly.

Table of Contents

Introduction

LONDON  BLACKOUT  MURDERS

London: Behind-the-Scenes

THE LADY AND THE MONSTER

Lady: Behind-the-Scenes

THE GIRL WHO DARED

Girl: Behind-the-Scenes

THE VAMPIRE’S GHOST

Vampire: Behind-the Scenes

THE PHANTOM SPEAKS

Phantom: Behind-the-Scenes

THE FATAL WITNESS

Fatal: Behind-the-Scenes

THE WOMAN WHO CAME BACK

Woman: Behind the Scenes

THE MADONNA’S SECRET

Madonna: Behind-the-Scenes

THE CATMAN OF PARIS

Catman: Behind-the-Scenes

VALLEY OF THE ZOMBIES

Valley: Behind-the-Scenes

The Republic Horror Difference

Introduction

“How often have I said to you that when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains however improbable, must be the truth?”… Sherlock Holmes, The Sign of the Four.

The above quote is appropriate for a brief explanation of how and why this particular book came about. I decided to write Republic Horrors: The Serial Studio’s Chillers, as the result of my long and often frustrating search for a film that I had seen as a youngster. Only after the fact did I realize that the law of unintended consequences must have been in full force on my journey to find this dimly remembered piece of celluloid history. How else to explain that, when I finally located the film, it led me to an entire cache of long-neglected motion pictures that had been hiding in plain sight for decades, largely unavailable to the general public. And so, I made it my mission to try to publicize the existence of these underrated films and rally support for their re-release. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s begin at the beginning.

As a child I saw a film that contained two scenes I never forgot. The reason was quite simple: Those scenes scared the living daylights out of me! The first involved a woman at the edge of a cliff with raging waters below. The second involved the unmasking of a rather unusual killer at the conclusion. I won’t go into more detail about the movie here because the film, Grissly’s Millions, will be covered in my book Republic Pictures: The Serial Studio’s Whodunits. Suffice it to say though, that those scenes were unforgettable to me as a child and, as an adult, I kept an eye out for the film. All I had to go on was my memory of those scenes. I didn’t have a name for the movie, nor did I know who starred in it.

Many of the B-movies made by Columbia were being run and re-run on TV when I was a kid, so I checked them out, but with no luck. Films from poverty row studios like Monogram and PRC were on TV during roughly the same period, but I also eliminated them. I was able to do the same for films from RKO and Universal as well as other major studios, and at that point, I was about to give up. I had gone through just about every likely suspect among films that were still being shown on TV, were transferred to VHS or were being sold on DVD. That is where dear old Conan Doyle and his Sherlock Holmes quote about eliminating the impossible came in.

There was still one studio, however improbable, that I hadn’t checked out. It hadn’t occurred to me to look for the film in Republic’s catalog since the studio was known mostly for serials and westerns, and its feature films hadn’t been shown on television in decades.

Because Republic’s serial/western output was so popular with several generations of youngsters, those films have remained available throughout the years. This has not, unfortunately, been the case with the many other movies the studio made on a wide variety of subjects. Once I realized this, I knew where to look, and find, that film I had been searching for all those years!

Valley of the Zombies

When fans and scholars look back on the horror films of the forties, several studios immediately come to mind. Universal, of course, normally heads the list since it was the undisputed home of horror, with a fear franchise that included the likes of Frankenstein, Dracula, The Wolf Man, The Invisible Man, and The Mummy. RKO was known for the imaginative and subtle horror films of Val Lewton and Columbia had its Boris Karloff “Mad Doctor” series. All of the above films are shown on television with some frequency. But there exists another body of work in the same genre that has remained generally unavailable for home viewing for over 50 years.

The studio that made these horror films, Republic, didn’t specialize in this type of fare. Its bread and butter came from films aimed solidly at the Saturday matinee crowd. But Republic, a self-contained lot located in the San Fernando Valley, had all the ingredients necessary to compete with larger fright factories.

The films discussed in this book have fallen through the cracks as a result of both Republic’s successes and its failures. Republic’s successes were largely due to its unerring ability to accurately perceive what young audiences wanted to see and to provide it in serials and B-westerns. Its fame in these areas has far overshadowed the studio’s other excellent offerings. At the other end of the spectrum, Republic’s failures were in the financial arena due to a combination of problems, including the studio chief’s continued attempts to promote his wife as a major movie star, despite general apathy on the part of the film-going public and outrage on the part of Republic shareholders. The resulting financial problems led the studio to sell its films to television in the fifties, before other companies would even consider “consorting with the enemy.”

In 1952 Republic got a welcome cash infusion of some 200 thousand dollars by releasing more than 100 of its lesser films to TV. And, by late 1955, it was ready to make many of its better offerings available to television. The studio’s serials, which were popular on TV when I was a youngster, remained in the public eye over the years, helped by … among other things … the popularity of the Batman TV show that convinced a whole new generation that these chapter plays were worth watching for their “camp” value alone. There was, of course, also a market for the studio’s westerns, since they featured many of the biggest names in the genre including Roy Rogers, Gene Autry and John Wayne.

But the other features Republic released to TV disappeared. They had been played over and over again on TV stations around the country in the fifties, when the only other movies being syndicated to TV were those made by independents that had gone out of business, like Producers Releasing Corporation and Monogram. But soon more material became available. RKO ceased making movies and its films were released to TV. And other big studios began rethinking their opposition to television.

When the Hollywood Anti-Trust Case of 1948 forced the major studios to give up block booking and ownership of theaters, the moguls were running scared. The last thing they wanted to do was to provide material to the enemy on their other flank, the growing popularity of television. But by the late fifties, they began to realize that selling their old black-and-white movies to TV would bring in handsome revenues without really posing much of a threat to current films, which were emphasizing enhancements television couldn’t offer, like Technicolor and Cinemascope.

With the new influx of more prestigious films from larger studios, the Republic features soon fell by the wayside. The situation was complicated by the fact that, a few years later, Republic would cease production. The studio’s various assets would wind up in the hands of different buyers, and the films covered in this book would be largely ignored. By the time Universal’s “Shock Theater” packages made that studio’s horror classics available to a whole new generation of fans, Republic’s horror films (and most of its other features, for that matter) had been lost in the shuffle.

On reflection, it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that Republic managed to do such a professional job on the horror films it produced. After all, many of Republic’s famous serials contained more than a few elements of horror. Those of us who grew up with them can well remember the scary skeleton disguise in The Crimson Ghost and the fearsome Don Del Oro in Zorro’s Fighting Legion, complete with the deep voice supplied by diminutive radio actor Billy Bletcher. And the Zombie-like “Dacoits” in Drums of Fu Manchu would have been a welcome addition to The Vampire’s Ghost.

The Catman of Paris

In some ways, the story of Republic’s contributions to the horror genre reads like a movie script itself.  Many of the major players could well have been dreamed up by some crazed writer intent on creating the surreal environment for a fright film. We have the talented but autocratic movie director whose obsession with detail leads to huge cost overruns that make him a Hollywood pariah. Resentment festers as he’s forced to earn a living as an actor at studios like Republic, which he reportedly dismisses sarcastically as “Repulsive Pictures.” Then there’s the mistress of the studio chief who stars opposite the resentful director, despite the fact that she has virtually no experience. The result: The Lady and the Monster.

And consider the cowboy hero who finds himself playing the lead in a “zombie” picture (Valley of the Zombies) that has no zombies in it! While we’re at it, what about the actor who plays the handsome hero in Republic’s The Vampire’s Ghost, only to disappear completely from the screen a few years later, and then resurface under a different name playing an evil TV villain who is almost unrecognizable under heavy makeup?

And it isn’t just the cast of characters that adds unusual touches to this real-life drama of the Republic horror story. Republic’s ingenuity in keeping costs down led to some pretty incongruous situations. How else to explain why the African village of Bakunda in The Vampire’s Ghost looks so much like the Mexican village that shows up in many of Republic’s westerns?

In fact, if you’re used to the studio’s serials and westerns, you will almost certainly notice some of the identical sets and locations being used in Republic’s features. It’s the same with the long list of top Hollywood character actors who alternated between westerns, serials and regular features on the lot. And the well- known stuntmen and special effects wizards who enlivened Republic’s Saturday matinee fare brought their considerable talents to bear on the studio’s feature films as well. But there’s plenty of time to consider these matters later.

For now, just sit back, relax and enjoy, as we explore a world so very different from today’s Hollywood, with its giant movie studios run by huge conglomerates. Imagine, instead, a time when a tight-knit organization made up of  dedicated professionals who took pride in their work, could consistently turn out polished films on bare-bones budgets.

Republic’s entries in the horror genre have been largely ignored for far too long. I hope this modest contribution to spreading the word about these films will be successful, and I invite you to join me now as we explore some of the best horror movies you’ve probably never seen!

LONDON BLACKOUT MURDERS

(Released 1943)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: George Sherman; Director: George Sherman; Screenplay: Curt Siodmak; Cinematographer: Jack Marta; Editor: Charles Craft.

CAST: John Abbott, Mary McLeod, Louis Borell, Lloyd Corrigan, Carl Harbord, Anita Bolster, Lester Matthews, Billy Bevan, Lumsden Hare, Frederic Worlock, Emory Parnell, Olaf Hytten, Peter Lawford.

“You can only fight fear if you know what it is you’re afraid of ”… John Abbott to Mary McLeod.

Republic Studios couldn’t help but notice the success its neighbor Universal was having with horror films in the early forties. After the studio launched a second wave of horror with the big-budget blockbuster Son of Frankenstein, it settled into a rewarding pattern of making smaller-scale horror films that cost little to produce but almost always seemed to turn a handsome profit.  Republic decided to try its hand at attracting the same market with a film that, while far from an all-out fright fest, contained enough traditional horror elements to test the genre waters.

The studio was always quick to update standard themes by switching the action to topical settings. Before Columbia transplanted Bela Lugosi to a London wartime locale for Return of the Vampire, Republic decided the backdrop would be appropriate for the tale of a multiple murderer who lives in a house said to be haunted by Jack the Ripper! The gilm, London Blackout Murders, wrapped production just prior to Halloween of 1942, while Columbia wouldn’t begin shooting Return of the Vampire until August of 1943.

This picture merits its “horror” film designation for several reasons, not the least of which is the presence of perennial menace-in-waiting John Abbott. The actor is also a gaunt specter in another film covered in this book, the better-known The Vampire’s Ghost. The serial nature of the killings in London Blackout Murders and the unusual and gruesome instrument of murder … a hypodermic needle hidden in a pipe … are other factors that lift the movie from routine mystery to macabre semi-chiller. Meanwhile, the name Curt Siodmak on the screenplay is a clear indication that the proceedings will take on some nightmarish qualities.  After all, the man behind such Universal horror offerings as The Wolf Man, Son of Dracula and The Invisible Man Returns didn’t build his reputation on light-hearted film fare. Siodmak’s most notable horror film association with Republic would come from the studio’s adaptation of his novel, Donovan’s Brain, which Republic released under the somewhat lurid title The Lady and the Monster.

One immediately noticeable difference between The Lady and the Monster and London Blackout Murders is the considerably smaller budget allotted to the latter movie. It’s quite clear right from the opening scenes of London Blackout Murders that Republic was economizing wherever possible on this one. The film opens with stock footage of London buildings damaged by German air raids. The first live shot doesn’t come until we see a cart carrying our heroine pulling up outside a timbered shop. While the scene is imaginatively-framed, as though shot through an archway, there’s no getting around the fact that the bottom of the timbered building is constructed on a set and the Tudor-like top is a rather mediocre Matte job.

On the plus side, this is where we are introduced to our two main characters. The woman in the cart is Mary McLeod, an actress who never really had much screen success. Most of her roles at studios other than Republic were rather small, including an appearance in RKO’s The Brighton Strangler, which was also set in war-time London during the Blitz. She gives a good performance in London Blackout Murders as Mary Tillet, a young woman who has lost her parents in a bombing raid. With her home destroyed, the vulnerable girl is provided with a room above a tobacco shop owned by a former doctor now going by the name Jack Rawlings. Of course, we don’t know at this point in the film that he’s using an assumed name, nor do we know that the dear old boy is wanted for the murder of his wife, which took place years earlier.

What we do know, considering the fact that Rawlings is played by John Abbott, is that there’s something definitely dodgy about him. Not that his outward appearance gives much away. Abbott comes across as almost charming in these early scenes as opposed to the vast majority of his on-screen appearances, in which he resembles nothing so much as a walking advertisement for neurosis. (See The Vampire’s Ghost.)

Abbott’s persona was a natural for films like this one, so it’s no surprise that he also shows up in movies like The Vampire’s Ghost and Cry of the Werewolf. But the actor was also very much in demand for Hollywood mysteries of the forties. One of his better ones was the Republic offering, Secrets of Scotland Yard. And Abbott was no stranger to detective series films, appearing in The Saint in London, The Falcon in Hollywood, The Power of the Whistler, The Crime Doctor’s Warning and The Notorious Lone Wolf.

Here, Abbott runs afoul of Anita Bolster as nosy neighbor Mrs. Pringle. She shows up to drop hints about the supposed unsavory history of the house. Bolster, often credited as Anita Sharp-Bolster, bore an uncanny resemblance to Margaret “Wicked Witch” Hamilton of Wizard of Oz fame, and she appeared in many genre films including Henry Aldridge Haunts a House, The Lodger and The Picture of Dorian Gray.

Bolster does everything in her power to annoy Abbott. Amid her claims that the house and its owner have sinister connections, the viewer almost wishes Abbott would move her to the top of his list of potential poison pipe targets.

Anita Bolster’s “Wicked Witch” look.

As if to underscore Mrs. Pringle’s warnings, at this point in the proceedings, a mysterious looking character, with a cap pulled low over his face, enters the tobacco shop to talk with Rawlings. The stranger’s name is George Sandley and it becomes clear that he’s meeting with Rawlings to give him the location of a man targeted for murder. Under the low slung cap is British character actor Carl Harbord, who began his career on the stage in England. He appeared extensively in British films before coming to America and finding work in Hollywood.

Now that the shadowy Sandley has given Rawlings directions to his prey, the stage is set for the first of the film’s London blackout killings. Rawlings heads to the air raid shelter where he knows his victim will be during the blackout, gets behind him and deftly stabs him with his handy pipe-cum-hypodermic needle, disappearing as quickly as he arrived.

It should be noted that this brief sequence gives Republic a chance to bring three well-known character actors center stage … Billy Bevan, Emory Parnell and Lester Matthews. Rawlings first meets with an air raid warden, played by the talented Bevan. Australian by birth, Bevan honed his comedic skills in the old Mack Sennett one-and two-reel shorts before turning to features where he often played British Bobbies or cab drivers. He popped up frequently in horror films such as Dracula’s Daughter and The Invisible Man’s Revenge and, one year after his air raid warden role in this film, he would appear in the Columbia Bela Lugosi vehicle, The Return of the Vampire.

Once John Abbott gets past Billy Bevan and into the shelter, he locates his intended victim, industrialist Hendrick Peterson, who is busy talking with his partner Oliver Madison. Prolific character actor Emory Parnell, who portrays Peterson, was a perennial favorite among B-movie audiences. He usually played a bewildered police detective or a talkative businessman in films such as The Falcon in Hollywood, The Crime Doctor’s Courage and Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House. Unfortunately, in Blackout Murders, Parnell is called upon to fake a Scottish accent and doesn’t quite rise to the occasion. On the plus side, his part is mercifully brief.

Meanwhile, his partner is played by Lester Matthews, whose early career included leading roles in Universal Classics like Werewolf of London and The Raven. The surprise here is that Matthews, who found a brand new career when television came along, including a major role in the Republic series The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu, isn’t wearing his usual hairpiece. But he looks as suave as ever in the role of Oliver Madison.

Back at home, our heroine Mary has grown restless in her room. She goes looking for Rawlings and sees him coming back in through a window. Rawlings says he thought he’d heard something and had just gone outside to investigate. At this point, Mary explains her nerves have been on edge ever since she overheard Mrs. Pringle saying she wouldn't stay in the house for a king’s ransom. Not unreasonably, Mary wants to know why. Rawlings responds by first asking Mary if she believes in haunted houses. It’s not a very comforting reply and he then goes on to explain, rather nonchalantly, that Jack the Ripper committed one of his many murders in Mary’s room!

Not surprisingly, our heroine is shocked by the news, but Rawlings thinks he can smooth things over and soothe her nerves by calmly reassuring her that Jack “stopped his ripping” 60 years ago. When, for some strange reason this fails to work, he brings a smile to Mary’s face by trying a bit of pop psychology and telling the girl to dispel all bad thoughts and only encourage good ones!

Mary’s brief moment of calm is disturbed almost immediately, however, as a bomb goes off and Rawlings’ pipe falls to the floor, separating the bowl from the stem and revealing the hypodermic needle. Since the needle doesn’t look all that much different than the ordinary metal fitting found in most pipes, Mary doesn’t really put two and two together until she sees a co-worker at a defense plant cleaning his pipe the following day. This happens to be in the middle of a discussion about newspaper accounts of the murder the previous night.

John Abbott stands over a sleeping Mary McLeod

So now we have a girl who has just lost her parents, been bombed out of her home, has learned her temporary living space is the site of a former Ripper murder and suspects the man who lives in her building is a serial killer. If anyone ever needed a strong shoulder to cry on in the worst possible way, it’s Mary. Unfortunately, they don’t come much worse than Louis Borell, playing Dutch serviceman Peter Dongen, Mary’s fiancée. Borell, billed in some films as Louis Borel, is one of the weakest nominal leads ever to appear in a Republic movie. Born in the Netherlands, Borell had a strong accent, so the script had to make him Dutch rather than British, the nationality that would normally be called for in the film.

On the plus side, the Dongen character has little to do here other than listen to Mary’s story, which helps move the exposition of the film along. But, in addition to being a prime candidate for anthropology’s “Wimpus Erectus” award, we soon learn our hero is in the running for “Dimmest Bulb” honors too, when he tells Mary she’s imagining things and Rawlings is actually a rather nice chap!

And he isn’t the only one who is clueless. We may know who the killer is, but at this point the police are just starting their investigation. Enter Lloyd Corrigan as Inspector Harris and Lumsden Hare as Superintendent Neil. Hare had a long career in supporting roles in everything from Gunga Din to Boris Karloff’s Thriller TV series. He would, in fact, appear again with his London Blackout Murders co-star Lester Matthews just two years later in the serial Jungle Queen.

Lloyd Corrigan, meanwhile, seemed to pop up everywhere. The multi-talented Corrigan was a writer and director as well as an actor, who appeared in another George Sherman-directed Republic film the same year, The Mantrap. He was back at Republic a few years later for The Ghost Goes Wild. But Corrigan was a familiar face at other studios too. He could play everything from a bumbling assistant in Universal’s The Mystery of Marie Roget to a clever killer in MGM’s The Thin Man Goes Home.

Inspector Harris and Superintendent Neil, investigating the murder of Hendrick Peterson, now visit Oliver Madison and the other surviving partner Eugene Caldwell. Frederick Worlock, who plays Caldwell, lent his presence to other Republic films like The Fatal Witness and Scotland Yard Investigator, but is perhaps best known as a member of the Universal Sherlock Holmes stock company. It is Worlock who hypnotizes Nigel Bruce in The Woman in Green.

Here, he and Lester Mathews refuse to give Lloyd Corrigan and Lumsden Hare information about their business and why their partner might have been murdered. When pressed, the two industrialists simply hint at “national defense” issues. Corrigan stresses the serious nature of the crimes he’s investigating. He says their partner’s death was the third in a series of similar murders. The first occurred after World War I, when a woman was killed with the same poison being used by the current murderer.  The next death took place much closer to the present, just a few months before their partner was killed in the air raid shelter. The victim was a lawyer who represented Lester Mathews. Corrigan, as Inspector Harris, warns Madison and Caldwell that their lives may be in danger.

Next we see Rawlings, who has given Mary a sleeping draught, aboard a train with Eugene Caldwell. There are several people in the same compartment on this crowded war-time train, including Inspector Harris who figures the killer will make an attempt on Caldwell’s life. A brief shot of a train is the only miniature work we see in this film, and it seems to have been lifted from another Republic movie. Of more interest to alert viewers is the presence of a very young Peter Lawford in the bit part of a soldier traveling in the same compartment. Rawlings succeeds in killing Caldwell right under the nose of Inspector Harris. But when Rawlings uses the excuse that he “must have gotten on the wrong train” to beat a hasty retreat from the compartment, the inspector becomes suspicious.

Inspector Harris soon pays a visit to Rawlings. Realizing that the police are closing in, Rawlings excuses himself briefly to go upstairs and leave some money for Mary while she’s still sleeping. When he comes back down, Harris makes it clear that he suspects him of being the London blackout killer. The two have a very civilized discussion, a cat-and-mouse game where each tries to outsmart the other. Rawlings seems to gain the upper hand, at least briefly, when he draws the inspector’s attention to the morning paper, which reports that another man has confessed to being the murderer. It seems George Sandley, shot by Madison while trying to kill the industrialist, admitted to being the killer before he died. We know Sandley, faithful unto death, was just trying to divert suspicion from his boss. But Inspector Harris hasn’t been fooled and takes Rawlings’ newspaper with him so he can check it for fingerprints. The prints match those of the doctor who murdered his wife all those years ago with the same poison being used now.

Rawlings is taken into custody and offers no resistance. At his trial, he explains that he killed his wife because she was evil, not for any personal gain. While this is hardly a very strong argument, the film glosses over it and emphasizes the more noble reason for his murder of the industrialists. He explains to the court that they were guilty of treason. Since the only one of Rawlings’ intended victims to escape murder, Oliver Madison, is in the courtroom at the time, we see the fear on his face as he realizes he will soon be under arrest.

The bailiff in the court hearing, Olaf Hytten, is a familiar face to genre fans. In addition to appearing in the Universal Sherlock Holmes series, he shows up in many of the studio‘s better horror films, including The Wolf Man, The Ghost of Frankenstein, The Invisible Man’s Revenge, and She-Wolf of London. His role here is small and he appears only in the trial scenes. (Among the few production-value lapses in this film, is the cheesy nature of the “stone” walls in the basement air raid shelter used as a makeshift courtroom. They appear suspiciously similar to those used as part of the Witch Doctor’s lair in the Republic serial Jungle Girl.)

While the judge is actually sympathetic to Rawlings, he has no choice but to sentence him to death. And it is here that the film, as it draws to its conclusion, delivers some mixed signals that could be a sign of last minute tampering. We have just seen our “hero,” the usually ineffectual Peter Dongen, get quite animated when he tells Mary that Rawlings is a patriot, “the only one with real courage among us.” Yet, when Rawlings meets Dongen and Mary in the hallway as he’s being led off by a police officer, our leading man clearly rejects a chance to follow in the “courageous patriot’s” footsteps. Rawlings actually hands Dongen his poison pipe and all but begs him to carry on his work. Instead, Dongen takes the pipe apart, drops the hypodermic needle to the ground and crushes it underfoot.

The impassioned speech Dongen delivers in defense of Rawlings doesn’t make much sense if this was the originally intended ending. Why would our leading man praise Rawlings as an unsung hero for eliminating British traitors, and  moments later repudiate Rawlings and his methods? One possible explanation could be the production code at the time. Crime had to result in punishment and even the suggestion that Dongen might carry on Rawlings’ particular form of vigilante justice could have forced last minute changes.

Whatever the case, the film is successful overall. Some of the standing sets are quite impressive, such as the well-appointed home in which Inspector Harris and Superintendent Neil question Oliver Madison and Eugene Caldwell. And George Sherman and photographer Jack Marta bring a good deal of atmosphere to the picture. As mentioned earlier, the first shot of Mary arriving at her temporary home is framed by an archway, drawing the viewer’s eye away from the rather obvious matte shot that makes up the top half of the tobacco shop. Later in the film, Sherman and Marta, proving that economic necessity really was the mother of invention at Republic, use rather artistic crane shots so that we see the actors from overhead, cheating to the right so that only the lower portion of the Tobacco shop on the left can be seen, eliminating the need for a matte altogether. This kind of inventiveness was only one of the factors that enabled Republic to turn out first-rate films on modest budgets.

Marta would go on to shoot some of Republic’s best features, gaining plaudits from film noir fans for movies like Whispering Footsteps and The Port of Forty Thieves. In the early fifties, Republic chose the cinematographer to handle some of its big budget productions such as Fair Wind to Java.

Photographer Jack Marta uses faux archway to mask a poor matte painting.

The weird method of murder, the presence of the strange serial killer Jack Rawlings and the legend that Jack the Ripper haunts the home our heroine is forced to inhabit, help lend an appropriate air of menace to the proceedings here. And, all things considered, London Blackout Murders turns out to be a satisfying early genre entry for Republic.

London: Behind-the-Scenes

The unique plot of London Blackout Murders makes for an unusual film. Rarely does one find a thriller where the murderer is working for a good cause! Here we have a serial killer complete with all the usual macabre trappings that go with the territory, yet the man is actually working to eliminate Nazi agents. Director George Sherman has to walk a fine line and so do the actors. The fact that all involved acquit themselves so well is no small tribute to the Republic team.

Lester Mathews and Billy Bevan lean over a body.

This was one of actress Mary McLeod’s first films and she does a nice job. For the most part, she played small, uncredited roles throughout the rest of her career. But she got a chance to shine in 1945 in another genre favorite, the Edgar Ulmer cult classic Strange Illusion, in which she plays Lydia.

John Abbott manages to elicit sympathy despite the grim efficiency with which he kills. Abbott always evoked a sense of melancholy when performing and it fits the setting perfectly in this film.

The man playing Abbott’s operative, Carl Harbord, is able to give George Sandley the mannerisms of a deranged partner in crime, although our attitude toward him changes when we learn the truth about his mission. After appearing on the stage in England, Harbord acted in British films during the thirties. He then crossed over to this side of the pond and had small roles in many of the films that employed the British acting contingent during the forties. Harbord is perhaps best known to genre fans for his role as Inspector Hopkins in the Universal Sherlock Holmes entry Dressed to Kill.

In the fifties he made a successful transition to television. Among his last TV appearances was a role in one of the better Superman TV episodes, The Lucky Cat. The story focused on an anti-superstition club. It echoed some of the themes in Sherlock Holmes, The House of Fear, which featured the “Good Comrades Club.” In 1957 Harbord appeared with Basil Rathbone in the play Hide and Seek, which ran for only seven performances on Broadway. Unfortunately, the actor died young. Carl Harbord was only 50 years old when he passed away in 1958.

It’s refreshing to see Lloyd Corrigan get a chance to play an intelligent detective in this movie. The multi-talented Corrigan was too often used as a comic foil in films of this period, but his acting versatility was well-known within the business. He was also an excellent writer and director. He co-wrote the screenplays for Paramount’s The Mysterious Dr. Fu Manchu with Warner Oland and its follow-up, The Return of Dr. Fu Manchu. And when Oland came back to appear in his final series entry, Daughter of the Dragon, Corrigan, shown below, directed.

Corrigan went on to direct one of the best mysteries of the thirties, RKO’s Murder on a Honeymoon starring Edna May Oliver as amateur sleuth Hildegarde Withers. He also directed Universal’s Night Key with Boris Karloff and Jean Rogers, of Flash Gordon fame.

Peter Lawford, who has the bit part of a soldier on the train, would be back in the cinema’s version of the British military in another Republic picture just a few months later, The Purple V. Like London Blackout Murders, it would be produced and directed by George Sherman with a screenplay co-written by Curt Siodmak. The film would also have the lovely Mary McLeod as the leading lady.

Sherman often wore two hats on his Republic productions, as was the case here. He functioned both as director and associate producer. Sherman, who directed John Wayne in several Three Mesquiteer films, produced Wayne’s The Comancheros in 1961, and helmed Wayne’s Big Jake in 1971. That film was Sherman’s last, although he continued to work in television until the late seventies. George Sherman passed away in 1991.

As mentioned earlier, the camera work on London Blackout Murders is notable, which is hardly surprising in view of the fact that the cinematographer is Jack Marta. The talented Marta began his career at Mascot before it was merged into Republic. Marta’s photography was impressive even in fairly early films like The Riders of the Whistling Skull, one of Republic’s best Three Mesquiteer offerings. He went on to have a long and distinguished career. Marta was cinematographer on the first full-length TV movie Steven Spielberg directed, Duel, an ABC Movie of the Week which was praised for its inventive photography. Marta was nominated for an Emmy on that project and won an Emmy for Outstanding Achievement in Cinematography for an episode of the TV show, The Name of the Game.

London Blackout Murders was encouraging enough to prompt Republic to continue to pursue and broaden its efforts in the horror/mystery vein, and to try its hand at all-out horror. Just as London Blackout Murders served as a kind of trial run for Republic’s entry into the horror field, the movie would give Sherman, who had spent most of his time doing westerns, the experience he needed to tackle his next, more formidable horror project, The Lady and the Monster.

THE LADY AND THE MONSTER

(Released 1944)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: George Sherman; Director: George Sherman; Screenplay: Dane Lussier, Frederick Kohner, from “Donovan’s Brain” by Curt Siodmak; Cinematographer: John Alton; Editor: Arthur Roberts.

CAST: Vera Hruba Ralston, Richard Arlen, Erich von Stroheim, Mary Nash, Sidney Blackmer, Helen Vinson, Janet Martin, Bill Henry, Juanita Quigley, Lane Chandler, Tom London.

“If we could only find a way to understand its message … Richard Arlen

“No Patrick, please! You’ve gone too far already”…Vera Hruba Ralston

It’s clear from the moment the opening credits appear on the screen, that someone at Republic has decided this picture is special. The words, “Republic Pictures presents Vera Hruba Ralston in” are superimposed over an impressive miniature of a giant castle in the desert. Next we see the title, The Lady and the Monster, followed by the words “with Richard Arlen,” and underneath Arlen’s name, “Erich Von Stroheim.”

We know two things immediately. The fantastic miniature of the castle tells us the studio is spending more money than usual on this film. Republic normally used a simple painting or matte shot under the credits for its mystery and horror films. And we also get a big hint as to why this film is special to somebody at Republic: Giving top billing to a virtual unknown like Vera Hruba Ralston, over well-known names like Richard Arlen and Erich von Stroheim, would seem to indicate somebody at Republic was mighty fond of the young Czechoslovakian actress. As it turns out, that somebody was the man who ran Republic, Herbert J. Yates.

The impressive castle miniature

His obsession with Vera would eventually be blamed, by some, for Republic’s demise, but … at this point in the Republic saga … fans can simply be grateful that Yates was willing to spend big bucks on what he saw as a showcase for Vera. The unusually large budget gave The Lady and the Monster all the trappings of a major horror film.

The impression of expensive production values continues past the opening credits as the miniature castle gives way to a spooky scene showing a dark figure, complete with cloak, limping across the windy grounds of the castle, heading for the front door. A voiceover explains that this is Professor Franz Mueller (von Stroheim.) Here the viewer is treated to a wide expanse of indoor set convincingly dressed to look like the outside of the mansion, right down to the cactus plants dotting the “desert” landscape.

The sets are every bit as impressive as Mueller heads inside, the door opened by Mary Nash, playing the housekeeper. Nash, whose career went back to silent films, is best known to genre fans for her rather masculine performance as Miss Finch in Charlie Chan in Panama, and for her role as the Queen in Universal’s The Cobra Woman. But she had featured roles in more expensive productions as well, including her impressive portrayal of Katharine Hepburn’s mother in The Philadelphia Story.

Of course, the Arizona desert is a long way from Philly and here Nash’s main concern is that von Stroheim has made it back safely from a trip to Phoenix. Also waiting for von Stroheim: Richard Arlen, playing the professor’s assistant, Doctor Patrick Cory. He’s dressed in evening clothes and about to leave the mansion for a party at the “Arizona Palms.” Professor Mueller seems surprised that Cory has accepted the invitation. At this point Mueller’s ward and assistant Janice Farrell, played by Vera, makes a striking entrance at the top of a long staircase on the elaborate set. She plans to attend the party with Cory, and Professor Mueller doesn’t seem to like the idea.

Mueller tells them he will need their help that evening to experiment on a sick monkey he’s just brought home, that’s about to die. It seems Mueller has a theory that he can keep the brain alive after death and, despite repeated failures, he keeps trying to prove it. This, of course, will come as no great surprise to seasoned horror movie fans. We’ve known since we first set eyes on von Stroheim that he must be some kind of mad scientist working out here in the desert. The only question was exactly what kind of odd-ball theory he would have to espouse to keep the plot moving. Now we know.

Dr. Cory and Miss Farrell join Mueller in the lab, an eerie set with massive vaulted ceilings. Their height is exaggerated by the use of crane shots, looking down on the action below. The play of shadows on everything in this film … walls, floors, faces … is remarkable. The photographer is the wonderfully talented John Alton, who would gain fame as one of the guiding lights of film noir. The moody composition of his shots is a major factor in setting the atmosphere of the film. Alton was a godsend for a studio like Republic. For one thing, he worked quickly. He knew what he wanted to do the minute he got on the set. For another, he achieved excellent results with far fewer lights than most of his contemporaries, which saved a lot of time preparing for shots. He was also a master at creating the illusion of much larger surroundings by combining just a few strategically placed set decorations with inventive lighting that tricked the viewer into imagining more than was actually on the screen.

Alas, no matter how superb the camera work, it can’t make up for occasional lapses in the script. An otherwise scary animal experiment in the lab is marred by two very ill-chosen lines about a medical instrument that sounds like something used to tickle people. One is tempted to suspect that the screenwriters, knowing that both their mad scientist and their leading lady spoke with heavy accents, decided to have a little fun. In preparation for the experiment von Stroheim turns to Vera Hruba Ralston and says: “And don’t forget the giggly saw.” Vera doesn’t help matters much when she responds with a look of sheer terror and repeats: “The giggly saw?” It’s a line that would have worked much better years later, coming from Cloris Leachman or Madeline Kahn in Mel Brooks’ Young Frankenstein. A gigli saw (note the difference in spelling) is a real medical tool used by surgeons to cut bones. It’s just unfortunate that it wound up in this script, causing more than a few giggles in the audience!

