Tag Archives: Cesar Romero

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 7.5 “Roarke’s Sacrifice/The Butler’s Affair”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Unfortunately, the show has been removed from most streaming sites.  Fortunately, I’ve got nearly every episode on my DVR.

This week, Roarke is haunted by a past love.

Episode 7.5 “Roarke’s Sacrifice/The Butler’s Affair”

(Dir by Cliff Bole, originally aired on November 12th, 1983)

This is an odd episode.  Both of the stories deal with love.  In one of them, Lee Meriwether plays a woman who is in love with her butler, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr.  She comes to Fantasy Island with a group of friends, all of whom are very judgmental about the idea of Meriwether dating a member of the help.  Mr. Roarke deals with the situation by threatening to reveal all of their secrets.  He explains that he does a thorough background check on everyone who comes to Fantasy Island.  I’m not sure if I buy that because some really bad folks have come to the Island.  Anyway, this story ends with Zimbalist starting to loosen up and Meriwether saying that she was going to continue to train him to be her boyfriend once they returned to the mainland.  I’m not sure if this is so much a love story as much as it’s a “I want to have sex with someone who I pay so they can’t ever say no” story.

The other story is a bit more interesting.  Julie Mars (Cyd Charisse, who I adore) is a dancer who walks with a cane.  It turns out that she and Roarke have been in love for years and the implication is that Roarke spent time with her off of the Island.  This is really a big deal.  It goes against everything that has always been implied about Roarke in the past.  Roarke never leaves the Island, that’s what we believed.  It turns out we were wrong.  He’s not only left the Island before but he’s fallen in love.  Julie’s fantasy is to be able to dance again.  Roarke grants her fantasy and Edmond Rome (Cesar Romero) wants to puts her in a show.  Roarke knows that the only way Julie can continue to dance is if she forgets the love that she has for Roarke.  That doesn’t quite make sense but Roarke just goes with it.  She leaves the Island, acting as if Roarke is just a friendly acquaintance as opposed to being the love of her life.

That was sad!  What made it especially sad is that Roarke doesn’t really have anyone to talk about all of this.  Tattoo was close enough to being an equal that Roarke could open up to him.  Lawrence is just a butler.  Some people confide in their butler.  Some people — as seen in this very episode — fall in love with their butler.  Roarke, however, is lost without Tattoo.

Poor Roarke!

Hold ‘Em Yale (1935, directed by Sidney Lanfield)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Georgie, the Chaser (Cesar Romero) is a con artist who works for a low-level gangster named Sunshine Joe (William Frawley).  When Georgie reads about an heiress named Clarice van Cleve (Patricia Ellis) who impulsively falls in love with any man wearing a uniform, Georgie pretends to be a member of the Foreign Legion and tracks her down.  Georgie thinks that Clarice’s father will pay him off, just as he’s paid off all of her other suitors.  Instead, Clarice’s father disinherits her and Clarice ends up living at Georgie’s place, along with his other criminal associates (Andy Devine, Warren Hymer, and George E. Stone).

Georgie reacts by getting out of town, leaving Clarice behind with his good-natured gang.  However, even the gang gets tired of Clarice insisting that they dress up for dinner and that they all get a good night’s sleep.  After Sunshine Joe cheats them out of their money, the remaining criminals head to the Yale-Harvard football game, hoping to win some bets and to set Clarice up with the player that her father wants her to marry, studious benchwarmer Hector Wilmot (Buster Crabbe).

Just a little over an hour long, Hold ‘Em Yale is actually a pretty amusing movie.  It was based on a short story by Damon Runyon and all of the characters are familiar Runyon types, streetwise but good-natured criminals who enjoy drinking and gambling and the film gets a lot of laughs out of their reactions to Clarice’s attempts to civilize them.  Patricia Ellis is great as the ditzy Clarice and this film provides a chance to see Buster Crabbe playing a character who isn’t a natural-born athlete for once.  It’s a minor film but worth watching for the cast and the snappy dialogue.  Who would have guessed a good movie could be built around Ivy League football?

 

Retro Television Review: Fantasy Island 6.12 “The Tallowed Image/Room and Bard”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Unfortunately, the show has been removed from most streaming sites.  Fortunately, I’ve got nearly every episode on my DVR.

This week, William Shakespeare comes to the Island!  Smiles, everyone, smile!

Episode 6.12 “The Tallowed Image/Room and Bard”

(Dir by Carl Kugel, originally aired on January 29th, 1983)

This week, we have another two fantasies and, interestingly enough, they both involve time travel.

Movie star Angela Marckham (Laraine Stephens) wants to be taken seriously as an actress.  She asks Roarke to send her back in time so that she can appear in one of Shakespeare’s plays.  However. something goes wrong when Roarke attempts to open up the time travel portal and instead, Shakespeare (Robert Reed) ends up in the modern era.

“Be this Heaven or Hell?” Shakespeare demands.

“This is Fantasy Island,” Tattoo replies.

