The Lawless Frontier

It seems striking that John Wayne, one of the biggest stars in Hollywood history, was ever of so little interest to the major studios. But in 1933, after dozens of films, and stints at Columbia and Warner Brothers, Wayne had little choice but to move down the rungs to Monogram Pictures. This was a poverty row outfit, a maker of low-budget movies shot on very fast schedules and without the star wattage of the bigger studios. As Wayne himself later told author Michael Munn: "For any actor trying to get on in the business, working at Monogram was not a good career move. Most of the contract players there may have had regular work, but they generally didn't move up from there into the major studios -- they went down, and that's the direction I thought I was headed." But over the next few years, Wayne built himself into a known star of B movies by making thirty films for producer Paul Malvern. Malvern's Lone Star Productions cast Wayne in sixteen westerns for release by Monogram (Wayne signed two consecutive eight-film contracts), followed by eight further films for Republic and six for Universal. By the time Wayne did Stagecoach (1939) and turned into an A-list star, he'd already amassed over fifty credits -- plus plenty more uncredited performances. The Lawless Frontier (1934) was the tenth of the Lone Star westerns. It was made on a budget of $11,000, shot in less than a week at Red Rock Canyon north of Los Angeles, and released by Monogram on Nov. 22, 1934. The director was Robert N. Bradbury, who directed many in the series and was the father of another famous B western actor of the time, Bob Steele. Wayne was paid $1250 for his work here. His castmates included -- as per usual for many of these westerns -- George "Gabby" Hayes and Yakima Canutt, probably the most famous stuntman in Hollywood history. (See separate TCM article on Randy Rides Alone [1934] for more on Canutt.) The leading lady was Sheila Terry, who appeared in some three dozen films in the 1930s before leaving the business. Sadly, she committed suicide in 1957, penniless after two marriages and a post-acting career as a New York press agent. Variety described The Lawless Frontier as "a labyrinth of a plot involving a desperado, a pretty girl and her desert rat father. Wayne surmounts every obstacle and bilks every move against him or others he's protecting... Sheila Terry is the girl. Against the drab background of the dusty western locale, she's like a swan swimming around in the Mississippi mud... The horses are all good." Variety noted a "big unintended laugh" in the film, after Wayne chases an outlaw on horseback: "Both have dismounted after riding their nags breathless and go off into the desert. The laugh comes when the men suddenly stagger around, unable to go faster than a walk, apparently from exhaustion." Wayne later said of these Lone Star westerns, "The plots weren't really that important. There wasn't time to develop character or some long story line. The emphasis was on action, and plenty of it, no matter what. Come hail, rain, sun, hell, or high water, you had to make those films in six days. If the wind blew, the microphone picked it up and nobody could hear the dialogue, so if any talking had to be done, it was usually done indoors. Out of doors, dialogue was kept to a bare minimum. The main thing was, finish the film and don't go over budget." These pictures greatly increased Wayne's popularity, eventually giving him the clout to negotiate a better contract. "I became more and more interested in learning the whole business of making pictures," he said. "I wanted to really learn my profession, but it wasn't easy making those cheap westerns. I went in and out of each one so quickly that I didn't even know their titles. To play a cowboy you needed a good hat, a good pair of boots, and you had to be able to ride a horse. But I wanted to learn more than that." In addition to soaking up valuable information about moviemaking, Wayne also relished the chance to spend time with actual cowboys on the set: "One of the most satisfying things...was the camaraderie of the cowboys who worked on those films. They were real cowboys, not actors. They'd been forced off the range by the Depression and had migrated to Hollywood looking for work in pictures. The last of the big cattle drives were over. These cowboys were the last. Working in pictures together, they found some kind of solace in just being with each other. I liked being with them, and really respected them. I listened to their stories and kind of absorbed their culture." Yakima Canutt later reflected on this, telling author Munn that "I felt John identified with the cowboys because they just weren't comfortable with the idea of home life, and John was feeling that way, too. He hadn't been married long, but he had trouble relating to women. He was inclined to put them on a pedestal. The cowboy needed to be free to roam and be with his own kind." By Jeremy Arnold SOURCES: Yakima Canutt, Stunt Man William K. Everson, The Hollywood Western Fred Landesman, The John Wayne Filmography Michael Munn, John Wayne: The Man Behind the Myth