While Mueller’s animal experiment ends in death for its subject, the scientist has managed to keep the monkey’s brain alive for 1½ hours past the disappearance of vital signs. This has him convinced that he’s getting closer to being able to do the same thing with humans. But, now that the experiment is over, the two humans who helped him are just happy they’ve still got enough time to make it to the dinner party. As Richard Arlen gets the car, Vera tells von Stroheim that she knows he insisted on having them take part in the experiment in an attempt to keep the couple from going out together. Again, Vera’s acting here leaves quite a bit to be desired, but this was her first major role and she reportedly had to learn her lines phonetically.

Vera finds von Stroheim repulsive.

When Patrick and Janice arrive at the party, Republic gets a chance to insert a little song and dance interlude. The “Arizona Palms” set is quite impressive, and has a large stage where Janet Martin sings a Latin tune backed by a full orchestra. Martin appeared in several Republic features, including Bells of Rosarita, the “All-Star” Roy Rogers western that featured virtually every western hero on the Republic lot. And never let it be said Republic let a good tune go to waste. The little ditty Martin warbles here, Quieremé Mucho, turned up again in the 1946 Gene Autry offering Sioux City Sue.

When Martin’s song ends, a specialty dancing act takes over, and then the bandleader strikes up a tune. This brings Janice and Patrick out on the floor and then they take a break in the lounge. Janice has just begun telling Patrick how much she resents Professor Mueller’s attempts to keep them apart, when a waiter brings a phone to Patrick and tells him the old boy is on the line. Mueller tells Cory a ranger has called to request help because a private plane has just gone down in the desert, and he hasn’t been able to get in touch with the regular local doctor. The professor says he was about to go, but found there was something wrong with the starter on his car. Mueller asks Dr. Cory to take his place. As the camera pulls back from a tight shot on von Stroheim’s face, the viewer realizes the professor is in bed. His story about car trouble was simply designed to get Patrick and Janice out of the party.

The Republic wind machines are cranking full-blast as we see Patrick’s station wagon being flagged-down by the ranger at the scene of the crash. Again, this is an indoor set representing the desert, but it’s quite well done. The ranger is played by Lane Chandler. Chandler, a leading man in silent films, later became a character actor and was a Republic regular in westerns and serials.

He rushes Arlen to the plane, telling him that one of the two men inside may still be alive. Arlen tells Chandler he’ll take the survivor to the castle, where they’ll treat the man until the regular doctor can be located. The doctor does eventually arrive, but just in time to pronounce the man dead and to ask Mueller to fill out the death certificate, while he rushes off to another emergency. Of course, everyone who has been following the movie so far, knows von Stroheim isn’t about to pass up an opportunity like this. Arlen is reluctant to help at first, but is quickly won over. Vera makes it clear she feels it’s wrong to experiment on a human. Worst of all … get ready … Arlen and von Stroheim order Vera to get … you guessed it … the giggly saw!

The operation is a success and Mueller has finally confirmed his theory. The brain is now submerged in liquid in a large jar, with wires attached to measure its activity. There’s just one little problem. Far from being some run-of-the-mill guy whose death would draw little attention, it turns out the subject of the experiment was the wealthy, powerful and apparently ruthless businessman William H. Donovan. (Why Arlen and von Stroheim are so surprised to find out the guy is famous is a bit of a mystery. Someone flying in a private plane in 1944 would be like someone flying in a private jet today. It wouldn’t take … pardon the pun … a BRAIN SURGEON to figure out this wasn’t some regular Joe making a beer run!)

So it’s no great surprise that, when Mueller and Cory arrive at the doctor’s office the next day, he complains of being deluged with calls from the press. He also informs the two that Donovan’s widow and the late millionaire’s attorney would like to speak to them. Mrs. Donovan is played by Helen Vinson, who was quite the screen siren in the early sound pre-code days. By the mid-forties, however, she was playing more matronly types.  The attorney, Eugene Fulton, turns out to be a very familiar face to most movie-goers of the time, Sidney Blackmer. The actor usually plays a shady character with ulterior motives and he doesn’t disappoint here. (He did play a police commissioner, Thatcher Colt, in 1942’s The Panther’s Claw, but that was a PRC film and poverty row was desperate for leading men in light of the war!)

The lawyer and the widow keep asking if Donovan had any last words. It turns out the mysterious financier has left nothing for his wife. But she and Fulton figure he probably stashed his money somewhere, and the two of them, who’ve been having an affair behind Donovan’s back, want to get their hands on it.

Back at the castle, Janice urges Patrick to abandon Mueller and the experiment. She explains that Mueller won’t be happy until he has her under his control. Patrick doesn’t feel they should leave abruptly and says he’ll try to break it to Mueller gently. But, back in the lab, he gets sucked deeper and deeper into the experiment as he realizes that the brain seems to be gaining strength. Patrick decides he doesn’t want to leave and miss out on making scientific history.

That night, there’s a break-in at the lab. Lawyer Fulton, hoping to get some information on Donovan’s last words, instead finds his former client’s brain floating in a jar. When the castle’s occupants hear him downstairs he makes a hasty exit and heads to the car where Mrs. Donovan is waiting for him. Most folks would be in a state of shock after finding a pickled brain in a castle laboratory, but not Fulton. He’s rather matter-of-fact as he tells Donovan’s ex-wife that her late hubby’s brain is preserved in liquid. In fact, he says this may be just the break they need to find out where the money is hidden.

Cory, meanwhile, is anything but matter-of-fact about the experiment. His enthusiasm now rivals that of Professor Mueller. In an excellent matte shot that combines the exterior of the castle with live action, we see Cory pulling up in the station wagon after a trip to town to get plasma and other supplies. Janice is waiting for him at the door, far from happy about the fact that he has totally forgotten about a date the two of them had to go horseback riding. This scene serves two purposes. It drives home the idea that Arlen’s character is becoming increasingly obsessed with the experiment, and it gives studio chief Yates an opportunity to show off his girlfriend in a spiffy English riding outfit.

Erich von Stroheim and Arlen become more and more determined to communicate with the brain despite Vera’s attempts to discourage them. Arlen actually moves a cot into the lab and begins sleeping there. One night he deliberately over-feeds the brain with plasma. This gives Donovan’s brain the power to transmit thoughts to Arlen, who finds he even has the ability to duplicate Donovan’s signature perfectly.

The following night, the brain has another message for our hero. It tells him to go to the federal prison in Los Angeles. Even though it’s the middle of the night, Cory dutifully follows instructions, walks to his car and drives off. Janice hears him leaving and follows. Cory, in a trance-like state, is on the wrong side of the road and almost collides with a truck. He crashes through a gate, the sound wakes him up and he pulls to the side of the road. Janice catches up with Cory and tries to get him to go back to the castle with her, but he says he has no choice … he must go to Los Angeles, even though he doesn’t know why.

When he arrives, Cory pays a visit to the not-so-grieving widow of the man who is communicating with him telepathically. He wants to know what connection Donovan might have had with federal prison. But Mrs. Donovan and her lawyer/lover claim not to know. When Cory leaves the house we see that a man is following him. Western and serial fans will recognize the man as actor Tom London. His craggy face was a fixture in lower-case films from most of the studios, including Republic.

Donovan’s brain sends Corey another message, telling him to go to the bank where Donovan has a secret account and withdraw 50 thousand dollars. Arlen leaves the bank and walks along Republic’s New York Street, followed, of course, by Tom London. Suddenly, he changes direction and finds himself heading to the office of shady lawyer Fulton. Once there, he tells Fulton he wants his help in getting a man who has been imprisoned for murder released. When Fulton asks who the man is, we realize Cory … who gives every sign of being in a trance-like state … doesn’t yet know. He looks puzzled until Donovan’s brain has him sign the name of the prisoner on a pad. Scrawled by Cory in Donovan’s handwriting, the name is that of Roger Collins, convicted in a widely-publicized case of killing his stepfather.

Cory has offered Fulton the money he’s withdrawn from the bank to get Collins out of prison, but the lawyer explains, even with the money, the task will be almost impossible. Arlen does a good job here. He manages to express the confusion and anger that his character feels without going overboard. And John Alton utilizes careful lighting from below to distort Arlen’s face in shadow to indicate Donovan is slowly taking full control of Cory’s mind.

As he’s leaving Fulton’s office, Cory does get the lawyer to agree to set up a meeting with Collins at the prison. As soon as he’s gone, detective Tom London, who has been in the reception area after following Arlen, speaks with Sidney Blackmer who tells him to continue tailing our leading man.

Richard Arlen under Donovan’s control.

We next see Arlen at the prison, where he meets with Bill Henry, playing falsely convicted killer Roger Collins. Sometimes billed as William Henry, the actor was the perennial juvenile lead or second lead in scores of films and is perhaps best known for his appearance in The Thin Man, as a young bespectacled detective wannabe. Here, as Collins, he finds it hard to believe that Cory really wants to help him. But Cory has to keep on trying to win Collins’ freedom, because Donovan’s brain, which now completely controls Cory, is insisting Collins is innocent and must be released.

When a worried Janice calls Cory from the castle, he yells at her and demands that she leave him alone. Janice realizes that the brain has taken over and she must do all she can to save Patrick. She’s packed her belongings in the bedroom and is waiting for Mueller and the housekeeper to go to sleep, when someone slips the key to the lab under her bedroom door. She sneaks down to the lab, past Mueller who is sleeping on a cot, and shuts off electricity to the brain. Mueller awakens, furious. But within seconds, the light that signals the brain is working comes back on. It doesn’t need electricity anymore … Donovan’s brain is now working on its own! With the help of the housekeeper, who she now realizes has provided the key, Janice flees the castle and heads to Los Angeles to try to help Cory.

While he still looks like Cory, his behavior is now totally like Donovan’s. It’s at this point in the film that Richard Arlen’s acting goes a little over-the-top, understandable since it’s a difficult role to play. As Cory/Donovan, he yells and screams at anyone who disagrees with him. This includes Fulton who tells him that winning Collins’ freedom will be impossible because the state has a star witness, a teenage girl who saw Collins outside the home of the murder victim.

Arlen gets the address of the young witness and heads over to the house where she lives with her grandmother. He doesn’t take any action against the girl because, as he talks with her, he begins to think some of her testimony may actually be helpful to Collins. Only later will he find out that this isn’t the case. By the way, the girl’s grandmother is played by Josephine Dillon, Clark Gable’s original mentor and ex-wife. She was 17 years older than Gable and was sixty when she appeared in The Lady and the Monster.

When Janice arrives at Cory’s apartment she realizes he’s in even worse shape than she thought. While she’s there, a detective named Grimes, sent by Fulton, arrives to talk with Cory. Janice is sent to a back room and Grimes explains that it will cost $100,000 to fix any re-trial. Cory isn’t happy about it and, after Grimes leaves and Janice comes back, he continues yelling at her. She goes to the room she’s taken on the same floor and calls the castle, hoping to convince von Stroheim to inject the brain with morphine in an attempt to free Patrick from its stranglehold. Janice gets the housekeeper on the phone, who tells her Mueller has locked himself in the lab and won’t talk with anyone.

But, as the housekeeper is hanging up the phone, Mueller comes out of the lab. He accuses her of trying to keep him from Janice, slaps her and calls her an “old, malicious, jealous fool.” Her eyes make it obvious that, if she ever did view von Stroheim as a “Babe Magnet,” she’s now definitely in “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned” mode. Meanwhile, back in L.A., Fulton pays a visit to Donovan’s widow and informs her all is going according to plan. Cory/Donovan will undoubtedly come up with more of the money he’s stashed away to pay Grimes, who is actually working for Fulton and will turn the money over to him. Fulton and the widow plan to take it and live happily ever after.

While toasting to their good fortune, Donovan’s widow remarks: “Strange that the man in the possession of Donovan’s brain doesn’t know the boy about to die (Collins) is Donovan’s own son.” Of course, anyone who has been reasonably awake thus far has already guessed that this is the reason Donovan is so hell-bent on getting Cory to win Collins’ release, but it never hurts to drive a point home!

The next day at his office, Fulton tells Cory that he has secured a retrial for Collins, but the teenage star witness remains a major problem. Cory storms out of the office past a secretary and a woman who is waiting in reception. The secretary is played by Maxine Whitney, wife of Republic director William Whitney who helmed some of the studio’s best serials. Bill was in the service at the time, and Maxine’s roles in several Republic films kept a paycheck coming in. The woman sitting in the lobby is none other than Janice, who wants to see Fulton. When she gets into the office, however, it’s Grimes that greets her, not Fulton. Grimes wants Janice to get Cory to write Donovan’s signature on a blank check. Otherwise, he says, he’ll report Cory to authorities for stealing the brain and other offenses. He also warns Janice that her boyfriend plans to kill somebody.

It doesn’t take long for Janice to find out just who that somebody is. When she gets downstairs, Cory is waiting for her. He tells Janice he wants her to take a ride with him. He drives to the home of the young witness. When the girl is dropped off by her school bus, Cory aims right at her, missing her at the last minute when Janice grabs the wheel and makes the station wagon swerve. The vehicle continues along a cliff road before coming to a stop. The cliff footage may well be a miniature. The Lydecker special effects department was so good that it’s hard to tell.

Cory/Donovan is furious with Janice for interfering and begins choking her. But back at the castle, the jilted housekeeper is getting her revenge by pouring morphine into the jar containing Donovan’s brain. Suddenly Cory comes to his senses. The morphine has put the brain to sleep.  Horrified by what he’s almost done to Janice, Cory asks her to drive him back to the castle.

At some point after all or most of the filming had been done, the producers apparently realized there were several story holes that hadn’t been addressed. So, as Janice and Patrick drive through the desert, in a scene that takes less than 60 seconds of screen time, poor Arlen has to explain the entire plot to Ralston. The script appears to have been written hastily and Arlen frequently pauses delivering his lines. It’s almost as if Vera Ralston represents the viewer, asking: “Will someone please tell me what the hell’s been going on in this movie?” Arlen gets things rolling:

Patrick: “You see, Fulton always knew that Collins was innocent … so did Mrs. Donovan. They didn’t want another heir because in the event they could use Donovan’s secret account.” (It appears Arlen flubbed this line because the “in the event” makes no sense. Still, it was left in, probably because it was the best of several takes and at least gives the viewer the general idea that Fulton and Mrs. Donovan didn’t want to share the money.)

Janice: “Another heir?”

Patrick: “Yes, you see Collins was Donovan’s son by a former marriage he didn’t tell anybody about. Well, Howard knew because Howard acted as Collins’ foster father.”

Janice: “And who was Howard?” (Thank goodness the scriptwriters have Janice ask this question, because most viewers are probably also wondering who the heck “Howard” is!)

Patrick: “The murdered man. He was Donovan’s secretary and he knew all about his detours to power. So it must have been Donovan who actually committed the murder.”

Janice: “But why did Donovan kill Howard?”

Patrick: “Because he wrote the life story of Donovan and Donovan didn’t want it published. Well, he made him an offer and Howard turned it down.”

Now that all the loose ends have been wrapped up, the action can resume. Janice and Patrick arrive back at the castle and make their way into the lab past a sleeping Professor Mueller. The housekeeper comes in and says she’s given the brain all the morphine in the lab. The three are discussing how to destroy the brain permanently, when Mueller awakens and pulls a gun on them.

This being a Republic picture, Arlen slugs von Stroheim and a fight ensues. After all, the studio’s famous stuntmen need a chance to strut their stuff. Unfortunately, there’s a slight mismatch here … von Stroheim’s double is a bit too tall and Arlen’s is a bit too short, but the fight, although brief, is well done.

Just as von Stroheim is about to whack Arlen over the head with a chair, the housekeeper picks up the gun and shoots her erstwhile lover. Vera, meanwhile, grabs a stool and smashes the jar containing the brain to smithereens. Just to drive home the point that this is a happy ending, narrator Frank Graham, who has been doing rather intrusive voice-overs throughout the film, wraps up with an assurance that the housekeeper’s shooting of Mueller was found to be justified and, while Patrick had to serve a brief sentence, Janice was waiting for him when he got out. The audience gets its happy ending and all is well.

Lady: Behind-the-Scenes

The Lady and the Monster has its faults. Some of the acting is inadequate and some of the lines are so bad that even Sir Laurence Olivier would have trouble making them sound believable. At the same time, the movie also has a great deal going for it. Most of the character actors are seasoned professionals from the Republic stable and elsewhere, who do an excellent job. Even the smallest roles are handled by familiar faces. Sam Flint, who plays the bank manager, appeared in scores of Republic serials and features and worked at virtually every studio in town, ranging from PRC to MGM. And Wallis Clark, a prison warden in this film, also appeared in a slew of movies, running the gamut from MGM classics like Mutiny on the Bounty and Gone with the Wind to Monogram cheapies like Murder by Invitation.

The director, George Sherman, while best known for westerns, was also responsible for some of Republic’s best mysteries, including The Mantrap, A Scream in the Dark and Mystery Broadcast. His previous work on London Blackout Murders helped prepare him for The Lady and the Monster. Perhaps Sherman wasn’t prepared, though, for word that his next film, Storm Over Lisbon, would feature the same three leads: Richard Arlen, Erich von Stroheim and Vera Ralston. Arlen and von Stroheim were fine, but Ralston was still trying to learn English. Whatever the reason, Sherman left Republic right after Storm Over Lisbon and headed for Columbia.

The Lady and the Monster benefited from having Richard Arlen as the leading man. Arlen was an extremely prolific actor with a career that dated back to the silents. If you’ve seen him in the 1929 classic Wings you know he was an excellent actor even as the sound era was about to dawn. He was a major star at Paramount in the early thirties, where he appeared in the classic Island of Lost Souls with Charles Laughton and Bela Lugosi. And, when he transitioned to smaller studios, Arlen’s professionalism allowed him to give excellent performances in an amazing number of low-to-medium budget films. He cranked out scores of successful actioners, often with Andy Devine as his co-star, for Universal. He had a separate series going at Pine-Thomas, the independent production unit that released through Paramount. But he also found the time to turn out a string of films for Republic.

Arlen briefly visited the studio in 1938 to appear in Call of the Yukon, an inexpensive oddity that had more to do with animals than people. His mid-forties Republic offerings were of better quality and The Lady and the Monster is a prime example. He starred in Republic’s That’s My Baby! with Ellen Drew, and then appeared in the aforementioned Storm Over Lisbon with von Stroheim and Ralston. The film also featured Valley of the Zombies lead Robert Livingston. Arlen was back with Livingston for The Big Bonanza, and then joined another Valley of the Zombies actor, Ian Keith, for Identity Unknown. The Republic film that would be double-billed with Vampire’s Ghost in some venues, The Phantom Speaks, provided Arlen’s next starring role. The prolific actor also made a brief cameo appearance in Republic’s The French Key, starring Evelyn Ankers and Albert Dekker.

While Arlen has a unique role in Lady … good guy early in the film, bad guy in the middle, then back to good … every movie like this one needs at least one dastardly villain and they don’t get any more villainous than Erich von Stroheim. While von Stroheim’s early story has been told and re-told … his stunning successes, his eccentricity and the excesses that eventually led major studios to cast him aside … his Republic years generally receive a lot less attention. Acting became a necessity to support himself after producing and directing were no longer an option. And it would appear that, as much as he needed the cash, von Stroheim never got over the resentment.

In The Lady and the Monster, the once-great director gives little sign of calling on any depth of acting knowledge he may have accumulated while working on the other side of the camera. Granted, he does a workmanlike job as Mueller, but the real honors go to Richard Arlen. Even if von Stroheim did think of Republic as “Repulsive Pictures,” the studio was paying his salary and this first major film to star Vera Hruba Ralston needed all the help it could get in the acting department. Technically, von Stroheim made his first appearance in a film associated with Republic in The Crime of Dr. Crespi. The movie, which also featured Dwight Frye, was made by Liberty just before that company went under. Republic picked the film up for distribution, but that’s as far as the studio’s connection went (other than the fact that director John Auer later wound up working for Republic.)

The Lady and the Monster was the first of four films Von Stroheim made in rapid succession for Republic, all of them above-average offerings from the studio. Storm Over Lisbon was a kind of Casablanca sideways, while Scotland Yard Investigator was a mystery with Sir Aubrey Smith and The Great Flamarion was an excellent film noir that demonstrated the early promise of director Anthony Mann. The movie also benefited from some fine acting on the part of Mary Beth Hughes, Dan Duryea, and … yes, Erich von Stroheim. He may have dismissed Republic at times, but he was in top form in Flamarion. His part in The Lady and the Monster, on the other hand, simply called for him to deliver a stock character, and that’s exactly what he did.

As a star vehicle for Vera Hruba Ralston, the film does more to expose her inexperience than to highlight her abilities. Vera was an ice skater, not an actress. And perhaps when Republic’s Herbert Yates brought her over from her native Czechoslovakia he thought she might be the studio’s answer to Sonja Henie. He put her in two Ice-Capades movies … one in 1941, the other in 1942 … but they failed to create much of a stir. Those were the only two films Vera had under her belt when Yates decided it was time to make her a star with The Lady and the Monster. Even if Vera didn’t have the language problem to contend with, this would be a pretty tall order. So it really should come as no surprise that the young skater was less-than-impressive in the acting department. To be fair, by all accounts she was quite a nice woman. Even John Wayne, who felt she was bad for box office business, apparently never had anything against her personally. The problem was simple: the public just never really seemed to connect with her. But Herbert Yates would continue his attempts to make her a star. In fact, in 1956 she was reunited by Republic with Sidney Blackmer from The Lady and the Monster, for Accused of Murder. Her final film was 1958’s The Man Who Died Twice. Vera passed away in 2003 at the age of 83.

Vera Ralston in a posed shot for the film.

One of the smaller parts in the film was that of Donovan’s son, the young man he’s trying to get out of prison. It went to an actor who had a name that was far from famous, but had a face that seemed to show up constantly in movies and on TV. While he appeared in many films for major studios, William (Bill) Henry was a perennial staple of B-movies for most of the thirties and forties, moving to television in the fifties. But he would also star in one of Republic’s last serials, Canadian Mounties vs. Atomic Invaders, released in 1953, when demand for chapter plays had dwindled.

Henry actually made his first appearance as a child, playing an uncredited part in 1925’s Lord Jim. But it wasn’t until the thirties, when he was a young man, that he began showing up in more substantial roles. His prominent part in The Thin Man was just one of several appearances at MGM. He later worked at many of the major and minor studios, often in featured roles. While he appeared in Gene Autry’s Stardust on the Sage earlier, Henry didn’t really get busy at Republic until the mid-forties when he made The Lady and the Monster, Call of the South Seas and Silent Partner.

Lane Chandler’s presence in any film was always reassuring. His career went back to the twenties. After being signed and dropped by Paramount, he free-lanced and eventually found himself in a series of westerns for independent producer Willis Kent in the early thirties. Here, he worked with director Armand Schaefer … yes, the same “Mandy” Schaefer who served as Production Supervisor on Mascot’s The Phantom Empire. So it’s no big secret how Chandler wound up in that film and scores of others when Schaefer later served as a producer and an assistant producer at Republic. But it takes more than connections to get roles in the huge list of films on Chandler’s resume. It takes talent and the ability to demonstrate that you can get the job done, and Lane Chandler had both.

While he had roles in plenty of features throughout his career, Chandler is probably best known to fans from the long list of serials in which he appeared. It’s as if casting directors saw this tall actor with a face that could play everything from Canadian Mounties and cops to cowboys and gangster henchmen, and immediately stamped his picture with a giant “Serials” emblem. He was a fixture in cliffhangers from Republic, Universal and others. In addition to appearing in the Flash Gordon serials, Chandler can be seen in Undersea Kingdom with future Mesquiteer Ray “Crash” Corrigan, The Black Coin, Zorro Rides Again, Tim Tyler’s Luck, The Lone Ranger, Hawk of the Wilderness, The Phantom Creeps, Manhunt of Mystery Island … the list goes on and on. Like so many actors who frequently worked at Republic, Chandler made an easy transition to television often appearing in westerns like The Gene Autry Show where the executive in charge of production was … you guessed it … Mandy Schaefer. Chandler, who was said to be well-liked by all of his colleagues in the business, kept working right up until his death in 1972 at the age of 73.

As mentioned earlier, another one of the familiar faces in a bit part in The Lady and the Monster belonged to Tom London. (You had to look closely to recognize him, especially without a cowboy hat on!) Even if you’ve seen only a handful of B-westerns from the thirties and forties, chances are good that you’ve seen London. The actor, born Leonard Clapham in Louisville, Kentucky in 1889, eventually moved to Los Angeles and began his career in silent films.  When sound came in, he found himself playing character parts in a steady stream of inexpensive programmers, often cast as a sheriff or a henchman. It’s in the latter role that viewers see him in The Lady and the Monster, working for Sidney Blackmer.

Why cast such a familiar face in such a small role? The reason is simple: money. It didn’t cost Republic anything extra to toss London into the film because the studio had him under contract. While London appeared in Republic movies before and after 1943 as a freelancer, his actual contract ran from 1943 until 1947. During that period, Republic felt the more films they could use him in the better! When TV took the place of B-westerns, London didn’t miss a beat. He’d still show up at the same old locations, like Melody Ranch to shoot the Gene Autry and Annie Oakley shows and Corriganville to appear on The Adventures of Rin Tin Tin, only now he was appearing on television rather than on the big screen. London was working right up until his death in 1963. In The Lady and the Monster, he was right at home, appearing with a who’s who of character actors, which insured that the movie would be populated with faces that were familiar to viewers.

The strong production values that made this film’s gothic desert setting so believable, added an unusual and very effective atmosphere to The Lady and the Monster. The movie has something that remakes of the story lacked: Great style. Noir cameraman John Alton may have been the major factor, but he received plenty of help. Republic’s impressive roster of technicians, from the set designers to the magicians in the Lydecker special effects department, brought their considerable talents to the project. The Lady and the Monster scored with audiences and actually outperformed similar offerings from Universal in many venues, providing Republic with all the impetus it needed to stay in the horror game.

THE GIRL WHO DARED

(Released 1944)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Rudy Abel; Director: Howard Bretherton; Screenplay: John K. Butler, from the story, “Blood on her Shoe” by Medora Field; Cinematographer: Bud Thackery; Editor: Arthur Roberts.

CAST: Lorna Gray, Peter Cookson, Grant Withers, Veda Ann Borg, John Hamilton, Vivien Oakland, Willie Best, Kirk Alyn, Roy Barcroft.

“The Ghost of Heron Point will walk on Saturday the 16th. We invite you to join us before midnight!”  …  Invitation to a Ghost Hunt.

Ghost hunting, an isolated mansion, a haunted pirate ship, a hidden cave and unexplained murders … The Girl Who Dared has it all. The plot has brother and sister Josh and Ann Carroll driving to a mystery party at the Georgia island home of Beau and Chattie Richmond. The film, unfortunately, begins on a slightly jarring note. When Josh, played by future serial Superman Kirk Alyn, notices a problem with one of the car’s cylinders, he drives into a service station. The outside day-for-night photography as the car pulls up to the station doesn’t match the pitch-black rear projection as the driver talks with the man he presumes is the mechanic. Josh is rather abusive to the guy. But Ann, played by Lorna Gray (soon to change her professional name to Adrian Booth,) tries to smooth things over. The fellow looks under the hood and tells Josh and Ann they’ll have to leave the car there for further work, but he’ll give them a lift to the party in his car.

Kirk (Superman) Alyn and Lorna (Vultura) Gray.

At this point we see the man go inside the garage and remove the coveralls he got from the owner. It turns out he’d only borrowed them to change his own tire. We now know this guy, whose name is Rufus Blair, is no mechanic and he has a reason for wanting to get to the island. Blair is played by Peter Cookson, who worked mostly for Monogram at the time. With Kirk Alyn and Lorna Gray safely ensconced in the back seat of his car, Blair gets behind the wheel and they’re off. As the trio heads for the island, called Heron Point, the impressive nighttime matte shot of the causeway more than makes up for the earlier lapse in day-for-night photography.

Once at the magnificent Richmond home, the three are greeted by Beau and Chattie. Beau is played by John Hamilton, who gets one of his better Republic assignments here. Chattie, meanwhile, played by Vivien Oakland whose career went back to the silents, has less screen time and far fewer lines in the film. Beau and Chattie greet Josh and Ann warmly even though it turns out they have no idea who sent out invitations. The idea of a “party” is news to them. But they’re good sports, so they’re just as friendly to the rest of the “guests” when they arrive.

And, since we need as many suspects as possible, it’s quite a list. In addition to Kirk Alyn and Lorna Gray (who would both appear in the Republic serial Daughter of Don Q almost two years later,) we learn Peter Cookson will eventually wind up staying as well. Among the other guests: A dapper, if slightly paunchy fellow named Homer Norton, played by Grant Withers; Sylvia Scott and Cynthia Harrison, who happen to be twins, so they can both be played by Veda Ann Borg; And Sylvia’s ex-husband David Scott, played by veteran Republic baddie Roy Barcroft, looking rather uncomfortable in a suit and tie. It seems David still has a thing for ex-wife Sylvia and he’s convinced that Josh has sent out the invitations so that he can make a play for her. While everyone else is inside, there’s a brief shot of Rufus Blair outside by the garage, apparently removing the distributor caps from cars that are parked there.

Once the guests are assembled, their host announces that he has no idea who sent the invitations, but he thinks a party is a splendid idea. Since the invitations promised a ghost hunt, John Hamilton, in his best Perry White manner, vows there will be one. It seems there’s a legend about “The Ghost of Heron Point,” the spirit of the captain of a pirate ship that ran aground a hundred years earlier. The captain favored Heron Point because it had a secret cave used to hide treasure. Once a year he supposedly returns to the site of the shipwreck, and tonight is the night!

But before setting out on the ghost safari, our host turns on the radio just in time to hear a news announcer report that Dr. Paul Dexter is being sought in connection with the theft of $100,000 worth of radium from Mercy Hospital in Atlanta. The news piques the interest of Roy Barcroft’s character, who says to Veda Ann Borg as Sylvia, “Didn’t you know a Dr. Paul Dexter when you were at Mercy Hospital?” She responds by saying she knew him, but only casually. Their conversation is interrupted by Willie Best, as the Richmond’s servant, bringing drinks. Then suddenly Ann screams, as she sees a strange man through one of the French doors that leads outside. By the time the other guests look for him, he’s gone.

The “Ghostly Pirate” of Heron Point rises from the shipwreck.

Meanwhile, as everyone is getting ready for the ghost hunt, Veda Ann Borg sneaks down to the cellar. She’s obviously looking for something, but we don’t know what. In the dark basement she’s suddenly attacked by the shadowy figure of a man, and lets out a scream. The other guests come running, but as she emerges from the cellar, with one of her shoes missing, she claims she only yelled because she thought she saw a rat. She also explains away her trip to the basement by saying she was just looking for something to use as a cloak for the ghost hunt. Roy Barcroft, meanwhile, retrieves her other shoe from the basement, but it has blood on it. Barcroft says he cut his hand during the search, which might explain the blood.

There’s no time to pursue the matter though, because the group has to leave quickly if they want to see “The Ghost of Heron Point.” The spirit of the dead pirate is said to appear at midnight, which gives them only ten minutes. Luckily, it’s just a short walk through the woods to the site of the old shipwreck, and both the indoor set used to represent the woods and the matte painting used to simulate the shipwreck are well done.

Sure enough, right on time, the ghost materializes. As the assembled group watches the figure of the pirate rising from the ship, Veda Ann Borg, standing next to Lorna Gray as Ann, sucks in a deep breath, sighs and drops to the ground. Ann cries out, “Somebody help me, Sylvia’s fainted!” But, as she crouches down to render assistance, Ann notices a knife and when she gets back up there’s blood on her hands. Now Borg, playing the other sister, yells at Roy Barcroft. Thumping on his chest she screams, “You did it, you did it. You killed my sister, David Scott. You said you would and you did, you did, you did.”

Realizing she’s overwrought, the women take her back to the house and put her to bed. While Chattie offers Veda Ann a couple of her sleeping pills, Ann takes off her shoes and places them in a closet organizer right next to the shoe we saw earlier with the blood on it. The men, meanwhile, decide to place a coat over the body and leave it where it is until the police can be contacted. It turns out that may be a problem, however, since the phone lines have been cut.

Willie Best is told to drive across the causeway and summon the police, but it turns out none of the cars will start. The viewer, of course, knows that they’ve been sabotaged by Rufus Blair.

Beau Richmond throws cold water on suggestions that Sylvia’s murder might have been related to the appearance of the ghost, when he admits to staging the show. The script has John Hamilton explain the apparition away, rather unconvincingly, by claiming that it was just the result of some wires he had rigged to raise the pirate figure at the appointed hour.

It’s decided everyone should settle down for the night and get some rest. But first, there’s the obligatory scene designed to heighten suspicion about Kirk Alyn and Roy Barcroft. Alyn sneaks into the dead woman’s room and Barcroft follows him. This is an excuse to stage a fight with Republic’s famed stuntmen, who … for once … don’t have to wear hats, because the melee takes place in the dark. The rest of the household comes running at the sound of the noise, and Alyn, as Josh, explains that he was only trying to retrieve a letter he had written to Sylvia so that the police wouldn’t misunderstand it.

Everyone gets back to bed and we see Ann tossing restlessly. As her head turns back and forth on the pillow, cameraman Bud Thackery thoughtfully superimposes the scenes that are disturbing her dreams. She remembers the bloody shoe returned to Sylvia after her adventure in the basement. But her subconscious now also remembers seeing the bloody shoe again in the closet in Cynthia’s room.

Startled awake, Ann decides to go and investigate. But when she gets down to Cynthia’s room, the bloody shoe isn’t there anymore. Cynthia remains on the bed, apparently still out like a light after taking Chattie’s sleeping pills. So, like most horror film heroines, Ann does something that no sane person would ever dream of doing. In the interest of ratcheting up the terror quotient of the movie, she decides to go out into the woods alone in the middle of the night to check on Sylvia’s body!