Shakespeare is happy to have escaped England because he was on the verge of being killed by the Earl of Norfolk (Lloyd Bochner).  Angela puts Shakespeare to work writing a scene for her but Shakespeare announces that he cannot use a “word processor” and needs a quill pen.  Luckily, quills can be bought at the Fantasy Island gift shop!  Shakespeare then gets writers block.  Angela really should just demand a refund.  Her fantasy is a bust.  No traveling to the past.  No play.  Shakespeare is kind of a jerk.  But then the Earl of Norfolk shows up on Fantasy Island and, with his life now in danger, Shakespeare discovers that can write again.  Hooray!

This fantasy felt familiar but, then again, the same can be said for many of the episodes of Fantasy Island that I’ve recently watched.  After six seasons, any show would start to repeat itself.  In this case, neither Angela nor Shakespeare are particularly sympathetic.  Roarke has the patience of the saint.

Meanwhile, Andy Durant (Ray Buktenica) goes back to Victorian-era London so that he can meet a model whose picture fascinates him.  Andy meets Pamela Gentry (Angela Landers) but is shocked to discover that she is about to fall victim to the mad owner of a wax museum.  Frederick Kragan (Cesar Romero) kills his models and then disguises them as wax figures.  (If this sounds familiar, it’s because it’s basically a remake of House of Wax.)  Kragan’s assistant, Otto, is played by Sid Haig!  Can Andy save Pamela’s life and expose Kragan’s crimes?

This was a fairly entertaining episode.  I actually kind of liked the idea of Shakespeare being a cranky jerk, even if there was nothing particularly British about Robert Reed’s performance.  Then again, there’s also nothing British about the performances of Audrey Landers, Cesar Romero, or Sid Haig.  This was an odd episode but the House of Wax fantasy had a lot of old school Hammer film atmosphere to it.  And, for those who enjoy Roarke/Tattoo comedy, this episode had a bit more than usual.  Between Tattoo trying to help Shakespeare and Roarke laughing off Angela’s very justified anger over her fantasy not being fulfilled, this was a very good Roarke/Tattoo episode.

Overall, this was a good trip to the Island.

I Watched The Strongest Man In The World (1975, Dir. by Vincent McEveety)

Posted on by Dazzling Erin

Dexter Riley (Kurt Russell) is back, again!  He still hasn’t graduated from Medfield College and Medfield is still on the verge of going broke.  Dean Higgins (Joe Flynn) discovers that the reason Medfield can never get out of the red is because the science class and students like Dexter are spending so much money on their experiments.  The Dean fires the science professor and threatens to expel Dexter!  But when Dexter’s latest experiment develops a type of milk that gives the drinker super strength, the Dean might have to change his mind.

A cereal company wants to buy the supermilk, which would get Medfield out of the hole.  But a rival cereal company just wants to steal the formula for the milk so they hire disgraced businessman and gangster A.J. Arno (Cesar Romero) to once again try to thwart the best laid plans of Medfield College.  Meanwhile, Dexter competes in a contest to prove that the supermilk has truly made him into the strongest man in the world.

The plot of the last Dexter Riley movie somehow manages to be even dumber than the first two and it was high time for Dexter to graduate and get on with his life but The Strongest Man In The World did make me laugh a few times.  Because this entry in the series involved super strength instead of invisibility or merging with a computer, it allowed for more physical comedy and it felt less dates than the other two movies.  The action is pretty much nonstop, as Dexter gets into one scrape after another and the cast is likable even if they all were getting a little old to still be playing college students.  Like the other Dexter Riley films, The Strongest Man In The World is too innocent and good-natured not to enjoy on some level.

I guess Dexter finally graduated after this movie.  Both he and Kurt Russell went on to better things.

I Watched Now You See Him, Now You Don’t (1972, Dir. by Robert Butler)

Posted on by Dazzling Erin

Dexter Riley (Kurt Russell) is back and just in time because Medfield College is on the verge of getting closed down again.

In The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes, buying a computer was supposed to be the solution to all of Medfield’s financial problems.  I guess it didn’t work because Medfield is broke again and corrupt businessman A.J. Arnoe (Cesar Romero) is planning on canceling the school’s mortgage so that he can turn it into a casino.

There is some hope.  Dexter has accidentally created an invisibility spray.  Not only does it tun anything that it touches invisible but it also washes away with water so there’s no risk of disappearing forever.  Dexter and his friend Schuyler (Michael McGreevey) know that they can win the science fair with their invention but the science fair doesn’t want to allow small schools like Medfield to compete unless they really have something big to offer.  Dexter tells the Dean (Joe Flynn) that he has a sure winner but Dexter also refuses to reveal what it is because he doesn’t want word to leak before for the science fair.  The Dean decides to raise the money to pay off the mortgage by becoming a golfer, as one does.  Schulyer works as the Dean’s caddy while Dexter uses the invisibility spray to help the Dean cheat.  That’s a good message for a young audience, Disney!  But when Arno finds out about the spray, he wants to steal it so he can rob a bank.

This was even dumber than The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes but it was also hard to dislike it.  The comedy was too gentle, Kurt Russell and the rest of the cast were too likable, and the special effects were too amusingly cheap in that retro Disney way for it to matter that the movie didn’t make any sense.  When a bunch of college kids learn the secret of invisibility and use it to cheat at golf, you know you’re watching a Disney film.