As she heads outside, Ann is followed by a figure that keeps darting from bush to bush and from tree to tree. When Ann gets to the site where the body is supposed to be, she removes the coat and finds only some brush and dirt under it. Meanwhile, when Ann sees the shadow of the figure that has been following her, she screams and faints.

Next we see Rufus Blair carrying Ann back into the mansion. The others have made their way downstairs after hearing the screams. Blair says he was the one who followed Ann outside and reveals that Sylvia’s body is missing. Ann, however, refuses to say what prompted her to go and check on the body in the first place. While all this is going on, John Hamilton discovers that he’s out of brandy and sends Willie Best down to the cellar to fetch some more. Unfortunately, Best finds a body before he finds the booze!

It turns out the dead man is Dr. Paul Dexter, the person the police have been looking for in connection with the radium theft. With two deaths, contacting the police becomes more urgent than ever and Blair promises he’ll fix a car at daybreak and go to notify them. By lunchtime, though, when he hasn’t returned, everyone seems inclined to agree with Homer Norton’s contention that Blair is actually the killer.

Norton and the others decide to take matters into their own hands and jerry-rig a distributor cap so they can fix one of the other cars and get off the island. It takes them until nightfall, but they succeed. While everyone goes inside to gather their things, Ann is given a gun by Beau and left to guard the car. When she sees a mysterious light in the fog-swept woods (which look a bit like Universal’s Wolf Man set,) Ann goes to investigate. It turns out the light belongs to Rufus Blair who is using a radium detector to try to find out where Dexter hid his stolen stash.

Blair tells Ann he’s already gone for the police and they are on the island. He also explains that he’s an insurance investigator and has been on the Dexter case since the theft was discovered. He was trailing Sylvia Scott as well, because Dexter … who had a crush on her … had made her a partner in the theft. Blair reasons that, if Dexter and Sylvia are now dead, there must have been a third person involved who killed them both.

The radium detector lights up over a certain section of the woods, and Blair quickly locates a trap door that leads to an old cave … perhaps the same cave mentioned in the pirate legend. Ann and Blair head down to the cave, which is the same set Republic used in so many westerns and serials. On the outside of the stage containing the cave set, Republic had built a livery stable front that could be used in its cowboy pictures, in another example of the studio’s “waste-not-want-not” philosophy.

Once in the cave, Blair and Ann find an empty tube that had contained some of the missing radium. A little further into the tunnel, they come across a woman’s body that looks like Sylvia’s. One of the shoes on the body has blood on it. But then Ann explains her theory to Blair. The dead woman in the cave isn’t Sylvia. It’s Cynthia. The twins switched clothes for the ghost hunt, but they couldn’t switch shoes because they wore different sizes. Blair realizes Sylvia wasn’t scared by a rodent in the basement … she was attacked by the killer. Knowing that her life was in danger, she somehow talked Cynthia into trading places with her for the ghost hunt.

Another figure, carrying a dead man on his shoulders, has entered the cave from a secret passage in the mansion’s cellar. He’s making his way through the tunnel even as Blair and Ann are talking. When he comes upon them he dumps the body, hides in the shadows and then gets the jump on Blair at the first opportunity.

This is another chance for the stunt boys to take over, and there’s a brief fight before the culprit takes off, running back toward the cellar, as Ann fires her gun at him. The killer manages to close and barricade the secret passage before Ann and Blair reach it and, by the time they break through, he’s gone.

Meanwhile, the group at the house has separated to look for Ann. They come back just in time to see Ann and Blair emerge from the basement. Blair explains he’s got police all over the island and … in the time honored tradition of these types of films … he wants everyone, including “Cynthia” who’s been holed-up in her room since last night, to gather in the living room. John Hamilton goes up to “Cynthia’s” room, only to find Veda Ann Borg quite dead. He calls for the others, and when they arrive, Blair reveals that the body on the bed really belongs to Sylvia and explains about the twins switching clothes the night before.

Now, Blair is ready to set a trap. Back in the living room with all the suspects gathered round, he outlines the plot up until this point. Sylvia, says Blair, got herself involved with Paul Dexter and the radium, but the two of them needed a third person who could sell the radium. It turns out the third person got greedy and decided to eliminate his partners. “The Killer’s right here in this room with us,” announces Blair. And he goes on to explain how the radium will help identify the guilty party.

It’s sort of comforting to know that the old standby, gathering all the suspects in one room as a ploy to weed out the culprit, is alive and well in this film, including the usual guilty-looking reaction shots. Kirk Alyn appears worried, Roy Barcroft’s eyes move rapidly from side to side and Grant Withers knots his brows and tries to look interested as Blair rattles on and on about the effects of radium. Blair says the killer has been exposed to the radium, and could already be sick and dying.

The idea that the culprit is in physical harm and must admit to his evil deeds to be saved in time is another oldie but goodie from the B-movie vaults. Sometimes scriptwriters use a variant of this theme, with the villain being forced to stay in a room where he has planted a time bomb. Invariably the guilty party confesses, only to find that the hero had found and dismantled the bomb earlier.

The bomb alternative would at least be easier to explain than the electronic-wave theory that’s trotted out here. According to Blair, the radium on the guilty party will cause static if the person comes close to a radio. So, he has Ann turn on the radio in the living room and calls on each of the assembled suspects to walk by. Since the radio plays loud and clear when Ann puts it on, she’s the first to pass the test. Next up is Willie Best who also passes with flying colors. Even veteran villain Roy Barcroft fails to set off any sinister static. But it’s a different story when Grant Withers gets near the radio. He causes more static than a mobile phone with a tin can for a cell tower.

Withers tries to make a break for it but the cops have him surrounded and soon he’s giving one of those confessions that would one day come at the end of every Perry Mason TV show.  “All right, All right,” he cries out. “I did it, I killed all three of them. Get me a doctor!”

Blair tells Homer he doesn’t need a doctor because he didn’t really set off the static. It turns out Ann did it with a loose ground wire, and a very frustrated Homer gets led off by the police. At the end, there’s a nice little scene with some cute banter between Ann and Blair that lets viewers know their relationship will continue to develop.

Girl: Behind-the-Scenes

The Girl Who Dared is one of Republic’s best looking features in the horror/mystery category. Director Howard Bretherton was well known for westerns, but he did quite a few regular features at Monogram, including entries in the Frankie Darrow/Mantan Moreland series. At Republic, in addition to westerns and The Girl Who Dared, he made Whispering Footsteps, starring John Hubbard as a bank teller suspected of being a serial killer known as the “Studious Strangler.”

Glimpses of the mansion in the film are used sparingly, but to impressive effect. The columned home appears foreboding in the brief thunder and lightning-enhanced shots inserted into the proceedings to add a note of menace to the film’s supposedly isolated island location.

The weakest link is the film’s denouement, mostly because of the plot device used to trick the murderer into making a run for it. Blair explains that the killer will have traces of radium on his body, which sounds reasonable enough. But then our hero goes on to say that he’ll be able to detect the guilty party by turning on the radio and having everybody in the room walk in front of it one-by-one.

He claims the radio will emit static when it responds to the radium on the culprit. Huh? Who could possibly fall for this ruse? Surely not someone smart enough to almost get away with three murders and come so close to escaping with the radium! Well, as a matter of fact, yes. Not to belabor the point, but it appears he’s suddenly become so stupid, that he seems to be amazed when he learns the static that led to his downfall was caused by the super-sophisticated, high-tech expedient of having our heroine Ann make use of a bare wire.

While some of the plot devices may be a bit hokey, the talented cast reads like an elite list taken from the Los Angeles Directory of Hollywood’s Best B-movie stars and character actors. The film provides a nice showcase for Veda Ann Borg, who seemed to pop up everywhere in the 1940s. While some genre fans may prefer her performance in Monogram’s Revenge of the Zombies, I’ll always remember her most fondly from RKO’s The Falcon in Hollywood, where she plays the good looking cabby who gives Tom Conway a hand in solving murders. In The Girl Who Dared Ms. Borg gets a chance to show her acting chops as she juggles two roles. The actress does an admirable job, but she couldn’t have had an easy time. Since it’s never clear which one of the twins was killed the first time and which one makes it through most of the rest of the movie, it must have been tough to figure out which sister’s characteristics are supposed to be on display in any given scene.

Speaking of the twins, the shots that require both sisters to appear on screen at the same time are quite well done and demonstrate Republic’s great good fortune in securing the services of cinematographer Bud Thackery. He was extremely skilled in making process shots look real. Just before the ghost in the pirate ship makes an appearance, everybody moves around to get a better view of the event. Peter Cookson, Veda Ann Borg, Vivien Oakland and John Hamilton are in the foreground, while … in the background … we have the rest of the cast, including Borg’s twin sister. Clever lighting provides shadows that help hide whatever trick was used, so we can’t tell whether the background is actually a carefully constructed rear-projection, the second Veda Ann is a double, or Thackery is using a split screen, as he has in previous shots. Whatever the case, the effect is seamless.

At the time this film was made, Virginia Pound was still using the stage-name “Lorna Gray,” which she would soon change to “Adrian Booth.” Whatever the name, this young actress … to use the parlance of the time … was “some hot dish” with “great gams.” Serial fans are quite fond of a still from Lorna’s appearance as bad-girl “Vultura” in Perils of Nyoka, showing her long legs to great advantage! Lorna was a good sport, up for playing any role that was thrown at her. While at Columbia, she even appeared in the Three Stooges short You Nazty Spy as “Mattie Herring!” She’s excellent in The Girl Who Dared and does far better than her leading man.

Peter Cookson has an annoying habit of hanging on to certain lines, as though he can’t remember what he’s supposed to say next. Apparently avoiding re-takes was more important than smoothing out delivery, so the pauses stay in. Still, he’s better here than he was over at Monogram where he played the male lead in the studio’s films about Kitty O’Day. They were designed primarily as vehicles for Jean Parker, who did well in them. But Cookson didn’t seem to rise to the occasion when working with directors like William “One Shot” Beaudine, who helmed the first movie in the series, Detective Kitty O’Day.

Both Veda Ann Borg and Lorna Gray appeared in O’Day entries and seemed to work equally well whether Beaudine or anyone else was in the director’s chair. Cookson, on the other hand, had trouble even with the rather limited duties he was expected to perform in the Monogram movies. (To be fair, I have a hard time sitting through almost any film that has Tim Ryan’s name in either the acting or writing credits, and the O’Day movies feature him in both capacities. I’ll never forgive him for making such a mess of The Mystery of the 13th Guest. This 1943 remake of Monogram’s 1932 The Thirteenth Guest was a pale imitation of the original thanks to Ryan’s contributions to the screenplay and his lame attempts at comedy. Ryan is mainly remembered today as the former husband and vaudeville/radio partner of Irene Ryan of Beverly Hillbillies fame.)

In comparison to Peter Cookson, Lorna Gray/Adrian Booth looks better than ever. She delivers “Nick and Nora” dialog with just the right amount of sass, while still convincing the viewer that she’s vulnerable enough to feel fear when the situation warrants.

Willie Best, the famous black character actor, is once again cast in the role of a terrified servant in The Girl Who Dared, the kind of stereotype that draws so much criticism today. Best’s role here is reminiscent of the one he essayed in Who Killed Aunt Maggie. Both of these Republic films are similar to a couple of Warner Brothers entries featuring Best, The Smiling Ghost and The Hidden Hand.  The actor’s association with horror films went all the way back to 1932’s The Monster Walks and continued through such big-budget offerings as Bob Hope’s The Ghost Breakers and such lower case fare as The Face of Marble.

Readers of a certain age will remember Willie Best as a regular on early television programs like My Little Margie and The Stu Erwin show. Unfortunately, though, the entertainer ran into some problems in the fifties. He was picked up in a drug bust and apparently it wasn’t his only brush with illegal substances. Singer Etta James said in her book “Rage to Survive,” written with David Ritz, that when she was on narcotics, she used to go to Willie to score high quality drugs. The actor passed away from cancer in early 1962.

John Hamilton does a fine job in this film playing the host of a party he didn’t even know he was giving. The actor, who would eventually become forever identified with his role as Perry White on the Superman television show, appears briefly in another film covered in this book, The Madonna’s Secret. Hamilton was busy at many other lots in addition to Republic, working at Universal, Columbia, Monogram and more. In fact, at Monogram he was prominently featured in Phantom Killer, the studio’s rather tepid remake of its 1933 Lionel Atwill thriller, The Sphinx.

John “Perry White” Hamilton as Beau Richmond

Vivien Oakland, who portrays John Hamilton’s wife, was a popular player in the Hal Roach comedies, working with legends like Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. She began in silents but made a nice transition to talkies, appearing opposite favorites like Edgar Kennedy and Leon Errol. In later years she had mostly small character parts in films like this one and the excellent Republic mystery A Tragedy at Midnight.

Kirk Alyn is a bit wooden in his role as Lorna Gray’s brother, making the character rather unlikable. On the other hand, that gives the viewer a chance to cheer for Roy Barcroft in their fight scene … a unique opportunity in a Republic film. Alyn always appeared to be more at home in serials. In features, it seemed, the less he had to do, the better. Roy Barcroft was at home in anything, but his bad-guy wardrobe generally ran to rather scruffy outfits, like the dirty white shirt and pants he wore as a skipper in The Vampire’s Ghost. In The Girl Who Dared, though, we get a chance to see Roy looking rather dapper.

Tom London appears early in the film as the owner of the garage where our hero pretends to be a mechanic. London, best known for his appearances in westerns like the Roy Rogers vehicle My Pal Trigger, was also in Republic serials such as Spy Smasher. But he found the time to play roles in a surprisingly large number of mysteries and dramas as well. In addition to The Girl Who Dared he appeared in the The Lady and the Monster and hundreds of other movies during his long career. Just trying to count the films he made while under contract to Republic from 1943 to 1947 boggles the mind. In 1944, the same year he appeared in The Girl Who Dared and The Lady and the Monster, he turned up in some thirty Republic features and serials. London was just as prolific when TV came along and worked right up until his death in 1963 at the age of 74.

Director Howard Bretherton had done quite a bit of work for Warner Brothers in the early thirties, but left the studio in 1935 to helm a number of Hopalong Cassidy pictures. He went on to work for several studios, but was especially busy at Republic. Bretherton was the perfect choice for a studio like Republic. He got the job done quickly and efficiently, whether working on a western or a regular feature.

Bretherton had plenty of experience to draw on when he helmed The Girl Who Dared, having directed films like The Argyle Case and Return of the Terror early in his career. Even at a studio like Monogram, he gave his all to assignments. The Frankie Darro/Mantan Moreland series, which benefited greatly from the chemistry between its two stars, got an added boost from Bretherton, who did his best to keep the camera moving. In On the Spot, an already suspenseful scene of Moreland walking down Monogram’s Western Street, is heightened by an over-the-head shot of the killer in a window taking aim at the comedian. Bretherton keeps the emphasis on suspense in The Girl Who Dared too, by avoiding any lulls between each scary, new development. Whether a scream rings out at the ghost hunt or a body turns up unexpectedly, there’s always something happening to grab the viewer’s interest.

John Butler did the screenplay for the picture and must have been thrilled to finally get a chance to write some hard-boiled dialog for Roy Barcroft and Kirk Alyn. Butler was a pulp fiction writer, but Republic had him working on nothing but westerns until The Girl Who Dared came along. Republic would soon assign Butler to two similar projects, The Vampire’s Ghost and The Phantom Speaks.

While The Girl Who Dared was based on the book Blood on her Shoe by Medora Field, whose novel Who Killed Aunt Maggie had been filmed earlier by Republic, this time around the studio decided not to go with the original book title since it virtually gave the main clue away. Also, The Girl Who Dared sounded better!

THE VAMPIRE’S GHOST

(Released 1945)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Rudy Abel; Director: Lesley Selander; Screenplay: John K. Butler and Leigh Brackett from an original story by Leigh Brackett; Cinematographers: Robert Pittack and Bud Thackery; Editor: Tony Martinelli.

CAST: John Abbott, Charles Gordon, Peggy Stewart, Grant Withers, Adele Mara, Roy Barcroft, Emmett Vogan, Frank Jaquet, Tom Steele.

“Africa, the dark land where voodoo drums beat in the night … I always come back to Africa, but even here there is no rest for me … I cannot die. I cannot rest” … John Abbott, playing a centuries-old vampire.

Why any director would resort to “jungle” sets of the “potted-palms-on-a-soundstage” variety when he’s got the entire Republic lot at his disposal, is a mystery to me. But that’s a sign of the uneven production values that show up throughout The Vampire’s Ghost, and it’s a shame because this isn’t a bad little picture. Perhaps Lesley Selander thought the opening credits superimposed over the scene of a lone “native” sending drum signals, would somehow hide the shortcomings of the set. If so, he was wrong. But the camera quickly switches to that old favorite, a map of Africa, as the narration that begins this chapter is delivered in somber tones. The picture of the map dissolves to a point-of-view shot as the unseen narrator crosses an African village street. We see his hand, adorned with an unusual ring in the form of a snake, open a door and walk in on a sleeping woman who awakens and screams in terror.

The following morning we see two natives carrying the woman’s body on a cot from her home. Father Gilchrist, the local priest, played by Grant Withers wearing a cassock and a pith helmet, arrives on the scene. Scared natives keep running up to him and asking for his blessing. This he does, telling them, “Go on your way, and have no fear.” But the priest looks a little fearful himself!

Veteran Roy Rogers/Gene Autry buffs may notice, by the way, that all of this action is taking place in a vaguely familiar location. That’s because the African village of “Bakunda” is nothing more than a minor revamp of the Mexican town set that Republic used in its westerns. These early shots in the film take place on Spanish and Cantina Streets and Hacienda Square on the backlot, and the only change has been to add a couple of palm trees and cover the tile roofs on the buildings with straw to suggest the jungle location!

Republic had Mexican streets that adjoined each other and could be dressed to look like almost anything. They were still in use long after Republic sold the lot, and turned up frequently on various television shows. The following two pictures show the intersection of Spanish and Cantina Streets in a western and in The Vampire’s Ghost. Note that the buildings are the same. The second shot is simply taken from a closer angle and shows the added straw roofs and palm trees.

Spanish and Cantina Streets in a western

Revamped as an African village

In the next scene, though, the producers don’t even bother with straw. Actor Charles Gordon, playing a fellow named Roy, who works for a rubber plantation, drives his truck into town and pulls up in front of the home of prominent businessman Tom Vance. Vance must be doing well for himself, because he obviously has enough dough to import a lovely Spanish tile roof for his home! Then again, maybe Republic simply ran out of straw to cover the tiles! In reality, the Vance house exterior is actually just another part of the Mexican village set, located in the studio’s “Hacienda Square.”

Roy is at the Vance home to see his beautiful fiancée Julie, who is Tom’s daughter. Father Gilchrist shows up and the conversation turns to a series of recent murders that the natives are attributing to a vampire. Nobody taking part in the discussion really believes in vampires, but everyone agrees that, whatever’s going on, it better end soon, because the natives are scared to death and they’re getting all riled up. (You’d think the group might give a little more credence to the vampire theory in light of the fact that Roy has just told them the victims all had two mysterious puncture marks on their necks and were all partially drained of blood. But heck, these movies all start off with the leading players blaming “superstitious natives” for abnormal goings-on.)

Roy figures he can get the latest on any rumors by visiting a local dive opened by Webb Fallon. Even though Fallon is a relative newcomer to the village, Roy figures he probably hears plenty of scuttlebutt from patrons of his booze-cum-gambling establishment. The camera cuts to a shot of Republic’s lovely all-purpose starlet, Adele Mara, doing an exotic dance in Fallon’s joint. Her bare-midriff costume and sexy moves are delighting the sailor clientele.

One not-so-delighted sailor is Republic reliable Roy Barcroft. He plays a boat owner who likes to gamble, and at the moment he’s losing big-time to John Abbott as Fallon. Abbott’s bulging eyes and menacing demeanor almost always mark him as the bad guy but … as if we needed help … we get a close-up of his hand with the incriminating snake ring on his finger.

As hero Charles Gordon begins a conversation with Abbott, Barcroft leaves. But he quickly returns with his men and a fight ensues. This is no surprise to fans of Republic serials, since one of the guys Barcroft brings back with him is veteran serial stuntman Tom Steele. The fight is shorter than most Republic brawls, but long enough for Gordon to get whacked on the head by a blackjack-wielding thug.

Fallon brings our injured hero to his private residence in the saloon and tends to his wound. As Roy is washing up, he notices the mirror above the basin has been removed and asks Fallon about it. Fallon explains that mirrors reflect the strong African sun and he has to be careful because he has bad eyes. Roy accepts this without question, and doesn’t seem all that concerned a few seconds later as Fallon goes ballistic when Roy tries to pick up what he thinks is a cigarette box. Roy notices that the box has Fallon’s name on it and the year 1588, but the saloon keeper explains that it belonged to one of his ancestors.

At this point the viewer can be forgiven for beginning to wonder just how bright our hero really is. After all, here we have Roy investigating a series of murders in which the victims have been drained of their blood, sparking rumors of vampires. Since vampires are blood-drinking killers who’ve been alive for hundreds of years and who avoid mirrors like the plague because they don’t reflect their images, you’d think the 1588 reference to Fallon and his avoidance of mirrors would at least spark some vague sense of foreboding.

Ah, but not our hero. Instead, he invites Fallon over to his future father-in-law’s for dinner! Fallon obviously takes a liking to Julie, calling Roy’s fiancée the loveliest girl in all of Africa! Next, the discussion turns to the most superstitious village in their part of Africa. It’s not far from Bakunda and is the main location of a witchcraft cult. The men decide it would be a good idea to make a trip to the village to see if they can pin down the vampire rumors.

As the get-together is breaking up, a servant in the Vance household named Simon Peter brings coffee to Fallon. He glances at the mirror behind Fallon and sees that only the guest’s suit is reflected there … no head, no hands … even though he’s “holding” a coffee cup and saucer! This is an excellent effect, probably by Republic’s Bud Thackery working with the Lydeckers, and quite similar to the work Universal’s legendary John Fulton did on many of that studio’s films like The Invisible Man, The Invisible Woman, and other entries.

The next day Roy, Fallen, Simon Peter and other native bearers begin a journey to the sinister village, and the viewer is actually treated to a few, brief outdoor shots. But when it comes time for actual dialog to take place, the actors are back on an indoor set. Hacking at a fake vine, Roy sets off a gun rigged by members of the witchcraft tribe that shoots a bullet right through Fallon, hitting one of the native bearers. Ever-gullible Roy accepts Fallon’s claim that the bullet missed him, but Simon Peter knows better.

That night, when the team sets up camp on the same stage set that we saw underneath the opening credits (alert viewers will notice the same potted palms and painted sky backdrop,) Simon Peter sneaks into Fallon’s tent to confirm his suspicions. He finds the bullet hole in Fallon’s shirt. Simon Peter and his friend … the one who was shot earlier in the day by the bullet that went through Fallon … decide they’ve got to kill the vampire. But the only thing that will do the trick is a spear with an arrow dipped in melted silver. As luck would have it, they just happen to have some silver to melt and they set about making the magic spear.

Later that night, the witchcraft tribe attacks the camp. Simon Peter gets shot and wounded as he, Roy, and Fallon fight them off, but he musters enough strength to pick up his special spear and hurl it at Fallon after the attackers flee. Roy manages to drag Fallon into a tent to tend to his wound, but when he pulls the spear out, he’s amazed to see there isn’t any damage. Fallon quickly explains:

“There’s no blood on it, Roy … you’re seeing a creature that doesn’t exist. You’re looking at a legend. The natives knew, as soon as they saw the first body of the first victim. They knew what creature it is that must have human blood to live.”

With that, Fallon puts Roy under a spell. He gives him the box that Roy thought was for cigarettes, and explains it actually contains earth from his grave. He tells Roy that, in order to be revived fully, he must be carried to the top of a nearby mountain and his head must be placed on the box while the moon rises. This entirely new legend in movie vampire lore would appear to serve no purpose other than to pad the film. This little diversion wouldn’t be so bad if the “top of the mountain” didn’t look like exactly what it is: some fake rocks and brush in front of a poorly painted mountain backdrop.

When he arrives back in Bakunda, Roy is acting strangely. Julie offers to care for him at her father’s house and Fallon volunteers to help. He knows this is the perfect way to keep an eye on the patient and worm his way into Julie’s confidence. This attention to Julie doesn’t go unnoticed by saloon dancing girl Adele Mara, who has been carrying a torch for John Abbott’s Fallon. Roy Barcroft, still sore from losing to Fallon, notices Adele’s jealousy and suggests that perhaps the two should get together and teach him a lesson.

Barcroft and Mara arrange to cheat Fallon at cards. (How the all-seeing vampire doesn’t spot the marked ace is anybody’s guess.) This, of course, doesn’t go over too well with Fallon, so any viewer who has been paying the slightest bit of attention so far, knows Mara and Barcroft aren’t long for this world. The vampire/saloonkeeper follows Barcroft, traps him in an alley, and … in a very well done animated shadow shot … closes in for the kill.

Roy Barcroft is about to donate blood!

Adele, meanwhile, knows what’s coming. She’s nervously pacing back and forth as Fallon enters her room. He hypnotizes her to come to him, and the scene suddenly shifts to the following morning, with Fallon being questioned about the deaths of the dancer and the boat owner. The last place the two were seen was at Fallon’s dive, but he professes no knowledge of what happened to them and the authorities seem to believe him.

Ever since Roy has fallen under Fallon’s spell, he’s been trying to break it, but without success. He gets his hands on a book which explains that the cross and fire can destroy vampires, but Fallon once again bends Roy to his will. At another point, Fallon catches Roy trying to toss the box that contains his burial dirt out the window, but manages to get Roy back under his control. The extra help that Roy needs to break free finally comes in the form of encouragement from Father Gilchrist and an extended prayer session at the church.

The natives, meanwhile, who’ve been faster on the uptake than anyone else in the movie, are convinced Fallon is the vampire and they’re about to close in on him. This prompts Fallon to call for Julie to leave her bedroom and come to him. This is one time John Abbott’s Shakespearean background works against him. As he part chants, part sings, “Julie … come to me, Julie … I’m waiting,” it’s hard not to think of a college performance of Hamlet or Macbeth.

Julie, in the grand tradition of all horror heroines, answers the vampire’s call and we get a nice shot of her walking down the windy street in a trance-like state. Fallon meets her and leads her into the jungle, even as Roy arrives back at the Vance homestead, now finally free of Fallon’s control. Realizing that Julie is missing, Roy, Father Gilchrist and Julie’s father head out to find Fallon. They break into Fallon’s saloon and find it empty. Luckily, the native drums begin beating out a message that Fallon has headed deep into the jungle with Julie.

Unfortunately, it’s back to the stage-bound potted palms for most of the film’s final jungle trek to rescue Peggy Stewart. Fallon has taken our hypnotized heroine to an old village temple with a shrine to the death goddess of a native cult. He thinks this is the perfect place to initiate Julie into the world of the living dead. Actually, from a horror fan’s point of view, he’s right. The dark, sacrificial temple is full of gloom and dominated by the multi-armed statue. But, just as the vampire is about to sink his teeth into our heroine’s neck, the shadow of a cross falls upon his face. The rescue party has arrived and Roy tosses the silver-tipped spear at Fallon, hitting him in the chest. And, should there be any doubt about John Abbott’s fate, the temple is set on fire and the giant statue of the goddess falls down on top of him!

Vampire: Behind-the Scenes

Republic assembled an impressive cast of reliable actors for The Vampire’s Ghost, which helped to lend credibility to a rather fantastic story with an unusual setting for a tale of the undead. Transplanting the blood-sucking title character to Africa was quite a switch, and Shakespearean actor John Abbott made a much more melancholy vampire than Bela Lugosi.

The unusual setting was the brainchild of an unusual writer. This film provided a launching pad for famed science fiction writer Leigh Brackett to get involved in screenplays. She wrote the original story for The Vampire’s Ghost and co-authored the script with John Butler. Brackett went on to take part in such high profile screen assignments as The Big Sleep, Rio Lobo and Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back. She was a favorite of many in the industry and it’s interesting to note that the sheriff in the original John Carpenter/Debra Hill Halloween just happened to be named Leigh Brackett!

Butler, meanwhile, went back to doing mostly westerns for Republic and other studios. At Columbia, he even did a semi-horror film when he was reunited with Republic alumni John English, Mandy Schaefer and William Bradford for 1949’s Rim of the Canyon, a spooky ghost town tale complete with underground tunnel and “haunted” saloon. Butler was still doing films for Republic in the fifties and writing for Republic television programs like Frontier Doctor. The prolific writer was busy almost up until his death in 1964, doing scripts for shows like Death Valley Days and 77 Sunset Strip.

John Abbott is excellent, as usual, in this film. His low-key style gives a totally different take on the “undead.” Abbott’s Web Fallon is certainly among the most intellectual vampires to grace the screen.

One of the stranger mysteries of this movie is something I like to think of as, “The Case of the Missing Actor.” The film’s hero, if we are to believe most reference sources, had a rather short and unspectacular career. He appeared in small roles in a few films for various studios, and then spent some time at Republic where he got to play major parts in films like this one and Three’s a Crowd, which was also directed by Leslie Selander. Two more good roles in Republic movies followed, but after that he surfaced at Pine-Thomas way down in the cast of that outfit’s low-budget Johnny Weissmuller/Buster Crabbe epic Swamp Fire. His name disappears from most film lists with a final appearance in 1949’s Reign of Terror.

Charles Gordon, star of Republic’s The Vampire’s Ghost.

Ah, but most film lists are wrong! It struck me as odd that an actor should give up his career at the tender age of 35, which is what Gordon would have been in 1949. Moreover this was a time when most former B-movie actors were looking to get into TV, and many would soon enter the new medium via early television shows either produced by Republic or shot at its studio. So, unless the actor either quit the business altogether or died (and none of the sources listed a date of death,) I reasoned he must be hiding in plain sight. And, as it turned out, he was.

I looked first at the old Lone Ranger TV series, because the show was a haven for many former Republic actors. The program was shot at such a fast clip … 2-to-3 shows a week … that it required actors who could work under the kind of pressure that Republic demanded. Also, I had interviewed Clayton Moore twice when I was in the news business. I knew he was a nice guy who would have recommended former co-workers if there was a job available. Sure enough, it wasn’t long into my review of old Lone Ranger episodes before I saw a familiar face.

While Charles Gordon may have disappeared after 1949, someone calling himself Glen Charles Gordon quickly resurfaced. And, after small roles in a couple of 1951 films, he moved to TV, dropping the “Charles” and now calling himself Glen Gordon. Ring a bell? If you’re a genre fan it should. One of Republic’s best-known early television shows was unique in that the “star” was actually the villain. And though you’d be hard-pressed to recognize him underneath all the makeup, the Glen Gordon who had the title role in The Adventures of Dr. Fu Manchu was the same actor who starred in The Vampire’s Ghost under the name Charles Gordon.

Charles/Glenn Gordon as Fu Manchu.

Gordon must have been right at home with the behind-the-scenes crew on the TV show. Bud Thackery, the man behind the camera when Gordon starred in The Vampire’s Ghost, was the Director of Photography on Fu Manchu. Gordon probably had plenty of reminiscing to do with makeup supervisor Bob Mark, since Mark had also been in charge of makeup on The Vampire’s Ghost. And John McCarthy Jr., set decorator on many of the episodes, had been employed in the same capacity on The Vampire’s Ghost and scores of other Republic features and serials. After Fu Manchu, Gordon appeared in several ZIV productions such as Tombstone Territory, Harbor Patrol and Highway Patrol. In the sixties he turned up in shows like Bat Masterson, Klondike, Rawhide and Mission Impossible. His last appearances were in the mid-seventies in several episodes of the popular TV show The Waltons. Gordon passed away in 1977.

Gordon’s love interest in the film, Peggy Stewart, like most of Republic’s leading ladies, was a survivor. She worked in various small roles in a variety of films before signing with Republic, but once she came to the studio, the actress found herself doing westerns almost exclusively.

The Vampire’s Ghost was one of the few films she did for the studio that didn’t require her to ride a horse. The fact that she was so effective in this non-oater should have led to more non-western features, but once she signed her contract at Republic, the break-neck pace of westerns was destined to be her main stock-in-trade. The Republic deal meant she’d be working on the same lot with Don “Red” Barry, the actor to whom she was married from 1940 until 1944. Barry had long since been remarried when he committed suicide in 1980.

Peggy was pragmatic about her career. Once she realized she was unlikely to ever rise above westerns and serials at Republic, she moved on after making a remarkable total of over 30 films in three years. But if the actress thought freelancing would get casting directors to think about her as more than just a western heroine, she was mistaken. She found herself typecast in inexpensive westerns for independents and serials for Columbia. So Peggy came up with a plan.

Looking for a way to get movie studios to stop thinking of her as a one trick pony who could only do westerns, Peggy decided to get out of the acting side of the business altogether. She felt a brief break would be enough to erase her association with westerns. So Peggy and a partner started a casting service for NBC, giving her a three year breather from films. But she found one little problem with her plan when she went back to acting. Virtually all of the jobs were in TV, and most of the shows at the time (the late fifties) were westerns! The actress began appearing on programs like Have Gun - Will Travel, Yancy Derringer, Wyatt Earp and The Rebel.

However, Peggy’s strategy did eventually work. She was soon doing non-westerns like The Mod Squad, Ironside and Baretta, starring her old Republic stablemate Robert “Bobby” Blake. (Peggy said Blake never did like horses, although he was required to work with them in the Red Ryder pictures.) Stewart continued to act on TV right into her golden years and still found time to appear at various fan conventions, where she always received an especially warm welcome.

Veteran actor Grant Withers, who played Father Gilchrist in The Vampire’s Ghost, was well past the prime of his career when he appeared in the movie. He began acting toward the end of the silent era and did quite well in the early thirties when sound came in. The actor had found a niche in B-films and serials by the mid-thirties and was playing mostly character parts by the forties. Genre fans know him from his role as Police Captain Street in the Monogram “Mr. Wong” series with Boris Karloff. Withers had a ten year contract with Republic beginning in the mid-forties and he had a major role in another film covered in this book, The Girl Who Dared. A friend of both John Wayne and John Ford, Withers appeared in many of Wayne’s movies.

The actor was married several times, including one marriage to actress Loretta Young when she was 17, which was later annulled. Although he made many TV appearances, he reportedly had money issues and health problems. The actor committed suicide in 1959.

The Vampire’s Ghost kicked off an unusual period of non-westerns for Lesley Selander. When he wrapped up work on this picture in mid-October of 1944, he had only three weeks to begin shooting the mystery Three’s a Crowd, which again starred Charles Gordon. By early January of 1945, Selander was at the helm of his third non-oater in a row, The Fatal Witness, with Evelyn Ankers. Then, Les was back in familiar territory with two westerns … Phantom of the Plains, a Red Ryder entry that began shooting right after The Fatal Witness, and Trail of Kit Carson with Allan Lane, which got under way in early March.

With some rare time off, Selander headed up to Lone Pine to direct the only serial of his career, Columbia’s Jungle Raiders for Sam Katzman. Then he was back at Republic in September to shoot The Catman of Paris. In the film business, you took advantage of whatever jobs were offered, even if it meant working almost non-stop for long periods of time. Selander seemed to do the best job he could with whatever assignment he was handed and he added nice little touches … the camera letting us see things through the vampire’s eyes, the play of shadows as Roy Barcroft is killed … all of the little extras that make The Vampire’s Ghost one of Republic’s better horror films.

THE PHANTOM SPEAKS

(Released 1945)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Donald H. Brown; Director: John English; Screenplay: John K. Butler; Cinematographer: William Bradford; Editor: Arthur Roberts.

CAST: Richard Arlen, Stanley Ridges, Lynne Roberts, Tom Powers, Jonathan Hale, Pierre Watkin, Charlotte Wynters, Ralf Harolde.

“Murder by a dead man! Vengeance strikes from beyond the grave.” … Publicity for Republic’s The Phantom Speaks.

“Into the body of a gentle scholar is transplanted the brain of a criminal, and a new and deadly monster is born to ravage an unsuspecting world” … Publicity for Universal’s Black Friday.

This Republic film is sometimes confused with Universal’s Black Friday, and it does bear some similarities, but key aspects of the plot are different and the early part of the movie is presented much like a film noir. In fact, even before we see the credits, we watch as a typical 1940’s gangster-type walks down a corridor toward us and fires a gun into the camera. More unusual for a Republic picture, directly after the credits, John English, who gained fame for his serial work, opens with a location shot. Again, we see a typical 1940’s mobster-type walking toward us, but … this time … when he gets close to the camera, he’s straightening his tie. Only then, does the camera pull back and reveal that we’re looking at character actor Ralf Harolde from the mirror of a cigarette machine. Harolde, who began acting in silent films, was especially in demand in the forties for films like The Sea Wolf, Horror Island and Murder, My Sweet.

As Harolde turns to walk away from the cigarette machine, we see a Merry-Go-Round and realize that he’s in a park. Harolde ducks into a wooded area, looks around as if expecting someone to be there, then pulls a letter out of his pocket. It’s from a woman named Betty asking him to meet her there. Instead, though, a man comes out from behind the bushes holding a gun. Veteran character actor Tom Powers is the man with the gun. It seems Powers, playing a tough guy named Harvey Bogardus, is convinced Harolde has been having an affair with his wife, Betty. It turns out he’s the one who wrote the letter to lure Harolde to the park, and now he shoots him.

The shot immediately draws the attention of police, but Bogardus sees a man he knows, Louis Fabian, in the park with his daughter Mary. He joins Fabian and the little girl to throw off police, who are looking for a lone gunman. Bogardus then makes it clear to Fabian that the lives of both he and his daughter will be in danger if he ever says anything about the incident.

However, a montage of newspaper headlines lets the viewer know that the ploy hasn’t worked. Bogardus is tried and convicted of the murder and sentenced to death. Then, as now, death row stories sold papers, so we soon see “Daily Globe” editor Pierre Watkin, who was equally at home whether playing a senator in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington or Perry White in the Superman serials, using the intercom in his office to summon hot-shot reporter Matt Fraser, played by Richard Arlen.

Watkin, who has been reading a book called “Contact with the World Beyond,” thinks he’s found a new angle on the execution and he wants Fraser to look into it. He’s learned that the author of the book, Dr. Paul Renwick, is scheduled to meet with Bogardus that evening, an hour before his execution. And, in one of those miraculous coincidences that only happen in Hollywood scripts, it turns out Fraser is dating Renwick’s daughter, Joan! Republic leading lady Lynne Roberts plays Joan, lending her considerable talents to a rather thankless role in a film that showcases Stanley Ridges and Richard Arlen.

When Fraser arrives at the Renwick home, the door is opened by Cornelia Wilmont, who makes the housekeeper in The Lady and the Monster seem positively cheery in comparison. Charlotte Wynters played the role and was no stranger to B-movies, especially mysteries. She appeared in, among others, Ellery Queen and the Murder Ring, A Desperate Chance for Ellery Queen, and The Falcon’s Brother with real-life brothers George Sanders and Tom Conway. Here, Arlen refers to Wynters as “Pain-in-the-Face.”

Before going upstairs to interview Renwick for his boss, Fraser has some business of his own to attend to. He finds Joan and presents her with an engagement ring. There’s a passionate smooch, interrupted by old “Pain-in-the-Face,” who says Dr. Renwick will see Fraser now.

The meeting between the two is well-done. Arlen manages to strike the right chord as a man speaking with both the object of his newspaper interview and his future father-in-law. More importantly, Stanley Ridges as Dr. Renwick underplays his role perfectly, balancing the startling theories in the script with an almost matter-of-fact delivery. Renwick explains that he’s close to proving that there is an immortal force that survives beyond death and can be contacted after a person dies.

There’s a simple but effective and eerie scene where Renwick pulls the drapes, surrounding Fraser and himself in darkness, as he demonstrates the technique he’s been using to practice his theory. Renwick, in fact, is quite open with Fraser but declines to answer one question: He doesn’t want to discuss his reason for going to meet with Bogardus that night, one hour before the killer’s execution.

The scene shifts to the prison, where Bogardus is awaiting his fate. Renwick visit’s the criminal’s cell, where Bogardus has been reading his book. This is the point at which the film could lose all credibility if handled differently. Here is where the plot calls for Renwick to elaborate on his theory, and a careful analysis would allow any viewer to realize that it’s just smoke and mirrors … there’s essentially nothing there. The theory boils down to: If “coming back” is the last thing you think about in the electric chair, you will be able to “will” yourself back.

But here’s where Stanley Ridges really shines. His acting … and, again, he is underplaying here … is so disarming that the viewer is inclined to gloss over any weaknesses in the plot. The script, by pulp fiction writer John K. Butler, also helps to smooth over inconsistencies. Butler was a pro, as evidenced by his writing for other films covered in this book like The Girl Who Dared and The Vampire’s Ghost.

We know exactly where the plot is heading as Bogardus is led to the electric chair and gives a short speech:

“OK, so I killed a rat. He got what was coming to him and I know some others that’ll get the same thing. I’m not through yet … hear me … not yet.”

Renwick, Fraser and his editor are among those listening to this rant, as they await the execution. The lights dim, we see the shadow of a doctor, his stethoscope moving to the shadow of Bogardus in the electric chair, and then hear the words, “I pronounce this man dead.”

When Fraser pays his next visit to the Renwick house, he receives a chilly reception. It seems the editor of the Globe has put Fraser’s name on an article that is highly critical of Joan’s father, essentially portraying Renwick as a “Psychic Fake.” While Fraser tries to get the paper to straighten things out, Joan deals with the stress by returning her engagement ring to him. Her father, meanwhile, draws the curtains again and tries to contact Bogardus.

Back at the newspaper’s office, we have another one of those scenes that Republic loved to use to save time and money. Several threads of plot development are tied together in a nice little package that requires only a few lines of expository dialog. Joan visit’s the editor’s office and learns that her boyfriend really didn’t write the article. In fact, he was so angry about it that he quit the paper. She also makes a winning case for running an article presenting her father’s side of the psychic debate and she and the editor agree that assigning the story to Fraser would be the perfect way to get him back. All that remains to advance the plot is for Joan to tell the editor that her father is becoming obsessed with the case, having trouble both eating and sleeping.

So, when we next see Stanley Ridges in his curtain-enshrouded room, it comes as no surprise that he looks disheveled, his collar askew and his eyes hollow. But, as he sits in his chair trying to contact Bogardus, Ridges begins to hear the criminal’s voice. And, as Ridges urges the killer to concentrate with all of his will, the executed man materializes in a chair opposite Ridges via a simple fade-in shot. But things get more frightening as Tom Powers and Ridges discuss the power of their individual wills. The camera focuses on the eyes as it becomes clear Powers feels he can take over Ridges’ mind. And Ridges, at this point, doesn’t appear to be too disturbed by the idea because he feels it will prove his theories.

Stanley Ridges and Tom Powers.

Of course, he doesn’t realize that Bogardus is about to make him a murderer and the first target will be James Kennerley, the lawyer who was unable to win an acquittal for Bogardus. Renwick arrives at Kennerley’s office as the attorney is dictating legal notes into a machine. He has all the characteristics and mannerisms of Bogardus, right down to the same voice, thanks to Republic’s audio effects mixers John Stransky and Howard Wilson. Even though he doesn’t look the same, between the voice and the distinctive way he breaks a cigarette in two when he puts it out, Kennerley recognizes Bogardus, who promptly pumps three slugs into him.

A newspaper boy downstairs hears the shots and police are soon investigating. As is usually the case in this type of film, Richard Arlen is investigating with them. As a reporter myself for many years, let me assure you this is not the way it happens in real life. Police don’t want reporters in their way and they’d never give access to just one reporter and ignore all the others or they’d be leaving themselves open to bad publicity from all the other papers that they snubbed.

So it’s necessary to suspend reality here, but it’s all in a good cause. After all, Arlen helps the investigation when he tells police that the cigarette in the lawyer’s ashtray has been put out in the same unusual manner used by executed killer Bogardus. Arlen also discovers that the dictation machine was on when the murder took place. Listening to it with the police, it becomes clear that … although it seems impossible … somebody who sounds just like Bogardus killed the lawyer. And when the newspaper boy is questioned, he tells police a man bought a paper from him right after he heard the shots. He says it was his last paper and had mud on it, but the man didn’t mind. He also says he would recognize the man again.

It’s doubtful, though, that the man would recognize the paper boy. The next morning, Renwick finds the muddy newspaper in his coat, but can’t remember where he got it. He tells the housekeeper he thinks he must have walked in his sleep, because he can’t remember anything. He checks his gun and finds it’s been fired, and … after closing the door behind the housekeeper who has brought him breakfast … Renwick turns around to find Bogardus sitting in his chair. The criminal tells Renwick that he’s now able to materialize all by himself, and can take over the good doctor’s mind anytime he pleases. As it turns out, he “pleases” to do it that very evening, having Renwick murder his unfaithful wife Betty, whose testimony helped lead to his conviction.

The deed takes place in an art-deco nightclub that looks quite impressive thanks to set-decorator George Milo and art director Russell Kimball. Sometimes billed as “Russ,” the talented Kimball also worked on all of the other films covered in this book. Stanley Ridges is seated at a table on a balcony, watching Marion Martin, as Betty, as she sings. Martin is familiar from scores of films, usually playing flashy blondes with names like Fifi, Bubbles or Oomphie! Hollywood had trouble seeing past her beauty, so she was often cast as a showgirl or a tough cookie. Here she sings a rather sophisticated little ditty for the forties. It has the provocative title, “Who Took Me Home Last Night,” and was written by Jule Styne and Harold Adamson.

As she sings, we get a nice overhead shot of Renwick looking down on the main floor from his perch above and writing a letter to the chanteuse, which he has the waiter deliver. The letter, which he signs with the name Bromfield, says that he has a proposition for her and asks that she meet him at the stage door to the club.

She does, but she hands the club watchman the letter and has him wait just inside the door in case anything goes wrong. Of course, everything goes wrong, as she finds out when Renwick starts talking with the voice of Bogardus, telling Betty he’s there to get his ring back. He shoots her, pulls off the ring and flees, with the watchman firing at him.

When police and the ever-present Richard Arlen show up to investigate the case, the watchman tells them Betty called the gunman by the name of her late husband. And Arlen finds a cigarette on the ground that’s been broken just like the one at the last murder scene.

Back at home, Renwick … his head on a desk and a gun in his hand … awakens. He can hear his daughter playing an organ in another room, where Arlen, the engagement now back on, is looking at her adoringly. On the plus side, it appears leading lady Lynne Roberts really can play, with her fingers hitting believable notes. On the minus side, the tune she’s playing here sounds like the world’s worst funeral dirge. No wonder the house has such a gloomy atmosphere!

When Renwick, still trying to clear his head, joins his daughter and her boyfriend, Bogardus starts talking to him: “They can’t hear us Renwick. It’s our minds talking, yours and mine, mostly mine.” Bogardus goes on to tell Renwick that he now needs to kill the father and daughter who saw him in the park and testified against him.

Bogardus knows they’re in the park again at that very moment, and he wants Renwick to go there immediately. The thought of killing the little girl makes Renwick cry out, “No!” This startles Joan and Matt, but Renwick tries to explain it away by saying Joan’s organ playing caused his mind to wander.

The next sequence of scenes is nicely set up by John English to create suspense and, again, uses cinematic shorthand to get several points across. After Renwick leaves the room, we see him in the hallway wearing a hat and coat and smoking a cigarette. He walks resolutely to the door, putting the cigarette out in an ashtray as he goes out. Joan has sent Matt after him, and Matt notices the cigarette bent in the same way as those found at the crime scenes. Outside, a cab pulls up to the door. The driver says, “Where to?” There’s a pause, as we wait to hear Renwick say, “Lincoln Park.” Instead he says, “Police Headquarters.”

Matt calls the cab company, identifies himself as a reporter for the newspaper, and asks that they have the cab driver who just made the pickup from the house let him know where he drops Renwick. The ever-lurking housekeeper is listening-in on another phone. But before the cab makes it to police headquarters, Bogardus manages to take control of Renwick again, and he tells the cabbie: “Driver, I’ve changed my mind. Take me to the park … Lincoln Park.” This little piece of dialog is made more chilling by the fact that it’s delivered in the voice of Bogardus!

The housekeeper is once again listening-in when the cab company calls Matt to let him know that Renwick has just arrived at the park. Matt immediately heads there. Meanwhile, at the park, we see Louis Fabian and little Mary on the carousel. Director English now uses repetition as an inventive way to underscore the danger the two are in. He has Stanley Ridges follow in the footsteps of Ralf Harolde just before he was killed by Tom Powers, right up to the shot of the reflection in the cigarette machine mirror.

Renwick is watching as the man and his daughter get off the carousel and he follows them to a pond where the little girl wants to sail her boat. There’s another excellent panning shot showing the small boat floating on the calm waters as William Bradford’s camera follows the rope it’s tethered to back to shore where the child stands in the reeds, unaware of the danger she faces. Her father is on a nearby bench, trying to catch some sleep.

Matt has arrived at the park and is searching for Renwick. The housekeeper has also gotten a cab to the park and is searching for Renwick too. Matt spots a distinctive broken cigarette on the ground near the carousel and knows he’s heading in the right direction, but fails to make it in time to save Louis Fabian.

Renwick has been in the reeds with the little girl, enacting a scene that seems to have been patterned closely on the one in Frankenstein where the monster comes upon Maria throwing flowers into the pond. Here the object in the pond is the boat. When Renwick asks the child what she’s doing, she responds, “I’m sailing my boat. Would you like to help?” But then little Mary recognizes the voice of Bogardus, even though it’s coming from Renwick’s lips. Luckily, Renwick hears Matt coming, and flees. A short time later, Cornelia the housekeeper comes upon Renwick sitting on a bench. He has no memory of what’s happened and she takes him home.

Charlotte Wynters as Cornelia the housekeeper.

Like Matt, police are beginning to wonder whether Bogardus really died in the electric chair. So we next see them in a cemetery digging up his grave. As usual, Matt is there too. But this time he wasn’t invited … the cops caught him climbing the wall. District Attorney Jonathan Hale is willing to let Arlen stay as long as he promises not to print anything about the disinterment. Hale tells Matt they decided to double check because they’ve analyzed the note that was sent to Betty before she was killed, and the handwriting is virtually identical to that of Bogardus. Yet, when a fingerprint expert checks the body, he tells Hale there’s absolutely no doubt that the body belongs to Bogardus, so there must be a dead man writing notes!

That same dead man is also making another demand of Renwick. He now tells the good doctor, who is back at his house, that he must kill Matt, who’s been doing too much snooping around. Renwick picks up a gun and tries to shoot himself as a way to break the spell and end the killing spree. But the will of Bogardus is too strong. Renwick does, however, resist Bogardus long enough to call Cornelia into the room and get her to promise to keep Matt away. Cornelia realizes what’s been going on, and she agrees to call the district attorney for Renwick so that he can turn himself in.

Unfortunately, by the time the cab drops them off outside Jonathan Hale’s office, Bogardus has taken over and Renwick sends Cornelia back home, despite her protests. But she stops at the first phone booth and calls Matt. He rushes down to City Hall, even as Renwick is slowly making his way up the stairs to Hale’s office. But Hale is with someone else, so Renwick waits to get him as he leaves the building. Arlen, however, arrives and warns Hale he’s in danger. He offers Hale a lift and the two drive off. As they discuss the case, however, Stanley Ridges rises from the back seat, gun in hand. Arlen swerves off the road and captures Renwick, who doesn’t know where he is or what he’s done.

Arlen goes to visit Ridges, who is now housed in the same cell formerly occupied by Tom Powers. Ridges tells Arlen he isn’t concerned about himself, but he is worried about the effect his actions have had on others. Cornelia has to go to prison for at least a year for shielding the good doctor. Renwick is worried about his daughter, but Matt assures him she’s doing well. Matt asks why he committed the murders, but Renwick insists that he doesn’t know. His last request, however, is that Matt come to his execution.

Just before the execution, though, Bogardus contacts Renwick again and tells him he plans to finish the jobs the doctor failed to accomplish, including killing the little girl and the district attorney. He says when Renwick goes to the chair, he’ll go alone. Bogardus plans on keeping his mind entirely apart from the doctor’s, so that it can come back again to live on and commit more murders.

Ah, but has the spirit of Bogardus forgotten that there is a two-way path between his mind and Renwick’s? He may have stopped reaching out to the doctor’s mind, but has Renwick, as he’s led to the electric chair, latched on to the mind of Bogardus? We hear Renwick utter, in the voice of Bogardus:

“OK, so I killed a rat. He got what was coming to him and I know some others that’ll get the same thing. I’m not through yet … hear me … not yet.”

Editor Pierre Watkin whispers to Arlen, “Hear what he said?” Arlen responds, “The same thing Harvey Bogardus said just three months ago in this room.” “His face … he looked just like Bogardus, even talked like him,” says Watkins. And, as both Watkins and Jonathan Hale look at him, Arlen adds, “I wonder if it was Bogardus?”

With that, the lights dim, we hear the prison doctor pronounce the inmate dead, and the camera focuses in on the bible the prison chaplain is holding, which is open to the verse: “For as he thinketh in his heart so is he.” It’s an unusual ending for an unusual movie. And even though Universal did manage to cram Karloff and Lugosi into Black Friday with Ridges, it can be argued that this little Republic gem is the better film.

Phantom: Behind-the-Scenes

The Phantom Speaks, which was shot back-to-back with The Vampire’s Ghost, went into production in mid-October of 1944 and wrapped at the end of the month. Although it was finished by Halloween, it wouldn’t arrive in theaters until the following spring. Director John English, whose Republic serials with William Witney are legendary among fans, had been a film cutter at MGM assigned mostly to shorts. He wanted to become a director but knew he had little chance at a major studio without more experience, so he began working for independents. He did mostly cheap Kermit Maynard westerns, but he also had some exposure to the work of a writer who would be involved with a couple of Republic’s horror films.

English directed the Tex Ritter western Arizona Days, with a screenplay written by Sherman Lowe. Lowe would later write the screenplay for The Catman of Paris and provide the original story for Valley of the Zombies. John English was one of several Republic veterans to leave the studio in 1947 to join Gene Autry at Columbia. Mandy Schaefer left too, and eventually became President of Gene Autry Productions. And one of Republic’s most reliable cameramen also found work with Autry, eventually shooting most of his TV shows. That cinematographer was William Bradford, the man behind the camera who worked with John English on The Phantom Speaks.

The Merry-Go-Round in the park setting for the first murder in the movie was a perfect choice and the on-location camera work was excellent, especially Bradford’s shot of Ralf Harolde being reflected in the cigarette machine mirror. Bradford worked mostly on westerns at Republic, but he was also responsible for some of the studio’s best-looking mysteries, including The Mantrap, Mystery Broadcast and Secrets of Scotland Yard. On The Phantom Speaks, he gets an able assist from Joseph Novak, who also worked with Bradford on one of the studio’s slickest thrillers, Grissly’s Millions. Not surprisingly, that film was also directed by English.

The location for the inventive opening shot was actually the Griffith Park Carousel. At the time The Phantom Speaks was shot, the merry-go-round had been in Griffith Park for seven years, having been relocated from its previous home in Balboa Park, where it was an attraction at the California Pacific International Exposition. It remains in Griffith Park until the present day and has been used as a location for dozens of television shows.

Stanley Ridges is excellent in the film, which is a real showcase for his talents. As mentioned earlier, this movie is often compared to Universal’s Black Friday. Ridges is good in both, but he gives a more subtle and nuanced performance in The Phantom Speaks, even though the Republic movie was shot at a more hectic pace, allotted only two-thirds the shooting schedule of the Universal film.

It had only been a year since Richard Arlen had finished work on The Lady and the Monster but he looks a bit pudgier and less energetic here. His acting is as polished as ever, but he seems a little too old to be playing the part of a brash boyfriend and wisecracking reporter. Lynne Roberts, who played the female lead in The Phantom Speaks, worked under three different names at two different times at Republic. In the late thirties, under the name “Lynn Roberts,” she appeared both in Republic features and serials, including The Lone Ranger and Dick Tracy Returns. Then she switched her name to “Mary Hart” and did several additional Republic films, including some with Roy Rogers.

She began working at Fox in 1940, changing her name to Lynne Roberts with an “e” and keeping that name when she returned to Republic in the mid-forties. Her first film back at Republic was The Port of Forty Thieves, which began shooting in April of 1944. By late summer the actress was filming The Big Bonanza with Richard Arlen and the two began shooting The Phantom Speaks in mid-October. This was not Lynne’s first brush with horror. Two years earlier, at Fox, she had co-starred with J. Carrol Naish and George Zucco in Dr. Renault’s Secret. After leaving Republic in 1947, Lynne remained active in films and television until her retirement in 1955. The lovely Republic leading lady passed away in 1978.

As usual, the supporting cast of this Republic film is populated by some of Hollywood’s most familiar faces. Playing a newspaper editor fit Pierre Watkin like a glove, and he was equally at home as a doctor, military officer or lawyer. It was in his role as a lawyer in the Inner Sanctum entry Dead Man’s Eyes that I first saw Watkin when Universal’s original Shock Theater package hit television.

And one of Watkin’s co-stars in that film, Jonathan Hale, is in The Phantom Speaks as well.

Jonathan Hale

Hale, who portrays District Attorney Owen McAllister in The Phantom Speaks, played the doctor who treats Lon Chaney Jr. in Dead Man’s Eyes. He also appeared with Watkin in Republic’s less-than-frightening comedy The Ghost Goes Wild. Other familiar faces in Phantom include Jack Ingram, Edmund Cobb and Ed Cassidy.

Ralf Harolde, the actor who plays the first victim of Harvey Bogardus, may have had a leg up in getting the part. The associate producer of The Phantom Speaks, Donald H. Brown, was one of the writers working on The Perfect Clue, a 1935 Majestic release that starred Universal’s all-purpose horror hero David Manners and also featured Harolde. Brown left poverty row and moved to Universal himself, working on … among other films … Night Monster and Son of Dracula. He then went to Republic, where in addition to The Phantom Speaks, he was associate producer on films like Traffic in Crime and The Mysterious Mr. Valentine.

Eddie Parker, who plays one of the policemen in the park, did double duty as a stuntman in the film. Parker worked all over town, but was especially busy at Republic, Columbia and Universal. It is for his uncredited work with fellow stuntman Gil Perkins, doubling the monsters in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man, that he is best known among genre fans today.

John Butler, who had written both The Girl Who Dared and The Vampire’s Ghost (with Leigh Brackett,) wrote the screenplay for The Phantom Speaks, and much of the dialog here is restrained, giving it a more realistic feel. Some of the lines given to gangster Harvey Bogardus may be a bit clichéd, but remember, this was one of the few times Republic gave Butler a chance to return to his pulp fiction roots. The studio had him working mostly on westerns.

The sound department did an excellent job making sure the voice of Tom Powers as Bogardus was in synch with the lip movements of Stanley Ridges. You can be sure there were careful rehearsals to get everything right. Republic had learned the hard way on its musicals that it was more important to take time to rehearse lip synching beforehand, rather than spend more money later trying to fix a lousy job.

Ironically, there is one scene near the end of the film where there is a minor “synch” problem, but it doesn’t involve lips. When Ridges is sitting in his cell, head in hands, awaiting execution, we hear Tom Powers communicate with him. Ridges is supposed to take his head out of his hands when he hears Powers begin to speak to him. Instead Ridges lifts his head to listen before Powers talks. Don’t blame Ridges or Powers. Instead, somebody in the sound department must have missed the correct cue when dubbing.

Richard Cherwin acted as musical director on The Phantom Speaks, as he did on many of the other films in this book. In addition to Republic features, he worked on serials. Cherwin composed the stock music for Manhunt of Mystery Island and the theme music for The Purple Monster Strikes.

Earlier, I mentioned “Who Took Me Home Last Night,” the song belted out by the ill-fated Betty in the nightclub. As was the case with other Jule Styne tunes, Republic got its money’s worth out of the song. The amazingly prolific Styne, who would eventually become a Broadway and Hollywood legend, had been signed to Republic by the talented Cy Feuer. “Who Took Me Home Last Night” originally appeared in Republic’s Hit Parade of 1943, with Gail Patrick (or her voice double) singing the mildly risqué tune. The film also featured Susan Hayward and John Carrroll. Shortly after Hit Parade of 1943, Republic used the song in 1944’s Casanova in Burlesque with Joe E. Brown and Valley of the Zombies villain Ian Keith. Then, in 1949, the song made the rounds of movie theaters again when Hit Parade of 1943 was reissued. Since the original title, with its reference to 1943 would have dated the film, the title was switched to Change of Heart.

When I interviewed Styne many years ago, he praised Republic as a perfect training ground. (See the chapter on The Fatal Witness.) The composer had originally been making more than ten thousand dollars a year at Republic, which was very good money in those days, but he had a problem … one that he shared with many others in the industry, such as Nat Levine, head of Republic’s predecessor, Mascot. Styne was a gambler, and he was quite open in discussing this with me. He said, despite his success at Republic and elsewhere, he still felt that … if he had just been a concert pianist … he would have gotten the attention he craved. Styne said he felt people would look up to him more if he placed thousand-dollar bets instead of fifty-dollar bets, which led to serious problems. By the time I met Styne, he realized that he had received all the attention he ever wanted and more, from the millions of people who loved his songs.

The music was just one factor in lifting this movie above normal thriller fare. The ambiguous note on which the film ends is another. The chilling words that come from the mouth of Ridges at the execution may well signal that the evil Powers will live on. On the other hand, Powers has already told Ridges that he has no intention of being with him at the time of his electrocution, presumably hoping to find someone else to inhabit. Yet there he is, his voice inside Ridges as he goes to the chair. Perhaps Dr. Renwick’s mind, dominated by Bogardus up until now, is finally the one in control, forcing Bogardus to go through the execution with him. Maybe the bully Bogardus, who thought he was so smart, has been outwitted by the gentle doctor. And, with no one alive on this side of the veil to contact, this time the execution is final!

Whatever the case, there’s one thing on which we can all agree: The fact that we’re still debating such things all these years later is a sign of the kind of thought and imagination that went into the stories Republic chose to tell. And it’s a tribute to the talented individuals who brought those stories to the screen.

THE FATAL WITNESS

(Released 1945)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Rudolph (Rudy) Abel; Director: Lesley Selander; Screenplay: Jerry Sackheim from a story by Rupert Croft-Cooke; Cinematographer: Bud Thackery; Editor: Ralph Dixon.

CAST: Evelyn Ankers, Richard Fraser, Barbara Everest, George Leigh, Virginia Farmer, Peggy Jackson, Frederick Warlock, Barry Bernard, Harry Cording, Hilda Plowright, Colin Campbell, Elaine Lange, Crauford Kent, Cyril Delevanti.

“The stork’s flying high at Universal, what with Evelyn Ankers and her stand-in, Maxine Rondeau, both quitting work to wait for their blessed events.” … Hedda Hopper, July 7, 1944

In retrospect, it was this gossip column item and another released around the same time, that should have provided clues regarding one of the more promising developments that was about to take place at Republic. The other bit of gossip indicated that the Universal actress was growing tired of the roles the studio was giving her. Evelyn’s dissatisfaction with her parts at Universal and, with the baby coming, her desire to cut back on the hectic pace of a contract player, led to her decision to freelance. That, in turn, led to a major boost in star power for the film discussed in this chapter, The Fatal Witness. Ankers was already pregnant with her first child when she made the last film under her long-term Universal contract, The Frozen Ghost, an “Inner Sanctum” entry.

And with “Scream Queen” Ankers as the heroine, a séance-like gathering in a spooky old house and a visit from a real ghost, Republic’s The Fatal Witness is hard to distinguish from a Universal horror film. The illusion is further enforced  by the fact that the impressive interior of the mansion has the same expensive look as some of the standing sets used in such Universal chillers as She-Wolf of London and the Sherlock Holmes offering, The House of Fear. In fact, the only real sign of economizing occurs at the very beginning of The Fatal Witness, as the credits roll over a shot of the mansion in which the action takes place. Unlike The beginning of The House of Fear, where Universal spent the money necessary to combine a matte painting of “Drearcliff House” with a live-action shot of waves rolling in at the bottom of the cliff, Republic takes the easy way out and settles for just a painting.

The film opens with a housekeeper using a fireplace poker to heat a goblet of mulled port wine for her mistress, Lady Ferguson. But before she has time to enjoy the benefits of the soothing drink, she’s thrown into a dither when she realizes an expensive emerald brooch is missing. The scene is played for all it’s worth by Barbara Everest doing her best “Angry old dowager” imitation and Virginia Farmer, as Martha the housekeeper, laying on the British accent so thick that at times it’s hard to understand what she’s saying. Everest graced many a big budget thriller, including 1943’s Phantom of the Opera and 1944’s The Uninvited and Gaslight. Farmer had small parts in movies made at many studios, ranging from the ultra-cheap PRC cult film Strangler of the Swamp to the Paramount classic Going My Way.

Lady Ferguson is certain that her shiftless nephew John Bedford is responsible for the theft. Evelyn Ankers, as Lady Ferguson’s ward Priscilla Ames, tries to smooth things over but to no avail. In fact, Lady Ferguson drags Priscilla to Bedford’s room where she insists on conducting a search for the Brooch. Bedford comes in as Lady Ferguson is going through his desk and there’s a confrontation. Lady Ferguson tells Priscilla to go downstairs, phone her solicitor and have him come first thing in the morning, so she can disinherit her nephew. Bedford, played by George Leigh, claims to be highly insulted and exits the mansion in a huff, but not before Priscilla tells him that she’s sure it will all blow over, so she hasn’t really called the solicitor. (To those of us who know where things are heading, this little exchange is tantamount to having Evelyn Ankers sign the old girl’s death warrant, but … hey … it’s a necessary plot device!)

Leigh, while a decent actor, looks more like a sleazy American gangster than a debt-ridden British playboy. He’s a fairly convincing drunk, though, in the next scene where he becomes obnoxious in a British pub. The pub set is quite impressive, reminiscent of those used by Universal in its horror films. Gano Chittenden was the art director on the film, and … in addition to working on some of Republic best westerns … he made limited budgets look a lot bigger on many of the studio’s mystery and horror outings, including Secrets of Scotland Yard, The Girl Who Dared, Grissly’s Millions and The Catman of Paris.

Bedford is sitting at a table in the pub ordering drink after drink. Behind the bar Harry Cording, playing pub keeper Gus, remarks that he’s never seen Bedford so in his cups. Cording was a regular in the Sherlock Holmes series at Universal and appeared in several other genre films from the studio as well, including The Black Cat, The Wolf Man, The Ghost of Frankenstein and The Mummy’s Tomb. His role as Bela Lugosi’s servant Thamal, in The Black Cat, was one of his best. It is the loyal Cording who helps Lugosi hang Karloff up so Bela can skin him!

The two leads argue, as a British bobby and a butler look on.

Tillie, the pub waitress, doesn’t have any problems with Bedford until he demands another drink after last call and she has to explain she can’t serve him. Bedford becomes irate and demands a kiss if he can’t get a drink. When Bedford tries to get fresh, Tillie slaps him. Gus rushes over to try to calm things down and Bedford takes a swing at him. Gus responds by knocking Bedford to the floor. The result is a night in the pokey for Bedford.

Elaine Lange, who plays Tillie the waitress here, had a busy but brief career at Republic. Between 1945 and 1946, in addition to The Fatal Witness, Lange appeared in the Roy Rogers western Man from Oklahoma, the serial Federal Operator 99, the prison drama Girls of the Big House, the Robert Livingston/Stephanie Bachelor vehicle The Undercover Woman, and Republic’s entry in the “Manimal” horror category, Catman of Paris.

The morning after Bedford’s altercation at the pub, we see Evelyn Ankers bring breakfast to Lady Ferguson’s room only to discover that the elderly woman is dead. Scotland Yard is called in and arrives in the person of handsome young Inspector Bill Trent, played by Republic favorite Richard Fraser. When not at the studio making films like Scotland Yard Investigator and Thumbs Up, he could be found elsewhere in Hollywood, whether appearing in major productions such as MGM’s The Picture of Dorian Gray or slumming in ultra-cheap PRC quickies like White Pongo.

Fraser learns from Cyril Delevanti, who plays the coroner, that Lady Ferguson was murdered by strangulation at approximately 3am and that the killer wore gloves, leaving no prints. Delevanti was a familiar face in movies and on TV. His career, which extended into the seventies with roles in films such as Bedknobs and Broomsticks and Soylent Green, included appearances in such Universal horror films as Night Monster, Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man and Son of Dracula.  Fraser, of course, views the reprobate nephew as the most likely suspect, which puts him at odds with Ankers who can’t bring herself to believe that a family member would do this. Since this is a Republic picture we can be certain that the couple’s loathe-at-first-site relationship will turn into true love sometime before the closing credits.

But first, Inspector Trent has to run into a seemingly insurmountable setback for his theory that the nephew is guilty. No sooner has he settled on his prime target than he learns that the suspect spent the night in jail, apparently making it impossible for him to be the murderer. Then police find a dress in Lady Ferguson’s closet that seems to have the brooch on it that the old woman thought was stolen. This gives Ankers a chance to do a little gloating, but Fraser smells a rat and decides to accompany the family solicitor, played by Colin Campbell, down to the jail. Campbell, best known to many baby boomers for his appearance in the spooky Superman TV episode A Ghost for Scotland Yard, overacts outrageously in this film, but for some reason the hammy performance has a certain amount of charm. By the way, his acting hadn’t improved one iota in the years between this film and the TV appearance. On seeing the aforementioned “ghost” of the Superman title, Campbell gives a shriek that would barely pass muster in a grade school pageant,

As the solicitor is bailing him out, the cat-and-mouse game between the nephew and the inspector begins. Bedford admits he hated the old lady and confirms he expects to come into quite a bit of money now that she’s dead. But he points out that he has an airtight alibi, since he was in jail at the time of Lady Ferguson’s murder.

It becomes clear that Inspector Trent remains convinced Bedford did it. He just isn’t sure how. Later, as part of his investigation, Trent heads to the pub where he runs into Bedford again. Seated at a table with Bedford is his girlfriend, Gracie Hallet, who is headlining at the local music hall. After a brief exchange in which Bedford tries to assure Trent there was nothing fishy about the drunken behavior that resulted in his alibi (“It must have been the result of the argument I had with my aunt”) Trent leaves, promising Hallet he’ll catch her performance.

Trent is back at the mansion the following day, letting Priscilla and Bedford know he has no intention of giving up his quest to convict Bedford. Priscilla still believes the nephew is innocent, but it’s obvious she’s warming to Trent. Meanwhile, in an indication that Trent is falling for Priscilla, the viewer is subjected to an overly long scene of the inspector being fitted for a new suit to try to impress the young lady. An alert viewer will immediately realize that this boring detour is in there for a reason that will become evident later.

At this point, it’s time for Trent to make good on his promise to check out Gracie Hallet’s act at the music hall. We see Peggy Jackson, as Hallet, singing a tune called, “From Here On In,” written by Sammy Cahn and Jule Styne … yes, as mentioned earlier, this is the same pair responsible for the Oscar-winning “Three Coins in the Fountain.” Styne toiled at Republic, turning out tunes for its B-pictures, but didn’t feel he was getting much respect. He got a chance to borrow Frank Loesser from Paramount to help him on one of Republic’s Judy Canova films, and Loesser borrowed Styne for a film when he got back to Paramount. It was at Paramount that they introduced the hit song “I Don’t Want To Walk Without You.” It became a standard and Styne found his stock with the Republic brass had gone up quite a bit when he returned to the studio.

Oddly, most sources don’t list “From Here On In” as being featured in The Fatal Witness, perhaps because only an excerpt is used. The song is listed in connection with the Republic musical Thumbs Up (AKA Swing It, Sister,) which was shot two years earlier. It would seem possible that Republic, in need of a quick tune to flesh out the Gracie Hallet character, simply borrowed it from the previous film. Adding credence to this theory: Even Styne’s own web site, which tries to list all of the films in which his songs are known to appear, fails to mention The Fatal Witness.

The fact that the scene was shot so cheaply also adds to speculation that it might have been devised hurriedly. Unlike Universal, Republic didn’t have a handy Phantom of the Opera stage which could serve as an all-purpose theater setting whenever it was required. The best Republic can do here is to show our hero and our murderer in close-ups of balcony box seats. Meanwhile, through the use of crane shots, we see Gracie Hallet singing below us with only the floor and a curtain serving to indicate that she’s performing on a theater stage. The dubbed clapping as she exits is hardly convincing.

There’s another unusual scene shortly thereafter. The camera focuses on the fog enshrouded door to the mansion, and we hear someone with a thick British accent say: “That’ll be half-a-crown sir … thank you sir.”

Next, there’s the sound of a car pulling away and Bedford walks into frame toward the door. An unusual, “artsy” shot called for in the original script? It’s more likely that this solution was dreamed up by the director and his photographer to get around having to rent a British taxi! Certainly the man behind the camera was used to this sort of thing.

Cinematographer Bud Thackery was an innovator who was well-known for his special effects and trick photography work. Thackery was equally at home lending his talents to serials like Manhunt of Mystery Island, horror films such as The Vampire’s Ghost, and oaters like Alias Billy the Kid. He stayed with the studio right through its early TV offerings, including The Adventures of Fu Manchu. He continued working when Revue Studios started producing shows like Soldier of Fortune at the Republic facilities. Thackery enjoyed a long and productive career in television, remaining active well into the 1970’s directing photography on popular shows like Ironside.

Back at the mansion door, just as he’s about to enter, Bedford is accosted by a disreputable-looking bloke named Scoggins. It turns out he’s a jail guard who was bribed by Bedford to let him out for an hour, and he wants more money now to keep his mouth shut. Bedford isn’t happy about it, but agrees to pay him. Scoggins is played by Barry Bernard, another one of those British character actors who always managed to keep busy in Hollywood, whether in PRC cheapies like The Panther’s Claw, Monogram entries like Charlie Chan in the Secret Service, or big-budget Warner Brothers thrillers like Cry Wolf.

Inspector Trent and Priscilla are now close enough that Trent invites her on a tour of the evidence museum room at Scotland Yard (Gee, he must be a fun date!) While there and showing her a cleaver used by a murderer (I told you he was a fun date) Lady Ferguson’s brooch, which Priscilla is now wearing, comes loose. Trent says he knows a jeweler who can fix it and asks her to leave it with him for a few days. (Yes, it’s another plot device.)

Meanwhile, Trent goes on a suit-buying binge again and this time we find out why the scenes with the tailor are so necessary for the plot. The inspector notices several other suits hanging on a rack, one of which is quite “loud” and out of keeping with the conservative nature of most of the tailor’s work. The tailor explains it was ordered by a man who seemed to have plenty of money. The tailor tells Trent the man works for the police force. “He’s a turnkey or something of that sort,” says the tailor, “a chap by the name of Scoggins.”

Any alert viewer immediately knows double-dealing Scoggins isn’t long for this world. After Trent visits him at the pub, Scoggins knows the police are wise to him and meets at the waterfront with Bedford to demand more money. The dock scenes here, although filmed on a stage, are good … reminiscent of the sets used in S.O.S. Coast Guard and so many other Republic serials. Bud Thackery was an expert at rear-view projection and the fact that the scene takes place at night and there’s plenty of fog is a definite plus.

Paying another visit to the mansion, Inspector Trent returns the brooch to Priscilla, explaining that … as the result of testing … he now knows it’s a fake. He tells Priscilla to be careful because he believes Bedford is a dangerous man. That night, Priscilla and the housekeeper think they hear Bedford whistling along with records in his room. Actually, of course, Bedford has recorded the whistling beforehand to give the impression that he’s at home. He slips out to a second meeting with Scoggins, where he’s supposed to deliver the money. Instead, he strangles Scoggins and dumps him in the water.

In films like this, the miniature pool on the Republic lot came in handy for any brief views of water that were necessary. For example, when Bedford strangles Scoggins and throws him into the water, Bud Thackery stays on a close-up of Bedford’s face, we hear a splash, and only then does Thackery switch to a shot of the water taken from the “dock.” We haven’t actually seen Coggins go into the water, but we’ve been tricked into thinking we did.

Bedford returns home, getting back in through the window. He’s just in time to change into a dressing gown and open the door for Priscilla who brings an evening snack to him. She’s still looking for reassurances that Bedford isn’t the guilty party and, without much difficulty, Bedford is able to convince her of his innocence. This creates some believability problems for the audience.

Republic may not have known they’d be able to get Evelyn Ankers for the lead when the film was in preparation. But once the studio found out, it should have made some script changes. Evelyn Ankers was at her best when portraying intelligent woman. Unfortunately her character here is as thick as a brick. We’re now three-quarters of the way through the film and Priscilla still doesn’t realize that Bedford is a “thorough rotter.”

In fact, she comes to his defense again, when Trent tells her about his belief that Bedford killed Scoggins. After she provides Bedford with the “whistling” alibi, she gets in a huff because Trent has the nerve to keep insisting that Bedford is the killer. The acting of both our leads is a little stiff at this point, perhaps because they know the script will soon call for Ankers to do a rather unbelievable about-face.

Priscilla’s remarks about the whistling lead the inspector to decide it’s time to check out Bedford’s room. Trent has guessed about the doctored recordings with the whistling on them, but our villain has already disposed of them. At times during the film, in scenes with Trent present, Bedford has been seen “knocking on wood.” Now, realizing that Bedford is superstitious, he comes up with the idea of having Priscilla throw a dinner party where an actress will play Lady Ferguson’s ghost.

Here we get down to some good old fashioned horror film fun and games, reminiscent of séance scenes in movies like Bela Lugosi’s Night of Terror, even though … strictly speaking … this isn’t a séance but simply a dinner party with a ghost as a guest. Set decorator George Milo adds to the atmosphere with an elaborately dressed version of Republic’s all-purpose standing living room and dining room sets.  Milo was also responsible for the expensive look of other Republic films like The Phantom Speaks and went on to lend his talents to such classics as Psycho and Judgment at Nuremberg.

The table is set for a ghostly appearance.

It is the proverbial “dark and stormy night.” Everyone present but Bedford is in on the ruse, and Republic has pulled out all the stops. Some of the best “dress extras” in the business are on hand to add a bit of class to the affair, the long table is set with candelabras and other pricey-looking silver, and the candles are lit so their shadows can add an extra air of menace.

There’s a nicely done scene when Bedford enters and is greeted by the butler. The excellent character actor Crauford Kent, playing Jepson the servant, tells Bedford he has something he has to say to him before dinner begins. At this point, the viewer is wondering whether the butler is about to give the game away to Bedford, but the suspense lasts for only a few seconds as Jepson quickly makes it clear he just wants to warn Bedford that the food may not be quite up to par.

With that, Bedford joins the group and the proceedings get underway. Our villain isn’t a fool, of course, and suspects this may be some sort of a trap. In fact, he comes right out and says as much, but is reassured by Inspector Trent that the police are finally convinced that they can’t break his alibi.

As expected, Lady Ferguson’s “ghost” shows up right on cue and tricks the murderer into confessing. Also right on cue, for anyone who has seen this type of film before, the butler hands Trent a message from the actress who was supposed to play Lady Ferguson, explaining that she’s ill and offering her apologies for not being able to make it. Just before the fadeout, Bud Thackery treats us to a spooky shot of the front hall door opening and closing on its own. Perhaps it’s just the wind, but then again …

While this ending is a bit hokey, the truth is, it’s no less credible than having the audience believe that any actress could have been made up to look so much like Lady Ferguson. Besides, the bemused look on the faces of Priscilla and Trent makes it clear they don’t know any more than we do, which makes for a pleasant wrap to an entertaining little film.

Fatal: Behind-the-Scenes

By the mid-forties it became apparent that Republic would benefit from some of the changes taking place in the film industry. Although Universal wouldn’t drop most of its genre stars until 1946, as mentioned earlier, at least one of the studio’s actresses had already begun freelancing. Evelyn Ankers got a jump on some of her Universal stablemates who would be terminated when new management decided it was time to eliminate B-movie production.

The gossip column piece about Evelyn’s pregnancy that begins this section came out in the summer of 1944. She managed to make it through The Frozen Ghost and the baby arrived in the fall. Universal most likely didn’t want to keep a pregnant actress on the payroll and Evelyn didn’t really want to stay. She wanted to be able to spend some time being a mother to her child, and that would have been very difficult if she remained under contract to Universal.

As with all contract players at the studio, Universal wanted to get the most it could out of Ankers, which meant keeping up a frantic pace. Had she stayed under contract, there would have been little time for herself, let alone the baby.

I once interviewed Evelyn’s fellow Universal contract player, Don Porter. We spoke at a time when Porter was well-established in television, where he had a long and successful career. Perhaps best remembered for genre films like She-Wolf of London, Porter confirmed that working at Universal could be hectic.

Porter, who appeared in several films with Ankers, including Eagle Squadron and Keep ‘Em Slugging, said many of their movies at Universal were shot on a tight, 12-day schedule. And, as if time constraints weren’t enough, he told me half the time they’d be trying to disguise the fact that they were shooting on the back lot by covering everything with fog. The actor remembered the prop people using bee-smokers and shooting them at the actors’ feet. The mist would rise up and get into his lungs, he said, making it “pretty darn difficult to get any dialog out!” Evelyn, of course, was all but swallowed up by the stuff in The Wolf Man.

And because of the pace of shooting, there wasn’t a great deal of time for some of the luxuries provided by a studio like MGM.  Porter said he did the best he could to fake a semi-British accent in She-Wolf of London, by listening to British players on the lot like Patrick Knowles. While Porter looked back fondly on his days at Universal, he made it clear that the studio operated very much like a factory, keeping contract players busy all the time. That was exactly the opposite of the kind of life Evelyn wanted to live now that she was about to have a baby.

Ankers must have also realized that her career was going nowhere fast at the studio. She appeared in some good films at the beginning of her contract, but she was thrown into many quickies at Universal as well, and eventually tired of roles that did little to showcase her abilities. The studio would co-star her with Ralph Bellamy in a fairly good film like the 1942 re-make of The Great Impersonation,  then throw her into a cheapie like Keep ‘Em Slugging, which was primarily a vehicle for The Dead End Kids and The Little Tough Guys. Toward the end of her Universal contract she found herself billed fourth from the bottom, as stripper Bonnie Latour, in the musical Bowery to Broadway. Here was a film that went out of its way to miscast as many contract players as possible. Only Universal could cast Turhan Bey as a rag-time band leader in lower Manhattan and Andy Devine as an Irish priest!

In view of the films Evelyn was getting, Republic must have looked like a decent choice when the actress went out on her own. And The Fatal Witness presented her with a good role as Lady Ferguson’s ward, Priscilla Ames.

Evelyn Ankers was an excellent actress, but it’s obvious that … in some scenes … she isn’t getting a lot of help from the director. At Universal, the cast and crew had almost a month to work on a film like The Wolf Man. Republic didn’t have that luxury. So, at times, a line that might have looked fine in the script sounds idiotic on the screen but nobody bothers to change it. When Priscilla knocks on Bedford’s door to bring him an evening snack, Bedford calls out, “Who’s there?” At this point Evelyn is saddled with the awkward line: “It’s I, John.” You would think somebody on the set would have realized how bad this sounded and switched to “It’s me, John” but … hey … maybe it’s just I who thinks the line sounds stilted!

However rushed the shooting schedules on some of these films, however, Evelyn Ankers always did her best and the studio was lucky to have her. In fact, Evelyn was one of the few good things about Republic’s 1947 Alaskan adventure picture Spoilers of the North. Virtually all of the adventure promised in the title came from the copious use of stock footage!

Richard Fraser may be a little stiff in The Fatal Witness, but he’s better than some of the other actors Republic had to use during the war. It’s the writing that provides the biggest problem for both Fraser and Ankers. When Bedford’s blackmailer conveniently turns up dead just as Trent is about to have him picked-up and questioned, Trent is told Bedford is certainly very lucky. “I wonder,” Trent muses, “I wonder if he isn’t just a bit too lucky.” Gee, you think so? Just because his aunt dies before she can change her will and he inherits a fortune. And just because a blackmailer dies before he can rat out Bedford? It wouldn’t have been easy for any actor to deliver lines like this.

The film was based on a 1930 play by Rupert Croft-Cooke called Banquo’s Chair. In 1959 Alfred Hitchcock would use this original title when he re-did the story as an episode of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. At Republic, detective novelist John Spain, writing under the pseudonym Cleve Franklin Adams, adapted the play for the studio’s movie version. Jerry Sackheim, who wrote the screenplay for the film, had worked on only a couple of B-films at other studios before coming to Republic, where he co-authored the script for a Robert Lowery mystery, Road to Alcatraz, the same year he wrote The Fatal Witness. He would later enter TV, writing for such early ZIV productions as Science Fiction Theater and Highway Patrol.

Producer Armand Schaefer made sure The Fatal Witness would have a polished look despite its low budget. He developed a knack for doing more with less when working on serials. Schaefer got his first big break when he was promoted to co-director on a Mascot serial after Breezy Eason reportedly showed up hung over once too often. He got plenty of experience at Mascot working on classic serials and has the dubious distinction of writing “continuity” for Gene Autry’s “Singing Cowboy vs. Lost Underground Civilization” epic The Phantom Empire. Schaefer continued to work closely with Autry at Republic and later moved with Autry when the cowboy star set up his own company to produce films and TV shows.

Lesley Selander was a talented director who turned out an astonishing number of westerns in his long career. But he also brought his considerable talents to bear on horror films and mysteries from time to time, including Republic’s The Vampire’s Ghost and The Catman of Paris. The Fatal Witness represents a solid, workman-like effort by Selander, whose ability to deliver the goods on time and within tight budgets would serve him in good stead when he moved on to television.

On this particular film, Selander had the advantage of working with two of Republic’s most talented behind-the-scenes names. The aforementioned Mandy Schaefer probably knew as much about Republic as anybody on the lot at the time. And Selander’s other ace-in-the-hole was cinematographer Bud Thackery. It’s obvious from the opening shot, where we get a tight view of a poker in a fireplace about to warm a goblet of wine. This is the kind of inventive establishing shot that had become second nature to Thackery, who had learned all the shortcuts of telling a story economically during his tenure at Republic. In this case, for example, even if we didn’t see the painting of the mansion behind the credits, the fireplace and the expensive-looking goblet being prepared by the maid would have told us immediately that we were in a wealthy home. The fireplace shot also creates much more visual interest than the more abrupt opening that less experienced photographers and directors might use.

The Jule Styne song, “From Here On In,” that was used in the film, was one of many that the gifted composer would write while at Republic. I had the pleasure of speaking with Jule (pronounced “Julie,”) back in 1979. At that time he was an icon in musical theater, the noted composer of songs like “Diamonds are a Girl’s Best Friend” from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and “Everything’s Coming Up Roses” from Gypsy.

Yet he was refreshingly honest and willing to talk about his early days at Republic. “I started my career as a concert pianist. I won a Mozart scholarship. But I soon found that my hands were too small to play certain classical works. I couldn’t easily do an octave.” Styne was only a kid at the time, but he realized small hands wouldn’t present a problem playing jazz, so he eventually began working with bands like Ben Pollack’s and people like Jack Teagarden and Benny Goodman.

Jule got an early start on what would become a life-long career about 15 years before he signed-on with Republic. “I wrote my first song down in Florida, walking with this very beautiful girl along the beach at five in the morning. And for lack of words to say, I just started humming. Later, I went back and orchestrated it with a band I was playing with and we performed it. (The song was ‘Sunday.’)  So my first song was written for a girl. Aren’t they all?”

In the mid-thirties, Styne came to Hollywood to work for 20th Century Fox as a vocal coach for stars like Shirley Temple. He explained how he wound up working for Republic. “Darryl Zanuck, who was then the head of 20th Century Fox, told me ‘You’re a vocal coach here, and it’s a luxury for a studio … you should write songs.’ He said, ‘I’m going to get you a job at Republic.’ So, there I am at Republic, writing songs for Gene Autry and Roy Rogers’ horse! But I had a big hit for Gene Autry … it was in a western … it was called “Purple Sage in the Twilight.” The movie was 1941’s Under Fiesta Stars.

Of course, Styne wrote songs for many other types of films in addition to westerns while at Republic, including “I’ve Heard That Song Before,” for the movie Youth on Parade. It was one of Styne’s earlier efforts for Republic and was nominated for an Academy Award in 1942. Wrapping up our discussion, Jule Styne, a man responsible for some of Broadway’s biggest hits and many of Hollywood’s major musicals, spoke fondly of the little studio in the valley: “Republic was a great training ground for me, and for a lot of other people in all avenues of motion pictures … the technical end and the creative end, both.”

I’ve often mentioned the excellent character actors and actresses utilized by Republic and how their talents led to long and successful careers. One of the dress extras in The Fatal Witness is a perfect case in point. Hilda Plowright, who plays a guest at the “ghost dinner” in this film, portrayed the “ghost” fourteen years later when Alfred Hitchcock did the story for his TV show under its original title, Banquo’s Chair. Plowright will be familiar to genre fans from Abbott and Costello Meet Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and other films. And, if the surroundings on the Hitchcock episode look familiar, it’s because set decorator George Milo served in the same capacity on The Fatal Witness!

By the way, the 1945 film wouldn’t be the only time Ankers and Fraser found themselves together in a spooky old mansion. They appeared in an episode of what is believed to be the first sponsored filmed series on television, Your Showtime. They were featured in an adaptation of the Sherlock Holmes saga, The Speckled Band, which aired on March 25, 1949. And the Production Supervisor was none other than Rudy Abel (billed as R. E. Abel) who served as the Associate Producer on The Fatal Witness, The Girl Who Dared and The Vampire’s Ghost.

The photographer, meanwhile, was Republic regular William Bradford, who shot The Phantom Speaks. And, on top of that, the Music Supervisor on the show was Republic favorite William Lava. But the show wasn’t shot at Republic. Rudy Abel worked out a deal with Hal Roach Studios, which was cheaper, and he had art director Eugene Laurie redress standing sets.

Alan Napier, later of Batman TV fame, played Sherlock Holmes and Melville Cooper was Watson. Evelyn, still looking quite beautiful, played the heroine, Helen. Fraser, his acting still rather stiff, portrayed Helen’s fiancé. With so many former Republic figures involved in it, the show provides some insight into how Republic might have done The Fatal Witness on the small screen, as the decade was ending and more Americans were turning to television.

THE WOMAN WHO CAME BACK

(Released 1945)

CREDITS: Producer: Walter Colmes; Director: Walter Colmes; Screenplay: Dennis Cooper and Lee Willis from a story by John Kafka; Cinematographers: Henry Sharp; Editor: John Link.

CAST: John Loder, Nancy Kelly, Otto Kruger, Ruth Ford, Jeanne Gail, Harry Tyler, Emmett Vogan, J. Farrell McDonald, Almira Sessions, Elspeth Dudgeon, Jack Carr.

“Not far north of Boston is the small town of Eben Rock. Though it seems quiet on the surface, 300 years ago it was the scene of the black terror … the branding of innocent people as witches, with the penalty death by burning at the stake.” … Narrator.

The film’s prologue pretty much lays it all out. It seems the townspeople can never forget what happened because the home of Judge Elijah Webster, who condemned 18 people to death as witches, still stands. And documents about this unfortunate period still exist, stored in the local church, where the Reverend Jim Stevens, played by Otto Kruger, is studying them. He has researched the origins of a shrine erected on the shores of the local lake and dedicated to a woman named Jezebel Trister, who … along with her dog … was burned at the stake centuries ago. The woman vowed to come back to seek revenge against the descendants of her persecutors.

The action gets underway with Lorna Webster traveling back to Eben Rock on a bus, after being away from her home town for quite some time. The first hint that things may be amiss occurs when an old woman with a dog flags down the bus. The old woman is dressed in black with a veil over her face. The driver refuses to allow the dog on the bus, so the woman reluctantly boards without him.

When the woman pays her fare with an ancient one pound note, insisting that it’s legal tender in “all thirteen colonies,” the bus driver is really spooked. The old girl finds a seat next to Webster, a descendant of the old witch-burning judge. Lorna is played by Nancy Kelly, appearing in the first of two films she would do for Republic during the period, the second being Murder in the Music Hall.

Lorna is surprised when the elderly woman knows her name, and shocked when the woman claims to be the aforementioned Jezebel Trister, which would make her more than 300 years old. The idea becomes more believable, though, when the old hag lifts her veil, revealing a craggy face so filled with lines and wrinkles that it makes Mick Jagger’s mug look as smooth as a baby’s behind! Anyway, Jezebel cackles so much that she disturbs the driver, who loses control of the bus and sends it sailing off a cliff and into a lake.

This is one of the very few films released by Republic where the miniatures are sub-par. But “released by” is the operative phrase. The bus tumbling off the cliff is far less believable than most of the studio’s trick shots because the Lydecker magic wasn’t involved. The major problem here is that the miniature is shot within the confines of a studio, rather than outdoors in natural light, which was a key factor in most of Republic’s special effects scenes.

A poor miniature of a bus going into the ravine.

At this point, the dog that was left behind when the old woman boarded the bus comes running down the road to the scene of the accident and begins barking. Right beside the broken guardrail stands a monument marking the spot where … in 1645 … Jezebel Trister was burned as a witch by order of Judge Elijah Webster.

A quick cut to flames dissolves to a shot of several frightening faces apparently looking into a cauldron, but … as the camera pulls back … we realize the faces are staring into a fireplace and we soon see that these are just masks being worn by children for Halloween. This masterful scene owes much to cinematographer Henry Sharp, who began his career in the days of silent films. His many sound-era assignments included Dr. Cyclops for Paramount and two atmospheric horror films for Warner Brothers, The Hidden Hand and The Mysterious Doctor.

Inventive shot from inside a fireplace.

A wider shot of the costumed children shows them getting ready for trick or treat in the local tavern/restaurant owned by Ruth Gibson, played by Ruth Ford. Ruth is the mother of one of the children and also the sister of a well-respected doctor in town, Matt Adams.

Matt is sitting at the bar talking with his sister when Lorna suddenly staggers in the front door, barely able to get out a few words about the accident before fainting in Matt’s arms. Everyone heads down to the lake to launch a search and rescue operation and the doctor promises to join them as soon as he cares for Lorna. But as Matt attends to Lorna, his sister is talking with some men at the bar, and it’s clear that they’re not happy about Lorna coming back.

Apparently the sheriff isn’t a big fan of Lorna either. As rescue workers carry bodies from the lake, Matt arrives and hears the sheriff telling Rev. Stevens that he thinks it’s mighty strange that an accident takes place the minute Lorna comes back. Matt’s angry about the remark, but there isn’t much time to respond, since there’s work to be done. It looks like everyone aboard the bus has died but Lorna, and they can’t find the body of the old woman Lorna has told Matt about. Stevens and Matt, thinking the body may have drifted, search the rest of the lake without any luck. As the two men pause for a smoke, Republic finds an economical way to insert plot background in a few short sentences, rather than resorting to costly flashbacks that might take days to film:

Rev. Stevens: You were terribly in love with her (Lorna,) weren’t you?”

Matt: “I still am.”

Rev. Stevens: “Did you ever figure out why she left us both stranded at the church?”

Matt: “You know as much about it as I do.”

Rev. Stevens: “Lorna was always different from the others. She was always sort of withdrawn, into herself … oversensitive. And then after that series of accidents ...”

Matt: “Oh now, you know that was pure coincidence.”

Rev. Stevens: “I know it, but Lorna blames herself.”

And there you have it. The ever resourceful scriptwriters tell the viewer, in record time, that Lorna is a sensitive woman who was somehow involved in a series of accidents. She felt guilty, so she left Matt at the altar and fled town. Republic perfected the use of this kind of brief dialog to replace costly exposition scenes in its serials and westerns. In those films, where action was everything, there would be a short break between fights or shootouts, where plot developments would be presented.

Now that the viewer knows the background, the story can move forward again. Lorna relocates to the ancestral Webster home to recuperate and the good doctor quickly pays her a visit. She’s on the mend, he’s thrilled to have her back, and there’s some serious smooching. The only ominous sign arises when Matt hands Lorna a black veil he assumes is hers. Matt tells Lorna she was carrying it when she collapsed in the tavern after the crash. A shadow crosses Lorna’s face, because she knows it belonged to the mysterious old woman. That night, she picks up the long veil and puts it on. When she looks in the mirror, she sees the old hag’s reflection and screams.

Lorna’s housekeeper, Bessie, runs into the room to see what’s wrong. When Lorna pretends nothing happened, the woman is convinced her mistress is crazy. The housekeeper is played by Almira Sessions, who specialized in portraying maiden aunts, landladies and parlor maids. Sessions is perfect for her part here, where she pries into Lorna’s business at every turn and never misses an opportunity to gossip about her mistress.

The action now switches to the tavern and we get a brief establishing shot to set the scene. Unfortunately, the exterior of the pub, in this otherwise atmospheric film, simply doesn’t ring true. It appears someone simply affixed a sign saying “Pilgrim’s Tavern, Ruth Gibson, Proprietor” to the outside of one of the bungalows on the backlot.

Inside the tavern, Ruth’s daughter is telling her uncle that her doll is sick. As a doctor, Matt dutifully prescribes some peppermint candy! But things turn more serious a moment later, when Ruth brings up the topic of Lorna with Matt. She tells her brother he’s making a fool of himself over his old flame. Ruth is convinced Lorna left Matt at the altar because she had second thoughts about whether he was “worthy” of marrying into the Webster family. But it’s clear Matt doesn’t share Ruth’s views and has no intention of giving up his pursuit of Lorna.

Instead, the good doctor, in a jaunty and romantic mood, pays a visit to the Webster mansion, with a box of flowers in hand. He presents them to Lorna, but when she opens the box, the flowers are dead! As you can imagine, this casts a bit of a pall on the proceedings. That night, Lorna hears the dog howling in the church graveyard and leaves the house to investigate. The scene, as she wanders through the graveyard to the church, is well done and reminiscent of some of the atmospheric shots in I Walked with a Zombie. Inside the church, Lorna’s search of the gothic basement crypt for ancient documents, has much the same feel as the Lon Chaney Jr./Bela Lugosi exploration of the castle ruins for the secrets of life and death in Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man.

Lorna goes through the documents Reverend Stevens has been investigating and comes upon one written by Jezebel Trister in which she admits to being a witch. Trister, writing in 1645, says the devil will keep bringing her back for three hundred years, sometimes in the form of a dog. Right on cue, Lorna hears a bark. She goes to run upstairs and sees the dog that belonged to the old hag standing at the top. The dog growls at Lorna, but then leaves and Lorna makes her way back to the house, carrying the Trister document with her. A suspicious Bessie sees her return, and wants to know where she’s been and what she’s carrying.

Rebuffed by Lorna, the malicious Bessie begins a gossip campaign against our heroine. Director Walter Colmes introduces a montage of local residents calling each other on the phone to pass on Bessie’s message that Lorna is mentally unstable. As if to underscore Bessie’s conclusion, we next see Lorna showing Matt the Trister letter, and telling him she’s convinced the old hag is still alive and has come to get her after 300 years. Lorna also tells Matt she’s sure the town has turned against her. (She’s right about that one!) Ever the optimist though, Matt vows to cheer Lorna up by moving her from the gloomy old Webster house to his sister’s tavern. Then, as soon as he can make the arrangements, Matt says, the two of them can get married and go on a long honeymoon.

Ruth Ford, Jeanne Gail and Nancy Kelly.

Things certainly don’t get off to a promising start at the tavern. Matt’s sister Ruth is downright cold to Lorna. And Lorna is mocked by some of the men in the bar, one of whom is carving a witch for a wooden weathervane and asks Lorna to pose. It doesn’t help any that Lorna, having been told by Ruth to feed the goldfish, mistakenly pours rat poison instead of fish food into the tank. Naturally, Ruth’s daughter begins crying because her little pets have all gone belly-up!

Not too surprisingly, Lorna decides that staying at the tavern might not have been one of Matt’s best ideas. She tells Matt what happened, and says she wants to move back to the mansion. As usual, the unflappable doctor responds with his “Now don’t let that bother you, darling” routine. Even actress Nancy Kelly must be getting pretty tired of this by now because, for the first time in the film, she goes over the top. She lets her character Lorna become just a tad too hysterical while ranting about calling off the marriage in light of the dead flowers and the rat poison. John Loder, as Matt, tries the old “Pull yourself together … you’re acting like a child” speech, but it doesn’t do any good.

The next scene is one of several that were shot on location. Lorna is sitting by the edge of the lake first glimpsed during the rescue operation, thinking things over. Rev. Stevens comes along and joins her. Lorna voices her concerns, and Stevens says he’s got a book about superstition he wants her to read. In an inventive shot that belies the movie’s tight budget, as Lorna and Stevens leave the lake, the camera moves to a close-up of the water. Their shadows are reflected in the lake as they walk along the edge of the water, then rain drops start hitting the water and the camera shifts to heavy rain back at the mansion.

Inside, Lorna is sitting by the fireplace and reading the book Stevens gave her. A loose shutter is banging in the storm, and … as she gets up to fix it … the book slips to the floor. When she gets back, she’s shocked to see the book burning in the fireplace! Lorna manages to get it out, but when she turns, she sees the black dog is in the room.

Meanwhile, Ruth’s daughter Peggy shows up at the front door. She was staying at another little girl’s house, but they had a fight. Peggy explains she’s been soaked by the storm and needs to dry off. Lorna tries to call Ruth at the tavern to let her know where her daughter is, but the phone lines are down. Peggy, remembering all the stories she’s heard about Lorna being a witch, gets scared when our heroine approaches her and she takes off screaming. The little girl runs off so quickly that she leaves her doll behind, which the black dog quickly picks up and drops at Lorna’s feet.

We next see Peggy back in her room at the tavern, with her mother and Matt anxiously watching over her. The girl has been sick ever since she got back from Lorna’s house and Matt isn’t quite sure what’s wrong. As Peggy rests in bed, she keeps asking for her doll. Matt goes to Lorna’s house to ask about the doll, but Lorna denies Peggy was ever there. Then, in one of those rather unbelievable coincidences that will be dismissed at the end of the film, the book on superstition that Lorna retrieved from the fire, falls off the shelf next to Matt, revealing the doll which has been hidden behind it. While this incident has every appearance of having been engineered by a poltergeist, Matt simply takes the doll and heads out of the house.

Back at the tavern little Peggy’s condition is worsening and rumors are spreading that perhaps her visit to Lorna has something to do with it. Ruth heads down to the church where she prays for help because she fears her daughter may have been bewitched. Ruth doesn’t blame Lorna by name, but, in one of several instances where the script goes out of its way to portray residents of the town as small-minded and nasty, Ruth cries out: “Whoever it is, destroy them, destroy them!”

After voicing this somewhat less-than-edifying prayer, Ruth leaves the church and walks past the Webster mansion in a well-done day-for-night tracking shot. She thinks she hears something behind her and begins running, arriving at the tavern breathless. She tells patrons at the bar that she’s convinced she was being chased by something … perhaps an animal … that began following her at the Webster house. The locals in the tavern are sure Lorna is to blame, and as they ponder Ruth’s remark about a possible animal, right on cue, we hear a howl in the distance.

On Sunday, at church services, Rev. Stevens gives his sermon on the “ugly rumors” that have been spreading around town. No sooner does he begin trying to calm down his flock, than a nurse appears at the church entrance and comes running up to Matt’s pew. She explains that Peggy’s condition has worsened and Matt leaves to take the girl to the hospital. Give the Rev. Stevens “A” for effort. He continues preaching his message of reason, but doesn’t get too far before Ruth jumps up, points to Lorna, and begins screaming that Lorna is responsible for all of the evil that has taken place in town. Although he finally gets the congregation to settle down for a closing prayer, it’s obvious that the pastor’s attempts to combat superstition in Eben Rock have been far from a resounding success.

Leaving the church, Lorna heads home to the mansion. Once inside, she writes a note to Matt saying she just can’t stand it anymore. Although Peggy is in the hospital now, her condition isn’t improving. Matt goes to the church to talk with Rev. Stevens and finds him down in the crypt, where he’s going through old Eben Rock documents. One of the drawers in a desk is jammed, and when they pull it out they find Elijah Webster’s long-lost journal. In it, he admits to forcing Jezebel Trister to sign a false confession.

Matt and Rev. Stevens rush over to the Webster mansion, hoping that once Lorna sees proof that the witch story was a hoax, she’ll return to normal. But several vigilantes from town arrive at the Webster place first and begin hurling rocks at Lorna’s window.

When Matt and Rev. Stevens show up, Matt chases them while Rev. Stevens runs into the house to check on Lorna. When he gets to the top of the stairs, he’s attacked by the black dog which seems to be guarding the landing. Next, we get a scene supposedly showing Otto Kruger and the dog tumbling down the long staircase as they fight. In reality, it’s quite obvious that Kruger is being doubled by a stuntman who doesn’t look a great deal like him. In close-ups we do get to see Kruger, since all he has to do is roll around the floor with a friendly pooch held to his chest!

John Loder gets back in time to rescue Otto, but in all the excitement, Lorna … still convinced that she is responsible for a curse on Eben Rock … has managed to slip out of the house and head for the lake. Matt and Rev. Stevens take off after her. Lorna has really gone over the edge now and, as she runs through the woods, she sees visions of townspeople and hears their voices accusing her of being a witch.

As she makes her way along the top of the ridge that heads down to the lake, Lorna trips, tumbling down into the water. The miniature shot of Lorna’s fall has to rank as one of the least convincing special effects scenes ever. A dummy is thrown down a fake-looking miniature cliff into some water below. Matt, hot on Lorna’s heels, jumps in after her (or rather, a badly done miniature dummy of Matt is thrown in.)

Matt helps get Lorna back to the edge of the lake, where the two of them are met by Rev. Stevens. With little time left to tie up all the loose ends, the script writers now throw reason to the winds. The black dog, which has just viciously attacked Otto Kruger and was beaten away with a chair by John Loder, suddenly comes trotting up to them, gentle as a lamb, and leads Kruger over to the witch monument by the lake, where the dog had apparently dragged his mistress’s body after the bus crashed. It was hidden by a pine tree, and Kruger confidently tells Loder that this is the answer to “The one thing we couldn’t explain.”

While it’s true that finding the body does prove that Lorna wasn’t lying about the old woman she claimed to meet on the bus, any alert viewer will realize this isn’t the only thing that hasn’t been explained in the movie. But after a couple of dissolves to tranquil pictures of the lake, we switch to a shot of a very happy Matt and Lorna at home, with Rev. Stevens rushing in to say that the old woman has been identified as an escapee from a county institution. She used to live in Eben Rock, knew the old legends, and began to believe that she was Jezebel Trister. With that rather shaky explanation, the scriptwriters declare a happy ending and we fade to black.

Woman: Behind the Scenes

If London Blackout Murders demonstrates Republic’s ability to produce films that foreshadowed Columbia’s The Return of the Vampire, and if The Fatal Witness compares favorably with some of Producer Ben Pivar’s Evelyn Anker’s pictures at Universal, then it is The Woman Who Came Back, a Walter Colmes production released through Republic, that most closely resembles an attempt at the more subtle approach to horror perfected by the Val Lewton unit at RKO.

While much of the movie is quite good, it must be said that … just like the “reasonable explanation” ending to MGM’s Mark of the Vampire, where it turns out Bela Lugosi and Carroll Borland are merely members of an acting troupe … The Woman Who Came Back wraps up on a rather unconvincing note. Granted that the old woman who escaped from the institution might believe herself to be Jezebel Trister, how did she know Lorna would be coming back to town?

More to the point, how did she know the exact day Lorna would be coming and which bus she would be taking? Then too, it seems rather strange that the old woman would be carrying money that was printed 300 years earlier. And, even if the viewer can get past that, how did the old girl recognize Lorna, go and sit right next to her, and introduce herself as a witch burned by Lorna’s ancestor?

On top of that, there is never any explanation for why the flowers that John Loder has purchased for Nancy Kelly turn out to be dead when she opens the box. Nor does the viewer ever find out why the book on superstition pops out of the bookcase in front of Loder, revealing the doll that Kelly has been trying to conceal. The weird coincidences go on and on, and it’s almost as if Walter Comes, who functioned as both producer and director on this one, ran out of time and decided to simply explain what he could in the few minutes remaining.

Colmes often co-produced projects with Republic, and … after he wrapped-up The Woman Who Came Back in the spring of 1945 ... he got ready for The French Key with Evelyn Ankers, which would begin shooting in the fall. Some of Colmes’ films were simply released by Republic or other studios and would actually be made by a company set up for that specific purpose. For example, Identity Unknown with Richard Arlen was released by Republic, but is actually copyright 1945 by “Identity Unknown Inc.”

Colmes frequently used Bartlett A. Carre as the production manager for his films, including The Woman Who Came Back. Bart Carre, as he was often credited, had an interesting career, starting in the business as an actor and stuntman in westerns, including some for Willis Kent where future Republic executive Mandy Schaefer was the director. Carre moved to the other side of the camera in the thirties and began working as a production supervisor. He remained in the business right through the fifties and sixties, contributing to some low-budget horror films that have become cult favorites.

Carre was production supervisor and assistant director of The She-Creature in 1956 and assistant director of Voodoo Woman in 1957. He was also production manager of Invasion of the Saucer Men, Pit and the Pendulum, Tales of Terror and other American International horrors. The high production values on The Woman Who Came Back indicate that, given a decent budget, Carre could do an excellent job.

The movie also benefited from the choice of Hollywood veteran Henry Sharp as cinematographer. He worked in the silents on such Douglas Fairbanks classics as Don Q Son of Zorro and The Black Pirate. He may be best known in the sound era for Dr. Cyclops, but my favorites were his horror/mysteries at Warners, 1942’s The Hidden Hand with Craig Stevens and 1943’s The Mysterious Doctor with Loder. He shot the moody Jealousy with Loder and The Man in Half Moon Street with Nils Asther in 1945, released respectively by Republic and Paramount.

A colonial mansion set is used as the Elijah Webster home and, together with the old crypt under the church, is a centerpiece for much of the action. It’s a bit disconcerting to notice that, as John Loder pulls into the driveway from a backlot street, the tops of the back scaffolding for other sets can be seen in the distance. Still the outdoor shots are welcome in the film, and there are just enough of them, intercut with soundstage action, to lend a credible air to the movie. For example, in one brief segment, we see the breeze swaying pine trees and then watch as the camera pans upward from bare branches on denuded trees to the top of the scary old Elijah Webster home. And the church basement office of the Rev. Stevens, with its low vaulted ceilings, adds a nice touch of menace to the proceedings.

One of the few bothersome things about the film, as mentioned earlier, is the disappointing miniature work. It bears no resemblance to the special effects wizardry of the Lydecker brothers. Ray Mercer worked mostly on poverty row at the time, with films like Return of the Ape Man, White Pongo and Devil Bat’s Daughter keeping him busy in the forties. He’s also credited, or discredited as the case may be, with another PRC cheapie, Wild Horse Phantom. This is the film in which PRC once again makes use of the cheesy “Devil Bat” device so that Al “Fuzzy” St. John can do his scared sidekick routine in a cave. And Mercer’s luck didn’t improve much in the fifties, when he did Bowery Boys movies and exploitation flicks like the Ed Wood classic, Jail Bait.

Mercer seemed especially ill-suited to the films Colmes released through Republic, simply because his work looked so poorly-rendered alongside the special effects the studio routinely provided for its own films. The shots in this film of Lorna falling into the lake and Matt jumping in to rescue her, are genuinely embarrassing. The dolls are so out of proportion to the fake-looking cliff that Lorna and Matt would have to be 11 feet tall to match them! The shots are out of focus too, probably because someone saw them when it was too late to do them over, and decided to distort the images in hopes that a bit of a blur would cover a multitude of sins.

Nancy Kelly in the church basement.

Another Colmes production released by Republic, Identity Unknown which I mentioned earlier, didn’t fare much better. The print of the film I’ve seen doesn’t mention who did the special effects in the credits, but one thing’s for sure. This wins the dubious distinction of having the second-worst miniature work in a film released by Republic. It’s a good movie over all, but it opens with a shot of a ship that looks like a child’s toy sailing in a bathtub. I kept waiting for a giant “rubber ducky” to come floating by!

The two leads are well-suited to this horror tale. John Loder had made scores of films in Britain before coming to America briefly, in the late twenties, without much luck. He went back to England and made more films there, including 1933’s The Private Life of Henry VIII with Charles Laughton. He also added a horror credit to his resume with The Man Who Lived Again aka The Man Who Changed His Mind, a 1936 Boris Karloff mad scientist chiller.

In 1937, Loder was in Doctor Syn with George Arlis. The story would later be made by Hammer as Night Creatures with Peter Cushing. (Disney filmed a version with Patrick McGoohan using the title, The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh.) The director of Loder’s Dr. Syn was Roy William Neill who would go on to helm Frankenstein Meets the Wolf Man as well as the Sherlock Holmes series at Universal.

When Loder made his second visit to Hollywood, he wound up working with Basil Rathbone’s Dr. Watson, Nigel Bruce. They appeared together in the 1940 Paramount film Adventure in Diamonds, which starred George Brent. Loder was dealing with a girl’s best friend again that year when he visited Universal for Diamond Frontier in which he costarred with that studio’s soon-to-be horror queen, Anne Nagel.

Leading up to The Woman Who Came Back, Loder was featured in several horror films, including 1943’s The Mysterious Doctor, in which he appeared with Lester Matthews, leading man in Universal’s original The Raven and Werewolf of London, as well as co-star of Republic’s London Blackout Murders. Loder also appeared in The Hairy Ape and A Game of Death, a remake of The Most Dangerous Game.

But Loder’s most significant horror film in terms of relevance to The Woman Who Came Back was The Brighton Strangler. Filmed at RKO in the summer of 1944, it opened in the spring of 1945. In Brighton, Loder is an actor who, dazed by falling debris during a German air raid, becomes unable to differentiate between the person he is in real life and the character he plays in the theater. Unfortunately, the character is a strangler. In many ways, in this film Loder portrays the same type of person Nancy Kelly plays in The Woman Who Came Back. Both are confused through no fault of their own, frightened and distrustful of those around them and of themselves. Loder, though, is of course less sympathetic since he really is guilty of the crimes.

Nancy Kelly started in the business as a popular child actress and successfully made the transition to adult roles. She and John Loder had worked together previously in the 1941 film Scotland Yard. Ironically, Evelyn Ankers had originally been slated for the role Kelly eventually got in that 20th Century Fox film.  Kelly was also featured in films from RKO, Universal and the Pine-Thomas unit at Paramount in addition to appearing in another Republic offering, Murder in the Music Hall. In 1956 Kelly was nominated for an Academy Award for her performance in The Bad Seed. The actress kept busy in television too, lending her considerable talents to a wide range of shows, including Suspicion, Thriller and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour.

There are times where critics might say Kelly overdoes it a bit here … times, for example, when her eyes get perhaps a bit too wide to express fright or surprise. But she had to walk a tight line in a film where the script often called for hysteria, so her overall performance was actually quite good. Kelly preferred the stage to film and excelled in both. Talent ran in the family. Her brother was Jack Kelly who co-starred with James Garner in Maverick.

As was the case with similar Republic films, smaller roles were filled with familiar faces. Harry Tyler, who plays the troublemaker who leads the opposition to Lorna’s presence in town, was well known to movie-goers of the thirties and forties and appeared frequently on TV and in films right up until his death in 1961. He could be a hobo, a henchman, a carnival hawker or a convict. He had the kind of face that seemed to fit almost any character part.

Emmett Vogan, who played the doctor Matt consults about little Peggy’s illness, appeared in Republic features such as The Vampire’s Ghost and The French Key, and showed up in serials like The Purple Monster Strikes and The Crimson Ghost.

It’s also nice to see veteran actor J. Farrell MacDonald as the sheriff in this one. Many genre fans remember him best from the 1932 Monogram chiller, The Thirteenth Guest, in which he plays Police Captain Ryan.

And last, but definitely not least, let us wrap up our discussion of this tale of superstition and witchcraft, by considering the woman who appears as the closest thing to a witch in The Woman Who Came Back … the frightful looking actress who plays the old hag on the bus, Elspeth Dudgeon.

Elspeth Dudgeon as the woman who thinks she’s Jezebel Trister

It is perhaps telling that, in one of Dudgeon’s early films, The Old Dark House, she played a man … Sir Roderick Femm. In fact, director James Whale even bills her as a man, “John” Dudgeon. The actress also appeared with Dracula, Mummy and Black Cat leading man David Manners in Monogram’s The Moonstone, and she played Aunt Lucy in the nifty little programmer Mystery House from Warner Brothers. The selection of Elspeth Dudgeon to play the old woman who thinks she’s Jezebel Trister is just one more example of the kind of attention to detail that went into the casting and overall production of  The Woman Who Came Back.

THE MADONNA’S SECRET

(Released 1946)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Stephen Auer; Director: William Thiele; Screenplay: Bradbury Foote and William Thiele; Cinematographer: John Alton; Editor: Fred Allen.

CAST: Francis Lederer, Ann Rutherford, Gail Patrick, John Litel, Linda Stirling, Will Wright, John Hamilton, Tanis Chandler.

“Now I know. The mind can reject some things … things too fearful to remember.” … Francis Lederer, after dreaming that he has murdered several women.

This Psychological thriller benefits from more star power than usual, some nice plot twists and excellent production values. Francis Lederer, who plays the tormented artist James Corbin, was often in big budget productions at studios like Paramount and Warner Brothers, and the same year he appeared in The Madonna’s Secret at Republic, he made Diary of a Chambermaid directed by Jean Renoir.

The film boasts stunning sets, excellent photography and good miniatures from the Lydecker brothers. While the mysterious artist/murdered models theme is similar to Bluebeard, the delicious twist ending is a treat.

The Madonna’s Secret opens with theater critic John Earl gazing intently at a portrait in an art gallery. Earl, played by Edward Ashley, thinks the woman in the picture, which was painted by an artist identified as James Corbin, looks very familiar. However, he can’t quite put his finger on where he’s seen her before. Earl knows the proprietor of the gallery, Mr. Hadley, and inquires about the model. Hadley says it’s the same woman Corbin has been painting over and over again and he provides Earl with the model’s address.

When Earl arrives at the apartment, he’s surprised to find that the model, Helen North, looks nothing like the girl in the painting. North, played by Republic serial queen Linda Sterling, explains that Corbin uses her to model for the body of his portraits but always paints the face of another woman he knew. Linda Stirling never looked lovelier and Corbin, as played by Lederer, would have to be nuts to want to substitute a different face for hers. But it’s necessary for the plot, so let’s accept it.

Also necessary for the plot is the next scene, in which Helen North’s boyfriend (Michael Hawks, below on staircase) lashes out at her, saying that Corbin’s refusal to put her face on the portraits is an insult. Helen (Stirling, below on landing) isn’t really all that concerned about it, but the boyfriend insists. Helen eventually agrees and promises that she will confront Corbin about the situation.

That night, the theater critic waits outside Corbin’s home and gets a glimpse of the artist as he leaves the house. Suddenly Earl realizes why he knew the haunting face in the picture. Corbin is actually a Parisian artist whose real name is James Corbeille. Back in France, he had been responsible for a painting known as “The Madonna’s Secret.” It was a lovely portrait of a model he intended to marry. But, before the nuptials could take place the model turned up dead, floating in the Seine.

The theater critic follows the artist to a nightclub, which is perhaps the most impressive set in the film. It’s also the location of one of the more bizarre scenes featured in The Madonna’s Secret. The woman singing in the nightclub is excellent, but we quickly realize that this is no ordinary performance. She’s warbling away as a knife-thrower shoots daggers at her! The singer, Tanis Chandler (aka Tanis Goldthwaite,) doesn’t seem in the least bit concerned by the unusual circumstances accompanying her performance. In addition to appearing in other films, such as The Catman of Paris and the Charlie Chan entries Shadows Over Chinatown and The Trap, Tanis was in early TV shows like The Cisco Kid.

Corbin, meanwhile, is seated at a table in the nightclub sketching the singer with a dagger through her heart! Since John Earl sees the picture when he comes to Corbin’s table, who can blame him for being more convinced than ever that Corbin got away with murder in Paris? But Corbin points out that he was cleared by French authorities and says he fled Paris with his mother to escape ugly rumors like the one Earl seems intent on spreading.

The next morning, Helen North is at Corbin’s home to pack her modeling kit. She explains that she no longer intends to model for him because she’s tired of having him paint another woman’s face on her figure. Corbin, who has been in such great mourning for his ex-love, agrees right away to switch to painting Helen. Not only that, but it isn’t long before Corbin is madly in love with his new model. The brief length of Republic’s B-pictures never left much time for character development, but in Madonna, the director faces a real “so many women, so little time” dilemma. The sheer number of romances that have to be squeezed into the short period allotted for the film make Corbin look like what psychologists today would call a “relationship addict!”

The fact that the lovely Linda Stirling plays Lederer’s latest love interest at least makes the whirlwind nature of their courtship seem more believable. Sadly the inevitable (for the plot at least) happens, and Linda is found dead before the wedding can take place. This time the body is found in the Hudson River rather than the Seine. Our theater critic is sure he knows exactly who is to blame and he loses no time in revealing his suspicions about Corbin to Police Lt. Roberts, in the person of ubiquitous character actor John Litel. Litel could always be counted on to play the part of a detective, district attorney or business executive with equal believability.

There’s plenty of evidence that points to Corbin, including the fact that Linda’s body was found near where it would have washed up had it been dumped from a boat house Corbin owns. So far, though, Roberts can’t prove anything against Lederer. John Earl is determined to get that proof. But his editor at the newspaper thinks Earl is devoting too much time to the case and too little to the theater reviews he’s getting paid to do. It’s nice to see John Hamilton getting a little dress rehearsal for his Perry White role on TV’s Superman, as he plays Earl’s boss, telling him to stick with his job as a critic and lay off the side investigations into his suspicions about James Corbin.

Since the story line calls for Lederer to be introduced to another woman … and quickly … so that he can be falsely accused of murdering her, the seductive actress Gail Patrick suddenly shows up. Gail may have been a bit past her prime for ingénue parts, but she was still extremely beautiful and she’s perfect in Madonna as a wealthy adventuress who sets her sights on Corbin. The two meet in the office of the art dealer who displays Corbin’s paintings.

In the art dealer’s office, by the way, a sheer see-through curtain covers a large window that looks out on the city’s skyscrapers. The very next scene shows the police lieutenant meeting with John Earl in his apartment, and the apartment looks out on the very same skyline!

Earl is still determined to prove that Corbin is the killer. With that in mind, he’s planted a spy in the enemy camp. The theater critic has gotten Helen North’s sister, Linda, to use the last name “Morgan” and apply for a modeling job with Corbin. Former MGM star Ann Rutherford, who plays Linda, was still a major name, so the fact that she looked nothing like Linda Stirling didn’t seem to bother Republic executives, especially since they probably got her at a bargain price. At this point, MGM had sold her contract and the actress was being loaned out to other studios.

Although Rutherford is supposed to be gathering evidence against Lederer, she soon begins to believe that he may not be guilty. There are also signs that she may actually be falling for him herself. Meanwhile, Lederer seems to be in lust, if not quite love, with Gail Patrick’s character.

Howard Greer, who designed Gail Patrick’s gowns, must have been keeping his fingers crossed the censors wouldn’t be looking too closely. While there was a flesh-colored layer under the dresses she wore, strategically-placed clusters of material on top only served to heighten the impression that audiences of the time were seeing more than they were supposed to. The painting in the art gallery that opens the picture also takes some chances. The woman is draped in an almost see-through little number that might have gotten code enforcers of the day hot and bothered if they had paid enough attention. Since the bulk of Republic’s output was made up of serials and westerns that appealed to the matinee set, it’s possible the censors had grown a bit less diligent about reviewing some of the studio’s features.

Gail Patrick, though, remains diligent about pursuing Lederer. They go out for a romantic evening, but the mood is spoiled when he turns down her suggestion that they marry. The two split up and head their separate ways, but when Gail gets home she receives a call telling her to meet Lederer at the boat house. She’s thrilled, thinking he’s changed his mind. As astute viewers, of course, we know differently.

When Patrick goes missing and is later found dead, John Litel and the district attorney, played by the always reliable Pierre Watkin, take Lederer in and grill him relentlessly, but he simply can’t remember whether he’s killed anybody. Some last minute evidence, however, seems to seal his fate. A search of the boathouse has turned up a piece of fur from Gail’s evening wrap. By this time Ann Rutherford is in love with Lederer and decides to stand by her man. Watkin orders Corbin jailed and Rutherford, who has been with him in the D.A.’s office, vows to continue fighting for him.

But the ordeal has taken a toll on Rutherford’s nerves and Leona Roberts, playing Lederer’s mother, decides Ann needs a nice rest. What better place to take the dear child than the boathouse? Viewers may wonder why the very place that has been the scene of the previous murders should be considered the perfect tonic for our distraught heroine, but Rutherford goes along with the idea. She doesn’t initially seem very suspicious, even when the elderly lady insists that she take some tea that turns out to be drugged.

Back in his cell, Corbin is pacing around trying to make some sense of everything and going over past events in his mind. Something suddenly clicks … he knows Linda is in grave danger and convinces the police to head to the boathouse and take him with them.

At the boathouse, now that Linda is on the couch immobilized by the drug she gave her, Mrs. Corbin begins to sweetly go through the list of women she’s murdered so junior would never leave her. To actress Leona Roberts’ credit, she does an excellent job of making this recital truly chilling!

As she’s about to inject Linda with poison, the police show up and shoot the old woman. Corbin is at his mother’s side as she dies. And it appears Ann Rutherford and Francis Lederer will live happily ever after, depending on just how much therapy they require.

Madonna: Behind-the-Scenes

With the luxury of a first rate cast and a month-long shooting schedule, The Madonna’s Secret has the look and feel of a major studio production. Director William (Wilhelm) Thiele was excellent at injecting atmosphere into his films. Thiele’s 1937 MGM mystery, London by Night, is a case in point. He surrounds George Murphy, Leo G. Carroll and George Zucco with enough fog and shadows to keep viewers on the edge of their seats, even if the killer is a bit obvious.

Thiele’s cinematographer on The Madonna’s Secret is a master of shadows who would go on to become famous among fans of film noir. John Alton’s ability to suggest a setting with subtle lighting changes became his trademark.

Art director Hilyard Brown worked on a slew of westerns at Republic, but also did some of the studio’s better-known horror films and mysteries such as Valley of the Zombies and The Mysterious Mr. Valentine. Later he would serve as art director on such classics as Creature from the Black Lagoon and The Night of the Hunter. (He and several others shared Oscar honors for Cleopatra.)

This was one of Republic’s more polished films, yet the studio reportedly managed to keep production costs in the $250,000 range. The major names in the film would have pushed the studio’s budget for the cast above its usual modest norm, but there was always an eye on savings. Ann Rutherford had built her reputation at MGM, but when that studio sold her contract to 20th Century Fox, the powers-that-be at Fox saw money to be made by loaning her out for films like this one.

Republic has often been described as a “Serial Factory,” but it was a “Feature Factory” as well. The same types of economic measures it used on serials and westerns were applied to some extent to features as well.

Let’s take a look at just one aspect of The Madonna’s Secret script to see how the studio dealt with potentially costly scenes. The script calls for bodies to be found near water, Francis Lederer to be seen on the edge of the river where a body washed up, shots of Lederer piloting a Chris-Craft motorboat, and scenes that show the vessel pulling into an expensive-looking boathouse. While MGM might think nothing of heading over to Catalina Island, Republic saved time and money by shooting almost everything at the Radford Avenue lot. At night, when Lederer is supposedly at the edge of a river talking with veteran character actor Will Wright, cinematographer John Alton shoots the scene from above the two principals, with only a street lamp to illuminate the sand and the edge of some water. Alternated with close-ups of the two, it’s enough to give the impression that they really are at edge of the Hudson River.

John Alton’s “Hudson River” overhead shot

When Lederer is actually supposed to be traveling on the river in a boat, we briefly see stock footage of a Chris-Craft, (not hard to find around the studio, since Republic used Chris-Crafts in S.O.S. Coast Guard and so many other serials.) Chris-Craft reportedly supplied boats to studio chief Herbert Yates in return for Republic featuring them in its movies. The Republic deal with the boat maker is an early example of the so-called “product placement” arrangements that have become so much a part of the modern movie business.

In close-ups, meanwhile, Republic relies on rear projection. But the company is at its most inventive when showing the vessel pulling into the boathouse to dock. The movie magic that came out of the Republic carpentry building, where workers putting sets together shared space with the men who worked on the miniatures, was something to behold. The Republic horror features didn’t require as many miniatures as the serials, but they were available when needed and saved plenty of time and money. It would have taken a lot of on-location scouting time to find the perfect boathouse on a lake for The Madonna’s Secret, so Republic simply had the Lydecker brothers build one to scale. As usual, it’s an excellent job and the viewer has to be watching closely to realize it isn’t the real thing, as the boat glides through the water realistically and maneuvers smoothly into the boathouse.

Miniature boat enters miniature boathouse.

As so often happened with its features, Republic cast a wide net for various players in this film. And names like Francis Lederer, Ann Rutherford and Gail Patrick certainly gave the movie marquee value. But the presence of a Republic serial and western regular in a small but important role is of much more interest to many of us.

Linda Stirling, who added her charms to this feature, like everyone involved in serials at Republic, was working almost around the clock. A six day week was normal and shooting could sometimes last until nine or ten at night. Since she might be required to report to the lot at five the next morning, that didn’t leave a lot of time for sleep. The actress actually considered non-serial assignments like The Madonna’s Secret a kind of vacation, since she was free of the rigorous serial shooting schedules.

And that’s the way I view these Republic features too … a kind of vacation for serial fans like me. For those of us who have spent countless hours enjoying Republic’s cliffhangers, they provide a chance to see our favorite studio using its serial skills in a different format and environment. The Madonna’s Secret is among the best examples.

THE CATMAN OF PARIS

(Released 1946)

CREDITS: Associate Producer: Marek Libkov; Director: Lesley Selander; Screenplay: Sherman Lowe; Cinematographer: Reggie Lanning; Editor: Harry Keller.

CAST: Carl Esmond, Lenore Aubert, Douglass Dumbrille, Gerald Mohr, Fritz Feld, Adele Mara, Francis Pierlot, Maurice Cass, Robert J. Wilke, Georges Renavent, Francis McDonald, John Dehner, Anthony Caruso.

“You may scoff, but that does not alter the fact that human beings have been known to take the form of certain animals” … Fritz Feld as the Prefect of Police

When Republic ventured into horror territory covered by other studios, the company always added some unique touches of its own. Republic moved its vampire to Africa and had a white linen suit replace a dark cape when it made The Vampire’s Ghost. Valley of the Zombies, meanwhile, takes place in the big city and there isn’t a zombie in sight. So it shouldn’t come as any surprise that the closest Republic comes to a Wolf Man-type film takes place in Paris and involves a cat rather than a werewolf.

Sherman Lowe gets credit for the original screenplay, but he may have borrowed the locale from Guy Endore’s popular novel, The Werewolf of Paris. Lowe was more at home scripting serials for Columbia and writing westerns for Monogram, PRC and Universal. Perhaps that’s why a few staples of the western show up in this horror film, including a surprisingly well-done carriage chase.

Too bad that the opening shot in the film, showing an eerie French street scene as the credits run, is ruined by the decision to give it away as a miniature almost immediately. Unlike the impressive miniature that provides a backdrop for the credits in The Lady and the Monster and leads the viewer to believe that he or she is looking at a spooky and potentially real castle in the desert, in Catman we know immediately that the realistic turret and assorted buildings and cobbled streets up on the screen must be a miniature. This is hammered home by the fact that we see a giant pussycat walk through the little set. This is not to say that the Lydeckers didn’t do their usual excellent job on this miniature. It’s just that it seems such a shame to ruin the illusion so quickly. (Note to all directors: Showing a friendly-looking cat at the beginning of a horror film does nothing to enhance the movie. Cute-looking animals fail to inspire terror.) Producers still hadn’t learned this simple fact many years later when they made Night of the Lepus. A bunny rabbit, no matter what the size, simply isn’t scary!

As the film proper gets underway, Carl Esmond, playing Charles Regnier, an author who has returned to France after visiting the Orient, enters The Café du Bois in Paris with a companion, Henry Borchard. While the two are being escorted to a table, it becomes clear Regnier is considered a celebrity, because he has written a book that, while popular with the public, has earned him enemies within the government.

Even though the film has barely begun, Republic decides to insert a musical number at this point, and viewers are treated to showgirls performing the Can-Can on a stage that looks suspiciously like the one used a few months earlier in The Madonna’s Secret. Regnier’s companion Henry Borchard, is played by Douglas Dumbrille, a busy actor whose bread and butter consisted mostly of mysteries.  Perhaps best known for playing Manderlay in Castle in the Desert, Dumbrille appeared in a couple of other Charlie Chan films, a Mr. Motto, an Ellery Queen, a Michael Shayne and a pair of entries in the Lone Wolf series. At Universal, his films included Lon Chaney Jr.’s The Frozen Ghost as well as The Cat Creeps.

Here, playing Borchard, Dumbrille notices that Charles appears to be ill. Regnier says he feels tired and can’t really explain what’s been wrong with him lately. He decides he needs some fresh air and feels it would be best to leave the café.

Although Charles thinks a walk will do him good, he’s obviously feeling light headed and keeps rubbing his temple. As he tries to support himself against the side of a building, a small black cat scurries out of the way. (Again, though, the little feline looks cute rather than threatening.) At this point, Regnier begins to have strange visions … icebergs, lightening flashing, a buoy thrashing about in rough water … that seem to cloud his memory. (By the way, director Lesley Selander does finally get it right. The shot of the buoy in the water dissolves to a black cat’s haunting eyes as they stare into the camera and this time the cat does look scary!)

Now the scene shifts to a man leaving the French Ministry of Justice with a briefcase. As he walks along the street, a coachman calls out to him, and … as the man moves closer … B-movie fans will recognize the face, if not the name. It’s Francis McDonald, who had a long career in silents before moving to sound films. He worked continuously in the thirties and forties and switched to television later. Here he plays a character called Devereaux and gives us his best imitation of a French accent.

Republic often saved time and money by using the most direct means possible to move the plot along. In this case, we have a coachman call to Devereaux and ask why he’s going home later than usual. This allows Francis McDonald to explain that he’s finally finished the “tedious job” of preparing the important documents he’s carrying which must be presented to the Prefect of Police in the morning. In this brief exchange we learn who Devereaux is, why he’s out so late, where he’s going, what he’s carrying that makes him a potential target and why he’ll be missed if he doesn’t show up in the morning.

This is where things get good. As Devereaux walks away, we see a giant, ghostly shadow fall over the building behind the coach. Obviously Devereaux is in for a surprise, which comes after he turns a corner and a caped figure jumps on top of him from a tree. Everything about this segment is excellent, from the time we first see the creature’s shadow until the time Devereaux is attacked, his briefcase removed by a hand with long claw-like fingernails. Even the music is perfect, resembling some of the cues Universal used in the Basil Rathbone/Nigel Bruce Sherlock Holmes series.

However, things go from the sublime to the ridiculous. No sooner do we get the excellently staged attack on Devereaux, than the miniature with the cat walking through it resurfaces. The camera pulls back and we see actors Gerald Mohr and Fritz Feld leaning on opposite sides of the table that supports the miniature. Mohr, playing Inspector Severen, tells Feld, playing the Prefect of Police, that he had the replica built to give Feld a “clearer picture” of the murder scene.

Mohr delivers the line with a straight face, even though the idea simply makes no sense. If Mohr wants to show Feld the exact location of the crime, he can just point to a map. Better yet, why not take Feld to the actual scene of the murder so he can get a first-hand glimpse of the surroundings? Making a perfect scale model would be a waste of both time and money.

However, the idea isn’t any stranger than the one espoused by Feld when he replies to Mohr. He mentions that the victim was “clawed to ribbons,” as if by a cat. He then goes off on a tangent, saying he’s sure the murder will turn out to be “supernatural,” and reminding Mohr of legends about werewolves and catmen. Huh? One man gets scratched during a murder and suddenly the head of the police department is convinced Paris is dealing with a werewolf-like catman? If they told him about a rash of robberies in Paris, would he assume that aliens from outer space were using magnetic rays to steal money and taking it back to their home planet in a UFO? The viewer can be forgiven for expecting men with nets to enter at any time and take dear old Feld off to a rest home!

That doesn’t happen, however. Instead Mohr points out to his boss that Carl Esmond’s character, Regnier, would make a dandy suspect, since the documents taken from Devereaux were related to Regnier’s controversial book. Moreover, pinning a murder on him would be a great way to discredit Regnier’s book, which portrays government officials in an unfavorable light. So Esmond is hauled in for questioning by Mohr and Feld. Unable to get much out of him, Feld pulls back a curtain and reveals his pièce de résistance, the crime scene miniature. Unfortunately for the two French officials, any hopes the little replica would somehow frighten Regnier into a confession are quickly dashed. The author seems more amused by the model than shaken, and that’s the same reaction Fritz Feld gets when he reveals his theory about a “supernatural” murder.

By now, Feld has developed a few more outlandish details that he tries out on Esmond. Feld tells our lead player: “Now you, monsieur, have traveled to many strange places in the two years you have been away from France.” He mentions India and Tibet before taking a gigantic leap of idiotic reasoning: “It seems only logical that a man of your intellect would learn, let us say, certain strange rituals … the black arts.” Feld further speculates that this knowledge has given the author control over the supernatural!

As would be expected, Esmond reacts with mocking skepticism: “In other words, you suspect me of turning myself into a cat merely to kill a harmless old man!” Perhaps realizing that Feld’s theories make him sound a few fries short of a Happy Meal, Mohr chimes in with, “Well, let us say that you found some way to make it appear to be done by a cat.

The game of “Catman and Mouse” isn’t over, though. Regnier, after being told he is not to leave Paris, immediately goes to tell his buddy Borchard that the police have apparently decided that he is the main suspect in the murder. When Esmond tells him about the “Catman” theory, Borchard laughs it off. (By the way, Douglas Dumbrille as Borchard, uses the same rather insincere chuckle he invoked in many a film, to let the viewer know this was a false heartiness signaling that the character he was playing wasn’t quite what he appeared to be.)

In an attempt to cheer Charles up, Borchard takes him to visit Paul Audet, the publisher of Regnier’s book.  Audet confirms that the book is taking Paris by storm and compares Regnier to literary greats like Victor Hugo. Audet is played by familiar character actor Francis Pierlot. He is perhaps best known for the role of Dr. Phipps in the Universal classic Night Monster, but genre fans will also remember him from films like Bewitched and Dragonwyck

In Catman, he asks Charles to level with him. As the publisher of Regnier’s book, “Fraudulent Justice,” he stands to lose a great deal of money if the government can prove that Regnier gained illegal access to the court documents upon which the book was based … the very documents Devereaux was carrying the night he was murdered. Regnier swears he never saw the documents and that the details of the case he revealed in his book were simply a figment of his imagination, as if they came to him in a dream.

Wherever the contents came from, Audet tells Charles that his daughter, who knew Regnier before he left Paris and has been corresponding with him while he’s been gone, is extremely impressed with the book. Since she is conveniently working in the back room, everyone agrees it would be a perfect time for Regnier to visit her (especially since we’re well into the movie now without, so far, introducing our female lead!)

Lenore Aubert may be best known to fans for her role as Sandra Mornay in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein, but she’s every bit as beautiful here as Marie Audet. True, her hair is piled up high on her head as if anticipating the bee-hive hair styles of the fifties and sixties, but … hey, you can’t have everything.

The warm greeting the two give each other makes it very clear that love is in the air. But there’s a fly in the ointment … it seems Regnier is engaged. So, when Carl Esmond as Regnier asks Lenore as Marie to dinner, she has to tell him she doesn’t feel it would be fair to his fiancée. “Talking here or writing harmless letters is one thing, but dining together is quite another,” says Lenore.

Of course, this is after she has been flirting outrageously with him and directed him to sit practically on top of her on a love seat … talk about mixed signals! The line Carl Esmond is given to read in response is hardly a winner either. He tells Lenore, “I guess that’s the penalty I must pay for being engaged to Marguerite.”

This being a Republic picture, you can be sure that the woman standing in the way of our hero’s happiness, fiancée Marguerite Duval, is played by none other than Adele Mara, the studio’s favorite bad girl. For a transition to the scene where Mara and Esmond will confront each other at a party being thrown in their honor, Lesley Selander uses a painting of the outside of a mansion. It’s very similar to the one used in The Fatal Witness and is too static to be realistic.

Unfortunately, the long balcony along the mansion garden, where we see Mara and Esmond walking, isn’t much of an improvement. A mixture of fake plants and unconvincing backdrops, it falls short of Republic’s usual superior work. The dialog is creaky too, as Esmond explains why he wants to call off the engagement and Mara makes it very clear that she has no intention of letting him do so.

Right on cue, Regnier decides he has a headache and goes off for a stroll in the garden, while Marguerite goes inside to find Borchard and ask him to follow her back outside for a talk. She wants to know why her fiancée is acting so strangely. The ever-sympathetic Borchard says Regnier may have contracted jungle fever in his world travels and urges Marguerite to be patient.

We then fade to a shot of a cat walking on a tree limb, but the background is, once again, the static painting of the mansion. Regnier is seen walking through the woods, feeling woozy and looking as if he’s about to pass out. You can guess what happens next. Lesley Selander cuts to pictures of buoys, icebergs, lightening and the eyes of a black cat. If nothing else, this gives Selander a chance to save a few bucks, since it’s the exact same footage we saw before the first murder.

Ah, but now … after all the silliness … we come to another really spooky scene. After learning about Regnier’s illness from Borchard, Marguerite feels guilty about fighting with him. Adele Mara goes out in a coach in the darkness to look for Charles so she can apologize. When she spots a figure in top hat and cape walking some distance away, she tells her driver to stop the coach and she calls out. The figure in the cape turns around and approaches, but … again … we only see him from a distance. Mara is looking out the other side of the coach, rehearsing what she’s going to say to him. We only see him from the back as he enters the coach and Mara, still looking away from him, begins to recite her apology.

Carl Esmond protects Lenore Aubert from Robert Wilke.

Of course, when she turns around to face him, her look of horror tells us she’s made a big mistake. We see the cape moving over her and hear the sounds of a cat and Mara screaming loudly. The driver stops the horses, but the culprit escapes before the driver hops down and opens the coach door to find Mara’s lifeless body.

In the very next scene, we’re viewing the shadow of a figure in top hat and cape approaching a door. When the actor who is casting the shadow comes into frame, the camera is positioned behind him so we don’t see his face. Although this is a scary little scene, if you’ve seen enough horror movies you know that it is our hero wearing the cape this time around.

Marie Audet opens the door to let Charles in, surprised to see him since he’s supposed to be at the engagement party. He explains he left the part early. Marie asks a logical question. Didn’t his early departure upset his fiancée? Regnier says he can’t remember … in fact, he can’t remember anything from the time he left the party until he arrived at Marie’s door. Marie is, understandably, alarmed by this. However Charles tells her he’s sure it’s nothing to worry about and suggests a trip to the Café du Bois for a midnight snack. Apparently Marie has overcome her previous reticence about going out with a man who is engaged, because this time she readily agrees!

Republic uses the same shorthand to establish the couple’s arrival at the restaurant that it did earlier in the film when Borchard and Regnier visited. We simply see a sign for the Café du Bois on a brick background with a lamp containing a lighted candle. But, as so often was the case at Republic, the little extras make all the difference. As the viewer watches the sign and flickering candle, the head of the Sound Department, Fred Stahl, makes sure hoof beats are dubbed-in to indicate the arrival of a carriage!

The couple receives a warm welcome at the café even though it is just before closing. While Carl Esmond is telling Lenore Aubert that he’s finished with Adele Mara, some men at another table are observing the couple closely. In fact, one of them … John Dehner … is sketching a picture of Lenore. Dehner was so omnipresent on television in the fifties, sixties, seventies and eighties that generations of fans may be unaware that he began his career in films in the forties. Seated next to Dehner is Anthony Caruso, also an extremely busy TV actor who began his career in films, including The Crime Doctor’s Courage, where his character was suspected of being a vampire!

Just to keep us up on police developments, Leslie Selander inserts a brief scene here showing Gerald Mohr questioning the concierge at the building where Regnier and Borchard are staying. Unfortunately, the character is played by Dutch vaudeville comic George Davis who does a very unfunny routine about having cold feet and sneezing. While most people would go out of their way to avoid this guy, Mohr decides to bring him back to headquarters for questioning.

Back at the café, a newspaper reporter comes in to tell the guys at the table that he has hot news! It seems the “Catman” has struck again.  Not only that, but he killed a woman this time … the lovely and wealthy Marguerite Duval. And police also have a suspect. They believe Charles Regnier killed Marguerite and they’re out looking for him right now.

Charles and Marie, overhearing all this, are about to beat a hasty retreat, when the men block Regnier, saying they plan to hold him for the police. At this point, the odds are four against one. Considering the fact that one of the four is the powerfully-built Anthony Caruso, who would play a character called “Mongo” the same year in Tarzan and the Leopard Woman, one would think Regnier would back down.

But remember, this is a Republic movie. At Republic, especially in the serials and westerns, four against one was considered good odds! Moreover, any confrontation such as this was viewed as an opportunity to put the studio’s famed stuntmen on display. The anticipated fight breaks out and includes all the usual favorite shots that Leslie Selander would have included in one of his westerns.

Where normally a cowboy would go sailing over a saloon bar, here John Dehner’s double sails over the café bar. There is one unconvincing shot during the fight, but it involves lead Carl Esmond rather than a stuntman. In a close-up, Esmond throws a punch with an elongated follow-through that clearly misses by a mile. When the dust clears, of course, Regnier has won and he heads out the door with Marie. As they leave, the camera focuses on Dehner’s sketch of Lenore Aubert, which remains in the café.

The next morning Marie gets her hands on the newspaper before her father gets up. She knows the headline will be about the “Catman” and she doesn’t want him to see it. She also tries to conceal it from Charles who has spent the night at the house. However, she relents and lets him see the paper and when he reads the police found two bloody gloves he’s convinced he really is the killer. The doorbell rings and Charles, believing the police have come to arrest him, prepares to surrender.

However, it is Borchard at the door. He tells Regnier the police will arrive at any minute and offers to take Charles away in his carriage. Marie insists on going too, and soon the three of them are seen riding along what obviously is a movie ranch insert trail. Not far behind them, we see Gerald Mohr and a police officer and soon the chase is on. The sequence is very well done and every bit as exciting as any chase in a Republic western of the time, especially the scene where the carriage carrying Mohr turns over, sending the passengers hurtling toward the camera.

It turns out Borchard is taking Charles and Marie to a chateau that a wealthy Marquis is allowing him to use. He tells the couple they will be safe there until he can smuggle them out of France. Borchard explains the police paid him a visit and showed him the sketch of Marie they had found at the café. The police hope to find Charles if they can identify Marie, but Borchard says he pretended not to recognize the picture.

This fails to cheer Charles up, though. In fact, he seems more convinced than ever that he is the killer and should turn himself in. But Borchard takes Charles upstairs for a nap, promising to take him to the police later, if he doesn’t feel better after getting some rest.

When he gets back downstairs, Borchard sits Marie down and tells her that the bloody gloves the police found in the carriage, belonged to Charles. There’s no way around it, he says, Regnier must be the crazed murderer. Marie is shocked and says Charles must turn himself in. Borchard, on the other hand, says the mania is just temporary and he will smuggle Regnier into Spain where he can continue with his writing career.

“I don’t want to alarm you unnecessarily Marie,” says Borchard, “but I think you ought to leave for Paris without delay. Every minute that you spend in this house, your life is in danger.” (Gee, how could a friendly little warning like that possibly alarm the young lady?)

Like most Republic heroines it turns out Lenore Aubert is made of tougher stuff. She makes it very clear to Douglass Dumbrille that she has no intention of going anywhere. She plans to stand by her man and do everything she can to help him.

Now the scene changes and we are back at police headquarters. Gerald Mohr, having hitched a ride back to Paris on a farmer’s cart, is sitting with Fritz Feld listening to Maurice Cass, who was always perfect for elderly professor-type roles. Cass is reading from a book his grandfather wrote about the effects of planets on the transmutation of life forms on earth. It seems the old boy was an expert on astrology and had determined that the “Catman” had been around for centuries.

Cass, best known to baby boomers for his continuing role in the TV show Rocky Jones, Space Ranger and for his appearances on a couple of Superman episodes, does a good job of trying to sound credible as he reads some ridiculous gobbledygook that supposedly proves the “Catman” is going through his final earthly cycle right now. (The most famous episode of Superman to feature Cass is The Defeat of Superman. Cass plays the role of “Meldini,” a scientific genius who cooperates with a gangster in a scheme to use Kryptonite against the man of steel.)

As we can expect from Feld’s record so far, Fritz sees absolutely nothing surprising about the claims from Cass. Mohr, on the other hand, is a tad more realistic. He tells Feld that he plans to arrest Regnier shortly. Far from being supernatural, says Mohr, Regnier is just a common criminal running amok. Suddenly there’s a knock at the door and an officer hands Feld a message. We don’t know what’s in it, but it must be important because … after reading it … Feld announces he and Mohr must leave at once.

We cut to a matte shot of the exterior of the mansion where Borchard and party are staying. It’s daylight outside, so it’s a surprise when we dissolve to an inside shot of the mansion where Borchard is telling Marie that he must leave at once to arrange safe passage for Charles under cover of darkness! Meanwhile Marie tells Borchard that she’s changed her mind and will go back to Paris, but only because she feels she will be in a better position to fight on Regnier’s behalf there. There are a few scary moments during this scene … the shadow of a cat passing along the wall and Borchard giving Marie a gun and telling her how to get to the servants quarters if she needs protection.

Upstairs, shadows fill the hallway as Lenore Aubert checks on Carl Esmond, who appears to be sleeping, and then proceeds to her own room. As Lenore begins to undress, we see Esmond awaken and arise from his bed, as the familiar icebergs and lightening once again materialize. Lenore, meanwhile, is now in front of a mirror, combing her hair, when she hears the sounds of a cat. She walks out onto her balcony and the “Catman” jumps out of nowhere to confront her. (Well, actually, jumps off a ladder just out of camera range, but what the heck!)

Marie believes the creature to be Charles, so she calls for him to stop as he follows her through the French windows, but he doesn’t and she’s forced to shoot. The bullets seem to have no effect, so she runs out of the room and downstairs with the “Catman” in hot pursuit.

We now get our first really close look at the monster as he’s slowed down for a moment by more shots fired from the gun Borchard gave to Marie. Marie is again firing in desperation, because she thinks the creature is actually Charles. The viewer may notice, though, from this brief close-up, that the monster doesn’t really look like Charles or anyone else we’ve seen in the movie so far. In fact, it’s actor Bob Wilke in heavy makeup.

Marie runs through the French doors on the first floor and out onto the veranda, which is actually just a very minor revamp of the large porch we saw earlier outside the party at the Duval home. Alert viewers will notice that even the archway is the same.

As the creature corners Marie by a garden wall, she shoots again and the monster falls, but only because the police, who have arrived just in time, hit their mark with the shots they fired. The creature is carried inside, and only then is it revealed that the monster is not Charles Regnier. Charles, awakened by the gunshots, has come downstairs. He and Marie, accompanied by the police, go over to the figure lying on the couch. The “Catman” is speaking with the voice of Douglas Dumbrille, who plays Borchard. He gives a rather confused explanation for the murders … something about having to help Regnier in order to be allowed to die himself.

This, of course, leaves several holes in the plot. Why, for instance, does the monster, who supposedly engaged in all kinds of ghastly activities over the centuries, now say he only killed Devereaux and Marguerite to help Charles? More to the point, if … as Dumbrille says … he murdered Marguerite because she stood in the way of Charles finding happiness with Marie, then why in the world was he chasing Marie all over the chateau grounds trying to kill her?

The dying transformation from creature to human is nowhere near as elaborate as similar scenes in Universal films, but it’s effective. The final shots of Wilke are at their Jekyll and Hyde best, complete with dark makeup around the eyelids and crooked teeth. His fearsome visage is nicely juxtaposed against the sympathetic lines he’s delivering. (Well, actually, Dumbrille is delivering them and doing a darn good job!)

As the monster closes its eyes, Republic’s makeup man Bob Marks removes some of the greasepaint and false hair, leaving just an outline of the widow’s peak heading into the dissolve to Douglas Dumbrille. This effective scene makes the obligatory semi-comic ending seem all the more out of place, as we have to listen to Fritz Feld brag about being right when he insisted that the murders were the work of a “Catman.”

Still, that’s a small price to pay for a film that is generally entertaining, has decent production values and offers the novelty of having the monster, when shown without makeup, played by one actor and when shown with makeup, played by another. All things considered, The Catman of Paris, which displays a polished look despite a 2½ week shooting schedule, was one of Republic’s better horror offerings.

Catman: Behind-the-Scenes

The Catman of Paris is, in many ways, a very good horror film. It has plenty of atmosphere and, for the most part, excellent acting. Unfortunately the script lets the actors down. Director Lesley Selander tries his best to get around the dialog by alternating moody night scenes with brighter action sequences wherever he can insert them, but he’s fighting an uphill battle. There’s no way to cover for a script that fails to establish at least some vague foundation for Fritz Feld to immediately jump to the conclusion that a few claw marks must mean there’s a “Catman” on the loose. And, while it’s certainly nice to see a well-constructed Lydecker miniature, its presence in this movie doesn’t make much sense.

A similar device was introduced in the Philo Vance classic, The Kennel Murder Case, back in 1933. But in that film, William Powell uses the replica to explain the complicated series of events involved in the intricate murder plot. In Catman, on the other hand, there doesn’t seem to be much reason for the Paris street diorama to be there. Certainly when Feld attempts to startle our hero by pulling back the curtain to reveal the miniature, the result is one, big fizzle!

Many of the actors in The Catman of Paris were blessed with longevity. Carl Esmond is a case in point. After all, how many Republic actors of the mid-forties got to appear in a Hammer vampire film? Actually, that’s rather misleading and the circumstances were unusual to say the least. But Esmond continued acting through the mid-1980’s and lived to the ripe old age of 102! His connection to Hammer was strictly limited to some spliced-in footage.

In one of the more misguided efforts in the history of horror films, Universal … realizing Hammer’s Kiss of the Vampire would run too short after editing for an appearance on NBC TV … decided to simply add some padding in the form of cheaply produced, badly mismatched insertion shots. Universal did the same with Evil of Frankenstein and The Phantom of the Opera, but at least Kiss of the Vampire, renamed Kiss of Evil for TV, had the advantage of featuring Esmond in the cast. Virginia Gregg, the voice of Mrs. Bates in the original Psycho, was also featured in the additional footage. Esmond and Gregg play the parents of a teenager who has fallen under the vampire’s spell, but other than that, this little patch-job bears no real relationship to the movie.

The female lead in The Catman of Paris, Lenore Aubert, really should have done better in Hollywood. She reportedly got herself blackballed because she refused to have anything to do with the casting couch some producers used rather blatantly at the time. Catman was Lenore’s first horror film, although she had appeared with George Zucco in RKO’s Having a Wonderful Crime and with Martin Kosleck (of  The Mummy’s Curse, The Frozen Ghost and House of Horrors fame) in PRC’s The Wife of Monte Cristo. Lenore would, of course, go on to star with Bela Lugosi and Lon Chaney Jr. in Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein and with Boris Karloff in Abbott and Costello Meet the Killer.

Carl Esmond and Lenore Aubert

Lenore Aubert was born Eleanore Leisner in what is now Slovenia and was educated in Vienna. She married Julius Altman, and the couple left Austria for Paris amid Hitler’s rise. From Paris she and her husband headed to the United States. The actress scored on the stage in New York and soon found her way to Hollywood. Her early career included some major films but later offerings from smaller studios were hardly challenging. After two movies made in Europe, the actress retired from films. Aubert was married and divorced twice and she is said to have spent her later years doing volunteer work in New York. Lenore passed away in 1993.

Fritz Feld, who plays the Prefect of Police in The Catman of Paris, was one of Hollywood’s busiest character actors and retired only a few years before his death at the age of 93! He would often appear as a fussy headwaiter or designer in comedic roles, and the popping sound that became his trademark, made by putting his hand to his mouth, originated in a film where champagne was being ordered. He is perhaps best remembered today for his role as an eccentric psychiatrist in the Cary Grant/Katharine Hepburn classic Bringing Up Baby.

Feld’s skill with comedy isn’t required in Catman, however. And, in fact, it must be admitted that for those of us who’ve seen him in so many roles as comic relief, it’s sometimes hard to take him seriously playing the police official. By the way, in real life, he was married to Virginia Christine, known to genre fans for her roles in such films as Universal’s The Mummy’s Curse and House of Horrors. But she also appeared in Republic mysteries like The Inner Circle and The Mysterious Mr. Valentine.

Gerald Mohr was an extremely busy actor on radio, in films and later on TV. He was equally adept at playing unscrupulous bad guys and steadfast heroes and could easily alternate between playing a villain like “Slick Latimer” in the Republic serial Jungle Girl and playing the lead in a series of Lone Wolf films. Mohr was much in demand when television came along and even had a TV series of his own, Foreign Intrigue, which was filmed overseas. He was also a popular narrator and voice actor and he appeared in the Barbra Streisand movie Funny Girl in 1968. Unfortunately, he passed away shortly after the film was released at the age of 54.

The Catman of Paris was one of two Republic films Mohr made with Lesley Selander in the director’s chair in 1946. The other was Passkey to Danger. Mohr made a third movie for Republic the same year, The Invisible Informer, but Philip Ford was at the helm on that one.

Both Gerald Mohr and Fritz Feld frequently pause in their delivery in Catman, as if unable to remember their lines. However, given the quality of some of their dialog in the film, it’s possible they’re just trying to work up the courage to deliver the next line without laughing!

Sherman Lowe provided the screenplay on this one, and his early training in Mascot serials like Jack Mulhall’s Burn ’Em Up Barnes and Ken Maynard’s Mystery Mountain, almost certainly didn’t provide a great deal of instruction on the finer points of dialog. However, while Catman’s script left something to be desired, Lowe was in better form when working on other Republic offerings around this time, including Valley of the Zombies, The Undercover Woman and The Invisible Informer.

Robert J. Wilke, who played the actual monster here, was an actor known mostly for his portrayal of bad guys in westerns. He is perhaps best remembered from the Gary Cooper classic High Noon, but he was a prolific actor in both TV and movies right up through the late seventies and early eighties. When I was a kid, it seemed he popped up in virtually every television western. He appeared in several episodes of  The Range Rider, The Gene Autry Show, The Lone Ranger and many of the other early fifties programs.

In the late fifties Wilkie was a semi-regular on Zorro playing Captain Mendoza and appeared on most of the popular westerns of the day including Bat Masterson, The Rifleman, Wanted Dead or Alive and Cheyenne. He remained very much in demand throughout the sixties and seventies and appeared in The Boy Who Cried Werewolf in 1973.

Robert Wilke, under heavy makeup, as The Catman of Paris.

In his youth, Bob Wilke was an excellent swimmer and diver, and he began his career in Hollywood as a stuntman. Since stunts were a key ingredient of most Republic films, the studio liked to keep people like Wilke nearby in case they were needed for an action sequence. So Wilke was given small parts and extra work to keep him on the lot. One of the directors who encouraged Wilke to do as much extra work as possible was Lesley Selander. This may well have helped get him the job in The Catman of Paris. Although applying the heavy makeup almost certainly meant an early call for Wilke, it couldn’t have been much worse than the 4am wakeup required for the many westerns he was doing on location at Iverson Ranch. The actors had to be ready to head out at 5:30 in the morning.

The makeup Wilke wore was designed by long-time Republic craftsman Bob Marks. While it has come in for criticism from some quarters, I think Marks actually did quite a good job. In some ways, it bears a resemblance to the Henry Hull creature in Werewolf of London, especially with the peaked forehead and hairline.

Director Lesley Selander already had The Vampire’s Ghost and The Fatal Witness behind him at Republic when he was chosen to helm The Catman of Paris. Most of Selander’s experience as a full-fledged director had been in westerns. He did the honors on a series of Buck Jones vehicles at Universal in 1936 and 1937 and then began directing William Boyd in many of the Hopalong Cassidy westerns produced by Harry Sherman.

Selander kicked off his contract at Republic in 1944 with two Sunset Carson entries, Call of the Rockies and Bordertown Trail. He was soon directing other Republic cowboy heroes as well, including Allan Lane, Bill Elliott, Monte Hale and even Gene Autry. Selander’s western experience is seen to excellent advantage in the coach chase in The Catman of Paris.

But Selander had training in non-westerns too. Early in his career, he worked for his friend “Woody” Van Dyke at MGM. Van Dyke was one of the most efficient employees of the glittering film factory that had so many pampered stars and directors. While some of his colleagues were costing the studio time and money by insisting on retake after retake until everything was just right, Van Dyke could get it right the first time. He passed along this talent to Selander, who worked with him on such classics as The Thin Man with William Powell and Myrna Loy. This kind of experience stood Selander in good stead when he was working at Republic, not only on horror films, but also on mysteries like Three’s a Crowd and Passkey to Danger. Selander was quick and efficient and his salary at Republic, reportedly less than 400 dollars a week at first, was a bargain considering the fact that many of his films were shot in ten days or less!

After leaving Republic Selander went on to work at other studios and even helmed the final entry in the Monogram Charlie Chan series, Sky Dragon. Like other Republic directors who knew how to work under pressure, Selander was in demand when TV came along, helming episodes of popular shows like Lassie, Fury and Laramie.

Catman cinematographer Reggie Lanning proved to be an able collaborator for Selander on this film. Lanning, who was behind the camera on some of Republic’s best serials including Zorro’s Fighting Legion and Spy Smasher, had learned to suggest more impressive surroundings than he could actually show on the low budgets he was often allotted.

In the scene that has Adele Mara being driven in a coach at night looking for her fiancée, the park-like setting is conveyed inexpensively by simply placing a few Victorian lamp posts at intervals along what would otherwise look like a western insert road at Iverson ranch or Corriganville. Insert roads were used for chase scenes and this one reminds me of the main insert road at Corriganville. The viewer gets a better look at it during the carriage chase. The insert road was actually rather short, but a director I was with when visiting the old movie ranch explained they’d simply shoot it from different angles to make it appear longer.

The rear projection is especially good in parts of the carriage scene. The transparency projection shots were done by Gordon Schaefer, who had started doing process photography on Republic serials. He worked on many of the films covered in this book, including The Phantom Speaks, The Vampire’s Ghost, The Fatal Witness, The Madonna’s Secret and Valley of the Zombies.

Following the carriage chase there is a brief exterior shot of the chateau where Borchard has taken Charles and Marie. It appears to be an excellent combination miniature and matte shot with only one problem: The swans swimming in the pond in the foreground are out of proportion. One swan’s head is above the benches at the side of the pond and almost half as high as the massive door to the mansion!

The scene showing the death of the creature and its transformation into human form at the end of the film is quite well done, especially the way Douglas Dumbrille’s voice is dubbed over the lip-movements of Robert Wilke. Thomas Carman and Howard Wilson were in charge of re-recording and they did a top-notch job. Carman and Wilson went on to do sound mixing for some of Republic’s biggest films, including The Quiet Man and Johnny Guitar.

Meanwhile, in this closing voiceover, Dumbrille does some of his best acting in the entire film. The creature is supposed to be dying and Dumbrille makes use of whispers and heavy breathing to convey the approaching end of a life over which he had little control. The care that went into this scene is typical of the overall approach Lesley Selander and his colleagues took with the film. The Catman of Paris may have been saddled with a tacky title, but it was a very respectable horror entry from the serial studio.

VALLEY OF THE ZOMBIES

(Released 1946)

CREDITS: Associate Producers: Dorrell McGowan, Stuart McGowan; Director: Philip Ford; Screenplay: Dorrell McGowan, Stuart McGowan from a story by Royal Cole and Sherman Lowe; Cinematographer: Reggie Lanning; Editor: William P. Thompson.

CAST: Robert Livingston, Adrian Booth, Ian Keith, Charles Trowbridge, Thomas Jackson, LeRoy Mason, Earle Hodgins, William Haade.

“To you, death is merely an absence of life, there’s no intermediate stage. But that is where we disagree, for I have discovered a world in between … a world of living death.” … Ian Keith as Ormand Murks

A shot of a spooky clock tower shrouded in mist opens the film, followed by a suitably fog-bound roof-top shot of Ian Keith, playing human vampire Ormand Murks. Spreading his cape, Murks looks around, spots a door and heads downstairs to the offices of Dr. Rufus Maynard, in the person of veteran character actor Charles Trowbridge. Trowbridge was in scores of movies, but genre fans may remember him most fondly as Dr. Petrie in The Mummy’s Hand. Before Murks makes his appearance in the office lab, there’s a brief scene to introduce us to our hero and heroine. Lovely actress Lorna Gray, using her other name here, Adrian Booth, plays Dr. Maynard’s nurse Susan Drake. We first see her cleaning some lab equipment at a sink. When she finishes and turns around, she’s surprised to see what appears to be a body underneath a sheet on the gurney behind her. Instead of running in the opposite direction as fast as her two feet will carry her, for some reason, Susan goes over and decides to check it out. Low and behold, boyfriend Robert Livingston is the mysterious man under the sheet and he manages to steal a kiss.

Livingston, who plays Dr. Terry Evans, was never quite as comfortable in these types of films as he was in westerns. And it doesn’t help that the scriptwriters have given the character he’s playing … supposedly a brilliant surgeon … lines that would seem more appropriate for a typical wise-cracking reporter. Be that as it may, Livingston and Gray make a good looking couple, so it’s no surprise when they decide to take a break to go out for dinner.

There’s an atmospheric shot of light streaming from the lab into the darkened office where Dr. Maynard sits working alone at his desk. We see a shadow slowly filling the light and suddenly the good doctor looks up to see Murks, the mental patient he had committed to an asylum several years before. Dr. Maynard thought Murks’ claim to be able to go into a state of suspended animation and revive himself with blood, was crazy. But that’s just what he did in the asylum, where he apparently faked his own death.

The shadowy cinematography in this portion of the film contributes to the overall impression that Zombies has much in common with Universal’s horror offerings. The man behind the camera was Reggie Lanning and his experience shooting atmospheric scenes for serials like Zorro’s Fighting Legion, helped prepare him for the eerie shots he delivered in Republic features like Who Killed Aunt Maggie, Strangers in the Night and The Catman of Paris, as well as Valley of the Zombies. See Charles Trowbridge and Ian Keith, below.

The creepy lighting Lanning uses in Dr. Maynard’s office adds to the suspense, and soon the body count is piling up. Once Murks has killed Maynard, Murks’ brother Fred, who has been working for Maynard under an assumed name and stealing blood for his sibling, makes a fatal mistake. Fred, portrayed by Earle Hodgins, who usually played sheriffs or carnival barkers, tells brother Ormand he didn’t sign up for murder and picks up the phone to call the cops. “I’ll put you back in the grave where you belong,” he says.

Then we get a shot from Fred’s point of view as Ormand walks toward the camera with an evil grin and mocks his brother’s words. “You’ll put me in my grave?” says Murks, as the camera dissolves to an appropriately eerie cemetery set, where we see a shovel doing some digging. The camera pulls back and we realize Murks is the one doing the shoveling. And it seems his digging has attracted some unwanted attention. We see Murks beat a hasty retreat as a police car pulls up. He hides behind a tree and listens, after the coroner and others arrive. He hears them identifying the body as that of Dr. Maynard and discussing the fact that it’s been embalmed.

Murks and his brother Fred stand over a body.

Police detectives Blair and Hendricks now head to Dr. Maynard’s office, where Dr. Evans and Nurse Drake have returned from having dinner together. She’s resting while he finishes up some last minute work. The detectives show up and inform them of Maynard’s death, and we’re treated to one of the many moments in the film where the dialog hits rock bottom.

Blair, played by Thomas E. Jackson, who built a nice career around his ability to convincingly portray detectives, asks Terry and Susan when they last saw Dr. Maynard. Susan asks the logical question:

Susan: “Is there anything wrong with Doctor Maynard?”

Detective Blair: “Nothing that a little strangling and a shot of embalming fluid didn’t cure”

Dr. Evans: “You don’t mean he’s dead?”

Pity poor Bob Livingston stuck with that line. He’s playing a supposedly brilliant doctor, yet when he’s told his boss has just been strangled and embalmed, he reacts by asking whether the old boy is dead!

It’s a real shame the writing is so lame at times, because the movie does have plenty of atmosphere. Just seconds after these lines, we’re treated to a frightening scene when the body of Murks’ brother falls out of the refrigerator as Nurse Drake opens it to check on whether more blood has been stolen.

Convinced Evans and Drake are the culprits, Blair and Hendricks, played by long-time western baddie LeRoy Mason, spend the night giving them the third degree, but to no avail. And, in the morning, when it turns out a cabbie was killed and embalmed while the two were in custody, authorities have to let our hero and heroine go.

A nicely done bit has Dr. Evans and Nurse Drake stopping at a gas station to get directions to the old Murks estate. Bob Livingston doesn’t realize that the guy working under a car at the station is actually our villain. So he thinks nothing of it when Ian Keith, with only his legs showing beneath the auto, tells him to leave his car at the station and proceed on foot. This he does with his girlfriend in tow.

Murks wait’s a few beats, then dons his cape and follows hot on their heels. Here again, the sets are eerie as we pass through the gates of the estate and walk through the grounds to the Murks family crypt. Unfortunately, the weak dialog spoils the atmosphere as our hero and heroine trade juvenile jokes that would make any viewer above the age of five groan.

In a sign of economizing, Ian Keith, who is supposed to be following the couple as they head through the woods, is never really shown. Apparently, the actor had already gone home for the day or the scene was an afterthought, shot after principal photography had already finished. Oh, we see one shot of Keith from the back, which could be anybody in a black cape and hat, and then the camera simply tracks feet in the underbrush. The only time we actually see his face is when Murks is shown leaning up against a tree and supposedly listening as the couple talks outside the mausoleum. However, alert viewers will realize that this insert shot is the exact same one shown earlier in the film when he’s listening to detectives speaking in the wooded graveyard!

Once inside the crypt, a decent set with faux marble walls, it turns out … surprise, surprise … that Ormand’s casket is empty. After an unseen hand closes the door on the unlucky couple they break free and head for the main house. Entering the boarded up home, they find embalming fluid and learn the Murks family business was an early “Funerals ‘R Us” operation. They also find the corpse of another victim, a doctor from a mental hospital where Murks was once held. As they begin to leave, they encounter Murks in the doorway, but he makes a run for it. In the darkness, Dr. Evans and Nurse Drake mistake Detective Blair for Murks and knock out him out  cold. Other detectives are soon on the scene, Blair is revived and we learn the police have been looking for Evans and Drake because the car they left at the gas station was found with a body in it … the embalmed corpse of the real gas station attendant.

The police agree to go back to the house with the couple, but by the time they arrive, Murks has disposed of the body that had been in the embalming room. The cops aren’t buying any of it, but Blair agrees to let Evans show him the empty casket in the crypt, leaving an officer behind with Nurse Drake who is promptly handcuffed to a piece of furniture. Any horror movie fan immediately knows where this is heading. But again, there are enough inventive chills here to keep the viewer in suspense. We hear footsteps upstairs, then gradually coming down the back steps and into the embalming room. We see the policeman go through the curtains, we hear a thud and our heroine cries out, “Did you get him?” The Curtains slowly re-open and we hear Ormand Murks say, “Yes, I got him.”

A terrified Nurse Drake squirms in horror. Then we get a shot from her point of view as Ian Keith comes closer and closer to the camera. This dissolves to a shot of a body in what had been the empty coffin in the crypt. It’s the corpse that had been in the embalming room and Detective Blair finally seems ready to believe Dr. Evans. When they get back to the house, Nurse Drake is missing and Blair suddenly hears his own car starting up and taking off.

Here’s where one of those coincidences that only occurs in movies comes into play. Earlier, when police had first arrived, one of the officers used the car radio to call for reinforcements. He got his message through and managed to get a reply, before the button on his microphone became stuck. At the time, the officer made a point of noting that the radio would be constantly transmitting until it got fixed. This little bit of scripting had “Key Plot Device, Remember for Later Reference” written all over it.

Sure enough, the reinforcements that were called for are pulling up just as Dr. Evans and the detectives get to the road in front of the Murks estate. Everyone piles into the police car and, since the detective’s car commandeered by our villain is constantly transmitting, they listen for clues about where Murks is taking Nurse Drake. As usual in these films, luck is with them and they hear the sounds of a train, indicating the car Murks is driving is near a railroad crossing. The next clue is even more far-fetched. The simple sound of static leads Bob Livingston to deduce that the car they’re chasing is passing a nearby power plant!

Murks arrives in the city and the sound of the gong made by the clock atop the building where Dr. Maynard had his practice with Dr. Evans, makes it clear Murks is returning to the scene of the crime and taking Nurse Drake with him. In the shot below, a hypnotized Adrian Booth has the drop on good guys LeRoy Mason, Bob Livingston, and Thomas Jackson.

When our rescue team arrives at the office and bursts into the lab, they find Nurse Drake has just finished a transfusion on Murks. She’s obviously under his power and the two of them make a run for it and begin climbing up the fire escape.

Dr. Evans runs up the inside stairs and gets to the top just in time to see Nurse Drake arrive on the roof. He runs to her but she’s hypnotized and when Murks appears he orders her to take Evans’ gun and shoot him. She’s about to do so, but the gunshot we hear comes from Detective Blair’s gun, and as it hits its mark, Murks tumbles several stories to his death.

Ian Keith and Adrian Booth

This would have made the perfect ending to a fun little horror film, one of those movies that many of us refer to as “guilty pleasures.” The fall from the mist-covered roof is dramatic … the perfect way to finish off a villain who has spent most of the movie draining other people’s blood. But the writers couldn’t resist gilding the lily by inserting a real “groaner” just before the fade-out. They have our heroine snapping out of her spell and saying she needs a drink. Poor Bob Livingston has to respond by suggesting a “Zombie!”

This is only the third time there’s been any mention of zombies in the movie, and even those few references are misleading, since … if the blood-drinking Murks resembles anything supernatural … it’s a vampire, not a zombie. Then again, there’s no real reason to quibble about this little incongruity. After all, there’s no sign of a “valley” in Valley of the Zombies either!

Valley: Behind-the-Scenes

The fall of 1945 was an extremely busy time for horror on the Republic lot. Valley of the Zombies, The Madonna’s Secret and Catman of Paris were all shooting in September. Zombies wrapped by mid-month, but Catman and Madonna carried over into October.

Philip Ford had just finished his first Republic assignment as a director, working on the mystery The Tiger Woman, not to be confused with the Allan Lane/Linda Stirling serial of the same name. This film, starring Kane Richmond and Adele Mara, was a move up for Ford, who had previously been an assistant director.

Perhaps because Philip, the nephew of well-known western director John Ford, acquitted himself so well in The Tiger Woman, the studio decided more thrillers were in order. Republic gave Ford Zombies, a straight horror film, and Crime of the Century, a mystery with horror film trappings including some homicidal characters, a mansion setting and a body on ice. After making a few more of Republic’s better mysteries, like The Mysterious Mr. Valentine, Ford was given mostly westerns. Like so many members of the Republic team, Ford moved to television in the fifties. He directed more than 50 episodes of Lassie and several episodes of Superman. Philip Ford was another one of those Republic stalwarts whose ability to bring a project in on time and within budget was invaluable in the new era of small screen entertainment.

Republic certainly got its money’s worth out of Bob Livingston in the mid-forties. He appeared in 16 films between 1944 and 1946, and even though one amounted to little more than a cameo (Livingston showed up along with the rest of Republic’s roster of western stars in Bells of Rosarita,) that’s a pretty busy schedule for anyone.

Livingston began his career with bit parts in silent movies under his real name, Robert Randall. In the early thirties he had small roles in films for various studios, before landing the lead in the 1936 Republic serial The Vigilantes Are Coming. He then assumed the role for which he became best known among young movie matinee fans of the time and young television fans watching replays in the fifties … the main character Stony Brooke in Republic’s Three Mesquiteers series. But he played the lead in many other Republic offerings as well, including Republic’s color Zorro entry, The Bold Caballero. When Livingston briefly left the Mesquiteers series for other Republic films, he was replaced by John Wayne. Not too many actors have had the distinction of having the Duke brought in as their replacement!

Bob Livingston and Adrian Booth find Ian Keith’s hidden mortuary.

Livingston returned to the Mesquiteers series and continued playing in it until 1941 when he left Republic for Producers Releasing Corporation. While the switch would hardly seem a wise career move, it did have two positive results.

Livingston took over for George Houston in PRC’s “Lone Rider” series, which gave young western fans a break. Houston was an opera singer whose wooden acting combined with PRC’s threadbare sets and cramped production schedules made the films hard to watch. The other plus, if it can be called that, is the fact that PRC put Livingston into a semi-horror film. The Black Raven is a really cheesy, soundstage-bound horror/mystery from the prolific, although quality-challenged team of brothers Sigmund Neufeld and Sam Newfield. If nothing else, Livingston at least got a chance to work with George Zucco on this film. For some reason … perhaps because he realized what a turkey it was going to be … Livingston decided to revert to his real name, Bob Randall, in the credits.

After wrapping up at PRC, Livingston returned to Republic in 1943, doing both westerns and non-western features. One of those features was Valley of the Zombies, which followed closely on the heels of an excellent mystery, The Undercover Woman, co-starring Stephanie Bachelor.

Livingston only did a couple of films for Republic after Zombies, and then started to freelance at various studios, often working with other Republic alumni.

Monogram’s 1948 Charlie Chan entry, The Feathered Serpent, is interesting because writer Oliver Drake simply adapted his original script for the 1937 Mesquiteers entry The Riders of the Whistling Skull. In that film Livingston was the hero, while in The Feathered Serpent he’s the bad guy.

The actor went on to appear in some of the RKO Tim Holt westerns that Republic veteran Lesley Selander was directing and some Columbia Gene Autry entries helmed by ex-Republic ace John English. He also appeared on the Autry television series and several other programs produced for the small screen. Livingston’s last few films were a far cry from his Republic days … some cheap exploitation flicks produced by Sam Sherman. Bob Livingston passed away in 1988 and left fans with fond memories of his work in some of Republic’s best actioners.

It was Columbia that initially changed the name of young actress Virginia Pound to Lorna Gray. They then threw her into a wide variety of films, mostly B-movies like The Man They Could Not Hang with Boris Karloff and shorts, including a couple with The Three Stooges. Columbia certainly got their money’s worth out of the actress, using her in two serials as well, 1939’s Flying G-Men and 1940’s Deadwood Dick.

Despite getting plenty of value for their expenditure, however, when her contract expired, the powers that be at Columbia didn’t renew. She began to freelance, mostly at Monogram, although she did appear in a Republic musical.

Perhaps someone at Republic had seen the actress in those two Columbia serials and figured if she could get through those, she could get through anything. Whatever the reason, Republic hired her to play the evil Vultura in Perils of Nyoka. More Republic offerings followed, including the lead in The Girl Who Dared, which is covered elsewhere in this book.

A true multi-tasker before the term was invented, an actress like Lorna, who was able to play good gals, bad gals and anything in-between in both features and serials, was invaluable to a studio like Republic. Realizing this, Republic signed the young lady to a contract in early 1945. There was also another important change for the actress. “Lorna Gray” became “Adrian Booth.” From now on, this would be the moniker she would go by.

Ian Keith, who plays Ormond Murks, must have gotten indigestion from the amount of scenery he chewed up in this film. In parts of the movie, the shadowy shots by ace cinematographer Reggie Lanning help draw attention away from his hammy acting, but in others he goes so far over the top that nothing can prevent viewers over the age of ten from getting the giggles. Keith was a stage actor with a long career and was supposedly among those considered by Universal for the original Dracula. But … in this film … he makes Lugosi’s acting style look positively subtle!

Thomas E. Jackson, who plays detective Blair, came to Hollywood when Universal did the movie version of a hit New York play in which he portrayed a detective. He solidified his reputation when he played another detective in the 1930 classic Little Caesar. Jackson became the man many casting directors thought of first when a script called for an inspector/detective type, so it’s no great surprise that he seemed to show up over and over again in the same role. In fact, two weeks after finishing Valley of the Zombies where he played Detective Blair, he was over at Monogram to begin shooting The Face of Marble, in which he portrayed Homicide Inspector Norton!

It’s nice to see LeRoy Mason working on the right side of the law in this film. He played more than his share of baddies, though he could pass for a police officer or detective when necessary, as was the case here. Mason even portrayed a character known as Zorah Bey, an unlikely master of the art of being buried alive, in the 1942 Michael Shayne entry The Man Who Wouldn’t Die from Fox. Mason had been in pictures since the silents and often played the heavy. He worked mostly in westerns for various studios, but … when under contract to Republic … he showed up in films like Zombies and Murder in the Music Hall as well, since the studio liked to use its term players in as many movies as possible. He also appeared in serials, including 1944’s The Tiger Woman, 1945’s Federal Operator 99 and Daughter of Don Q in 1946.

Earle Hodgins, who played the brother of Ormond Murks, portrayed medicine show pitchmen, burlesque barkers, bartenders and just about anything else that came along. He was a familiar face in films and later on TV, where he appeared in multiple episodes of popular shows like Maverick, Have Gun-Will Travel, and Gunsmoke.

Hodgins and the other excellent choices for character parts in this film more than make up for the fact that Ian Keith can’t resist the temptation to ham it up a bit. Meanwhile, Robert Livingston and Adrian Booth/Lorna Gray give their usual fine performances, even if they have to struggle with some silly dialog here and there. Despite its flaws, Valley of the Zombies demonstrates that Republic was capable of giving Universal a decent run for the money when it came to making good, old fashioned horror films.

The Republic Horror Difference

Each of the studios had a “look” that set their films apart in the forties. MGM, for example, couldn’t make a movie that looked shabby even if it tried. That’s one of the reason’s the studio’s attempt at “Our Gang” comedies didn’t work. Even when the kids were supposed to be rigging some home-made contraption or building a make-shift clubhouse it was obvious that MGM’s skilled carpenters had done the job!

When it came to horror films, Universal was in a league of its own since the genre had become the studio’s specialty. RKO, meanwhile, found its own niche, with the Val Lewton unit creating subtle, suspenseful horrors that remain classics to this day. Columbia, of course, had its Karloff mad scientist series. Elsewhere, poverty row studios like Monogram and PRC, while they viewed horror films as easy to make and easy to sell, never really put sufficient money or thought into their offerings to develop much of a following at the time, although they’ve won some cult fans since.

So where did Republic fit into all of this? As mentioned earlier, movies like The Fatal Witness bear a strong resemblance to some of Universal’s offerings, right down to a familiar leading lady, Evelyn Ankers. The sets are similar and some of the character actors are the same. True, the leading man, Richard Fraser, isn’t as strong as some of the names on Universal’s roster. But, all and all, The Fatal Witness isn’t a bad little B-movie that delivers what it promises. And The Phantom Speaks stacks up well against Black Friday from Universal, with Stanley Ridges playing similar roles in both films.

One thing Republic didn’t do however, was develop a separate unit for its horror output. This meant that someone working on a western one week could find themselves assigned to a fright film the next. George Sherman produced and directed London Blackout Murders and did an excellent job, working closely with one of the best photographers in the business, Jack Marta. Sherman was at the helm again for The Lady and the Monster, and he really lucked out this time around, with John Alton, who would become a film noir legend, behind the camera.  But Sherman left the lot after being assigned another Vera Ralston vehicle and, when The Girl Who Dared began shooting in late March of 1944, Howard Bretherton was directing, Rudolph Abel was handling most of the production duties and Mandy Schaefer was overseeing things as Executive Producer.

Rudy Abel was about as close as Republic got to having a regular horror producer (actually, he was listed as “Associate Producer.”) Abel worked on The Girl Who Dared, The Vampire’s Ghost and The Fatal Witness. But Abel had Lesley Selander in the director’s chair for Ghost and Witness with Bud Thackery behind the camera for both offerings. The Phantom Speaks, meanwhile, had serial ace John English directing and William Bradford as cinematographer. Up until he was assigned Phantom, Bradford had done a few good mysteries and some action-adventure films, but most of his work was in westerns.

This was typical of the studio, and … because the individuals involved were so talented … the approach worked reasonably well. However, one has to wonder if the movies would have benefited from assigning a specific unit to genre films.

Republic’s constantly changing production staff for its horror movies was in marked contrast to Universal’s approach. At Universal, during the same period, Ben Pivar was producing the vast majority of the studio’s lower-case horrors. And, of course, at RKO the Val Lewton unit was turning out true horror classics on small budgets.

One Republic advantage over many of its rivals, though, was the company’s physical plant. While a studio like Monogram had to settle for a few small soundstages, Republic had a full facility with many of the trappings of the more impressive majors. The studio occupied a lot originally built by Mack Sennett on land bordering the Los Angeles River donated by local officials who wanted to attract the movie business. Unfortunately for Sennett, by the early thirties it was in receivership and Mascot’s Nat Levine was able to lease it with an option to buy, at a time when his operations were expanding. Levine never did come up with the $190,000 necessary to buy the studio, but Herbert Yates was quick to grab it when he merged Mascot, Monogram and several smaller studios into Republic.

Over the years, various additions were made and the studio was able to shoot large portions of many pictures right on the lot. There were several soundstages, plus western streets, Spanish streets, New York streets and stand-alone sets. When a film like The Madonna’s Secret called for a speedboat to dart through the waters, the producer could simply ask the Lydecker brothers to film it in the studio’s miniature pool with its sky backdrop. And should a producer need to show his actors exploring the underground entrance to a spooky old house, as was the case in The Girl Who Dared, the excellent Republic cave set was readily available.

None of this would have been possible had Yates not gotten his hands on Mascot. His ownership of Consolidated Film Industries, which processed film for Mascot and the other studios involved in the merger, facilitated the deal. And, of course, it was Yates who came out on top. He was certainly no stranger to the idea of using mergers to make money. He had seen it work when he was involved with the tobacco industry and had employed the tactic successfully when he took control of American Record Corporation during the depression. Tough economic times allowed Yates to buy the catalogs of other record companies that failed, and release them on his own labels. Getting hold of the old Mack Sennett studio at a bargain basement price was an even better deal.

Lorna Gray/Adrian Booth and Peter Cookson in the cave set.

But it wasn’t just the fact that he now had a fully-equipped lot that helped cut back on expenses for Yates. Republic would also try to plan all location filming and other outdoor shots at the beginning of a movie’s schedule. During this period, there would be an indoor set available and ready for use at all times so that, in the case of bad weather, they could simply switch to shooting interior scenes and no production time would be lost. Even in normally sunny California, this strategy often came in handy and saved quite a bit of money. On a picture like The Vampire’s Ghost, if it rained and Director Lesley Selander couldn’t use Cantina Street or Hacienda Square on the backlot, he could just switch to shooting interiors on the bar set where much of the action takes place.

In general, Republic used the same formula for its features that Mascot had originally used for its serials. The studio would try to get a few fairly big names whose services could be obtained for reasonable prices, and would add well-known character actors … some under contract, others hired on a freelance basis.

Also of prime importance in the mix were the stuntmen. It’s impossible to overestimate the contributions of people like Yakima Canutt, Dave Sharpe, Dale Van Sickel, Tom Steele, Ed Parker, Ken Terrell, “Babe” De Freest and Nellie Walker. They may not have played as big a role in Republic’s horror films as they did in the studio’s serials, but they were always there when needed. In a film like The Catman of Paris we have a couple of screen incidents most frequently associated with westerns and serials transported to the French setting of the film. As mentioned earlier, a barroom brawl simply becomes a café contretemps and a wild stagecoach ride is transformed into a carriage chase.

And the same film provides a good example of how Republic’s serials were often the perfect training ground for stuntmen who became actors. Robert Wilke, who plays the Catman when we actually see the creature in makeup, had a long list of serials to his credit. Wilke, who would go on to a prolific career in films and on TV, began with appearances in Republic cliffhangers like S.O.S. Coastguard, The Fighting Devil Dogs, Daredevils of the Red Circle, Spy Smasher and many others.

Among the major contributions Republic made to the world of action films in general and serials in particular: The careful choreography that it brought to stunt work. Yakima Canutt and Dave Sharpe were considered the best stuntmen in the business and they took part in the movement that led to safer and better looking stunts.

In the early days, much of what a stunt double did was based primarily on brawn. Most could roll with the punches and do convincing falls, but … with scripts that essentially just said “Fight Scene” … they were left pretty much on their own to improvise. This could result in awkward moments where one double might go sailing out of camera range, while another could look around and find he had no one left to tackle after he threw someone over a bar.

Dave Sharpe began as a tumbler. He could plot out a movie gag the way a circus performer would plot a routine. Far from relying on brawn he relied on brain. And he was a key reason that the stunt work in Republic pictures was the best in the business. His contribution to Republic classics like The Adventures of Captain Marvel is immeasurable. And Republic management knew it. That’s why people like Dave Sharpe, shown below doubling Ralph Byrd, made more money as stuntmen in a film than they did if they merely acted in the movie!

Left to their own devices, the talented crew at Republic could often work miracles. But they weren’t always left to their own devices. Directives from the front office could sometimes be a help and at other times they could be a hindrance… often in the same movie!

It was Herbert Yates who reportedly came up with the idea of having Erich von Stroheim inhabit a giant castle in The Lady and the Monster. This was a definite plus for the movie since the excellent miniature devised by the Lydecker brothers created an atmospheric tone for the film.

On the other hand, it was Yates who thought The Lady and the Monster would be a better title than Donovan’s Brain. Author Curt Siodmak is said to have hated the name change, and who can blame him? Donovan’s Brain was a thoughtful story, but the title Yates chose was more like a forerunner of the fifties, where classic titles like I Married a Monster from Outer Space graced theater marquees.

And let’s not forget the Republic chief’s other major contribution to the film … the choice of his girlfriend Vera as the leading lady. The one silver lining on that front is the fact that Yates pumped more money into this movie because he wanted to showcase his new discovery!

But even Republic’s lower budget horrors looked good, largely because the studio was always able to stretch its dollars.  Armand “Mandy” Schaefer, the famed producer/director who moved from Mascot to Republic in the studio merger, viewed the people at Republic as one big stock company. The studio had tried and true actors and technicians that it used time and time again, who could be relied on to save time and money.

It wasn’t easy. Producers and directors had to lay everything out beforehand to make sure shooting could be accomplished with utmost efficiency. Directors at Republic might shoot five or six times the number of setups that their counterparts at MGM or Paramount could manage in one day. But that’s because Republic’s directors meticulously planned ahead of time. They put every shot they would take on a storyboard and kept notes. If the director was shooting the leads by a lake and knew he’d need a tracking shot on a nearby path three scenes later, he’d let the crew know in advance so they could be getting the tracks ready. Actors and actresses at Republic used to talk about the difficulty of finding a place to rest between takes on location without getting in the way of all of the activity among crewmembers.

Don Porter, mentioned earlier with regard to Evelyn Ankers, told me Universal had begun to try much the same thing when he was working there. He said his B-movies were shot out of sequence, making it difficult at times to remember exactly where he was supposed to be in the film. Porter, in fact, said most of the time, shooting on his films began with the last scene. Often, he said, he’d start “in the clinch with the leading lady that led to the fade out!”

Porter was in a better position than most actors to assess the impact of this method of filming on the industry in later years. He was one of the most successful actors of the forties in transitioning to television. Not only did he co-star in early TV shows like Private Secretary with Ann Sothern, but in later series such as Gidget as well. At the same time, he continued appearing on the big screen in films like Mame with Lucille Ball. Republic serials may have pioneered the idea of grouping shots to save money, but other B-movie studios soon picked up on it. And Porter told me he then noticed these cost cutting techniques resurfacing on early fifties television shows with super-short shooting schedules. Later he saw it used in even expensive TV programs and finally in some of the major movies he made late in his career. So, Republic was actually ahead of its time.

While the studio may not have had Porter on its roster, it did manage to get a surprising number of name players as leads in its pictures. But, despite the list of actors and actresses that took part in Republic’s horror films, I’ve always wondered why the studio didn’t make greater use of more of the big names who earned a reputation in the genre at other studios.

For example, Anne Gwynne had found the pickings rather slim after leaving Universal. Like her close friend Evelyn Ankers, Anne was a natural for Republic and her name, whether in combination with Evelyn’s or not, would have been a definite plus for any of the studio’s horror films. The two ex-Universal damsels in distress would have been perfect together in The Fatal Witness, with Anne perhaps playing the role of the villain’s girlfriend.

In late 1945, around the time Anne was on the lot filming The Glass Alibi, Republic had been shooting The Madonna’s Secret and Catman of Paris, both of which had roles for which Anne would have been suitable. Unfortunately that wasn’t to be, although Anne was back at the studio a year later to film the not-very-funny or scary The Ghost Goes Wild, which was released in early 1947.

Anne Nagel would seem to be another missed opportunity. She stopped by Republic in the fall of 1945 to shoot her part in Murder in the Music Hall, a mystery Herbert Yates envisioned as another vehicle for girlfriend Vera Ralston. And Anne was back in March of 1946 to work on Traffic in Crime, which also had a part for the old Catman himself, Bob Wilke. But neither film exploited Anne’s reputation as a former Universal horror heroine.

If nothing else, one would expect Republic to find a role for Anne in The Phantom Speaks, to take advantage of her association with Universal’s Black Friday. Republic shot The Phantom Speaks, which was released in spring of 1945, in October of 1944. Anne was definitely available, and a Republic horror film would have been a big step up after appearing in films such as The Mad Monster at PRC!

The same holds true for Bela Lugosi, who was toiling away at Monogram in films like Bowery at Midnight and The Ape Man at approximately the same time Republic was shooting London Blackout Murders. John Abbott did an excellent job in the film, but Lugosi would have been a bigger name. And the fact that Blackout would have reunited Lugosi with Lester Mathews, his co-star in The Raven and Billy Bevan of Dracula’s Daughter fame (even though that wasn’t Bela in the coffin,) would have provided some nice publicity fodder.

Lugosi finished Genius at Work over at RKO in early September of 1945, just as Republic was beginning to shoot Valley of the Zombies. Bela may not have been known for his acting subtlety, but Ian Keith plays the role so broadly that it’s hard not to laugh at times. And again, Bela would have been a bigger name to attract horror audiences. (By the way, Lugosi almost got the chance to play in a Republic film. He was actually signed for one of Republic’s early efforts, The House of a Thousand Candles. Hollywood trade papers at the time reported Lugosi showed up for the first week of shooting, but suffered from a bad cold which worsened to the point where he was forced to back out. Actor/Director Irving Pichel, of Dracula’s Daughter fame, replaced him.)

Looking back, it’s hard to understand why Republic didn’t make better use of proven horror specialists in other areas as well. Dwight V. Babcock, another pulp fiction writer who brought his considerable talents to movies, worked on some of Universal’s best-known horror films, including The Mummy’s Curse, Dead Man’s Eyes, House of Horrors and She-Wolf of London. Republic had Babcock briefly, but used him for only one mid-forties film … the mystery, Road to Alcatraz.

If Republic failed to realize the potential of hiring major horror writers and stars for its films, the studio was definitely innovative in the way it could afford to pepper its pictures with other well-known talents … especially character actors. Many were freelance and Republic hired them by the day. But there too, the studio managed to save money. As mentioned earlier, Republic pioneered the art of including on the storyboard, every actor needed for every scene in one location ahead of time. That way, technicians could light the set once, shoot the scenes one after the other and let the editors take care of continuity later. The technique meant some actors could shoot all of their scenes in just a few days.

Republic also had another trick for keeping costs down. Like everything else around Republic, even backlot sets did double duty. The livery stable on the Western Street actually housed Republic’s famous cave set, which was used in The Girl Who Dared and so many westerns and serials. And the studio’s serial writers had their offices inside the building on Cantina Street that appears as the exterior of an African village church in The Vampire’s Ghost.

Republic also saved time and money by employing some of the best cinematographers in the business. Bud Thackery worked on several films mentioned in this book, including The Girl Who Dared, The Vampire’s Ghost, and The Fatal Witness. He honed his craft on serials like Undersea Kingdom and Dick Tracy, where he began as a specialist in process photography. In fact, it was Thackery who supervised the original construction of the process stage at Mascot when Nat Levine moved into the old Mack Sennett Studios, which eventually became Republic. It was no easy project and the stage got plenty of use over the years since Republic relied so heavily on process shots to supplement live action stunts for its cliffhangers. Serials that benefited from Thackery’s considerable talents included Haunted Harbor, Zorro’s Black Whip, Manhunt of Mystery Island and The Crimson Ghost. Note how careful lighting makes a simple mask and phosphorescent gloves look scary in The Crimson Ghost, shown below.

It goes without saying that a large part of Republic’s unique magic derived from the special effects conceived by two of the most talented men in the business, Theodore and Howard Lydecker. Their full story is not within the scope of this book, although I mention them briefly with regard to certain films. For all of the fascinating details I highly recommend The Legendary Lydecker Brothers by Jan Alan Henderson. Jan also wrote the section on the Lydecker brothers which is featured in Lone Pine in the Movies. It’s impossible to estimate how much time and money the team’s innovative special effects and miniature work saved Republic by eliminating the need for expensive on-location shooting.

The directors at Republic also made a huge difference … rough and tumble guys who could roll with the punches and take anything that came along. If it sounds like I’m describing them as if they were stuntmen, the comparison is valid. They included John English, legendary for his serial work with Bill Whitney, as well as George Sherman, Lesley Selander, Howard Bretherton, Phil Ford and so many more.

Veteran Republic director Joe Kane, interviewed by Charles Flynn and Todd McCarthy in Kings of the Bs, explained why former Republic directors were so much in demand in television. At Republic, minus the credits, a director had to shoot 54 minutes in six days to come up with a typical programmer. In television, an hour show came down to 48 minutes by the time you eliminated the advertising. But in TV, Kane and his colleagues only had five days and you couldn’t shoot late into the night as they often did in the old days at Republic.

Despite the hard working crews and all the economy measures that allowed the studio to add such gloss and polish to its horror films and other features, by the time Republic was turning out The Madonna’s Secret, Catman of Paris and Valley of the Zombies, there were signs that the studio could be heading for serious trouble. Labor unrest, due largely to jurisdictional disagreements between unions representing craft workers, reached a boiling point in 1946. (By the way, this was also the year that Republic recorded its biggest profit.) While the disputes were eventually settled, production expenses for all of the studios jumped. Between the beginning of the forties and the end of the decade, the cost of production went up some 60 percent.

A company like Republic was especially vulnerable. It was expert at making movies for a fixed price and could pretty much figure out what it would take-in from distributors, so the studio was fairly certain ahead of time how much money it would make on each film. The increase in costs threw a major monkey wrench into the formula. It was hard to trim budgets without it showing on the screen, since Republic already operated on tight margins.

Another major factor, and one that shareholders began to complain about, was studio chief Herbert Yates’ penchant for taking the money the serials, westerns and regular features were making, and pumping it into more expensive vehicles for Vera Ralston.

By the late forties, of course, all of the studios faced a major challenge with the emergence of television.  But, in many ways, this could have been a plus for Republic. If ever a studio appeared to be in a position to benefit from the emergence of TV, it was the little studio in the valley.

Early filmed television series were shot very much like serials. Directors had to be fast, churning out a huge number of setups a day. Actors needed to read their lines in one take. Technicians were required to do their jobs well and perform their duties quickly under incredible pressure.

Republic was the perfect training ground for those who would be successful in this new medium, and the large number of former Republic personnel who were hired by companies involved in early television production bears that out. How sad then, that Republic itself was unable to carve out a lasting niche in TV.

The company’s financial problems, by the time TV came along, often come in for the lion’s share of the blame.  But many critics also say that Republic failed to keep pace with the times. They claim tastes changed after the war and Republic kept turning out the same product. Other scholars point to the early release of Republic movies to television. Remember, at that point, theater owners viewed TV as a deadly enemy. Some felt Republic was “selling them out,” which strained relations between the studio and its distributors.

I don’t pretend to be a scholar. But I am uniquely qualified to comment on another aspect of Republic’s early release of its film library, simply because I’m old enough to have been a kid when television was coming of age. I’ve never seen anyone mention this before, but I believe it belongs in the debit column when it comes to the long list of factors that contributed to Republic’s demise.

The problem is simple. Republic was, in effect, competing against itself with its early TV shows. Even at the age of seven I could tell the difference between the magnificent Republic movies I was seeing on TV and the lackluster Republic programs the studio was making specifically for television.

The movies, from the thirties and forties, had a much more expensive look if for no other reason than the fact that the money in their budgets stretched further in those days. An additional factor was the advantage of having full crews on salary in the movie days, making it easier to do everything from difficult special effects to quick revamping of sets.

I can well remember that, as kids, my brother and I found The Adventures of Fu Manchu … one of the best of the Republic shows … a bit boring compared to the Republic serials. The TV program was shot mostly indoors on rather cramped sets. The serials were shot mostly outdoors. And while there were some good fight scenes in the TV series, they didn’t hold a candle to the stunt action in the serials. My brother and I certainly weren’t aware that the actor playing Fu Manchu was the same guy who starred in The Vampire’s Ghost, but we did know his Chinese accent was phony even at that young age. Other Republic shows were even worse. True, Stories of the Century, another early Republic program, was praised by critics, but my brother and I thought it was a dud compared to the action-packed Republic cowboy movies we were seeing on TV at the time.

Sadly, it was left up to others to take advantage of the opportunities that early television offered. Some, like Four Star Productions and Revue, even used rented space on the Republic lot to do so. And, by the time shareholders were demanding that Herbert Yates be ousted, perhaps the aging businessman just didn’t have much interest in a fight. In any event, it seems a shame that Republic, once such a feisty upstart, had to go out with a whimper instead of a bang.

Thankfully, though, we have been left with a legacy of unique motion pictures to serve as a celluloid reminder that Republic was a force to be reckoned with in its glory days. Perhaps this book will inspire television executives to make the films covered here, along with other Republic offerings that have been largely absent for several decades, available once again to the general public. It’s time for a whole new generation to experience the thrill of anticipation that the Republic logo brought to the young, and the young-at-heart, for so many years.

Authors Note

For far too long, many of the feature films produced by Republic Studios have been denied their rightful place in Hollywood’s rich and diverse history. Most of these films were shown in theaters in the forties and then leased to television in the fifties, before the major studios were willing to provide their movies to TV. Many of Republic’s feature films haven’t been shown on television since.

It is the author’s sincere hope that this book will promote a wider knowledge of these movies and thereby benefit both the current owners of these films and a new generation of viewers who have never had the opportunity to see them.

The years that appear under the titles of films at the beginning of each chapter refer to actual release dates. Production dates often differ.

The photos in this reference/research work are used for historical and scholarly purposes under the “Fair Use Doctrine” of the U.S. copyright law. While every effort has been made to provide proper acknowledgement where it is due, in the event any inadvertent omissions have occurred, we shall be pleased to correct them in future editions.