I Watched The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes (1969, Dir. by Robert Butler)

Posted on by Dazzling Erin

Medfield College has a problem.  No one takes the college seriously.  Maybe if the college could win the big college quiz show, people would finally stop laughing at Medfield but the students are not academically talented.  Professor Quigley (William Schallert) thinks that the college needs to finally buy a new-fangled device called a computer.  The Dean (Joe Flynn) says that there’s no way any college can afford something as expensive as that!  Luckily, businessman and gangster A.J. Arno (Cesar Romero) is willing to donate one of his computers.  It takes several students to move the computer into the lab because the computer is huge.

Medfield finally has a computer but are the students smart enough to win that quiz show?  Popular jock Dexter Riley (Kurt Russell) happens to be in the lab during a freak thunderstorm.  When both he and the computer get struck by lightning at the same time, it leads to Dexter becoming a human computer.  He suddenly knows everything.  He can speak any language and solve any equation.  He can answer any question/  Whenever anyone shines a light into Dexter’s ear, they see circuit boards.  No one really cares that none of this makes sense.  Medfield is going to win that quiz show for sure!  But first, Dexter is going to have to escape from Arno, who fears Dexter now knows all the details about his gambling ring.

Watching this Disney film was a real eye-opener for me.  Computers are such a part of my everyday life that it was strange seeing a college making such a big deal about getting one.  The computer that Medfield got looked more like the type of computer that NASA used to go to the moon than the ones that were in my high school computer lab.  I was worried that no one seemed to care that Dexter had a circuit board in his head.  Not even Dexter seemed to care.  It was also funny to me that all he had to do was get struck by lightning while standing near a computer and suddenly, he knew how to speak every language and solve every problem.  I use a computer everyday and I can still only speak English and Spanish.  I feel like I’m getting cheated.

The whole movie was absolutely ludicrous but I did enjoy watching this movie.  It was too sweet, innocent, and good-natured not to enjoy.  There was nothing realistic about the movie but it was nice to imagine a world where everyone gets along, the bad guys are all too buffoonish to really be dangerous, and a serious knock on the head leads to thing returning to normal instead of permanent brain damage.  Kurt Russell was only 18 when he made The Computer Wore Tennis Shoes but he could already carry a movie.

Retro Television: Fantasy Island 4.15 “Loving Strangers/Something Borrowed, Something Blue”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1984.  Almost the entire show is currently streaming on Daily Motion.

Sorry for running late with the review today.  Are you prepared for some romance?

Episode 4.15 “Loving Strangers/Something Borrowed, Something Blue”

(Dir by Cliff Bole, originally aired on February 14th, 1981)

It’s a special Valentine’s Day episode of Fantasy Island!

Now, I have to admit that my first reaction to this was to think that I would be pretty depressed if I spent a Valentine’s Day at home, watching Fantasy Island.  But then I realized that’s pretty much what happened to me this year.  I had the excuse of a sprained ankle, though.  Add to that, I was watching The Love Boat instead of Fantasy Island and Jeff and I still had a romantic time, even if I was stuck on the couch for most of the day.

(For the record, my ankle is doing much better.  It only hurts with every 20th step now.)

Anyway, both of this episode’s fantasies are about falling in love.

Tom (Peter Marshall) and Margaret Wilkerson (Jane Powell) have been married for 25 years.  It’s been a happy marriage but they’re both curious whether they would still fall in love if they met each other as the way they are now.  Their fantasy is to meet again for the very first time.  Mr. Roarke warns them that this might not be a good idea but Tom and Margaret still choose to walk through the Door of Forgetfulness and immediately forget that they know each other or that they’re married.  Uh-oh — Tom’s flirting with a younger woman!  And Margaret just met international man of mystery, Cesar Romero.  Well, that marriage is doomed.  Or is it?

No, of course, it’s not doomed.  This is Fantasy Island and it’s Valentine’s Day.  Still, you do have to wonder why Roarke grants fantasies that could so easily go terribly wrong.  What if Tom and Margaret hadn’t eventually found each other again?  How would that be explained to the members of their family in Indiana?  Does Mr. Roarke ever worry about getting sued?

As for the other fantasy, Jack Foster (John Gavin) wants to marry Pamela Archer (Shelley Smith) on the Island.  The wedding is being planned.  Tattoo is calling people to order the cake and the plates and the silverware and it’s actually kind of neat to see Tattoo do something other than glare at Mr. Roarke.  However, Pamela has not told Jack the truth about her trampy past and she fears that, if the truth comes out, it will destroy Jack’s campaign to be governor of Illinois.  (I don’t know what she’s worried about.  It’s not like Illinois has a reputation for being run by ruthless political machine or anything.)  Pamela wants to marry Jack but …. OH NO, IT’S MARJOE GORTNER!

Marjoe plays Nick Corbin, who was apparently Pamela’s pimp in her previous life.  He’s come to Fantasy Island to drag Pamela away from Jack and Pamela feels that she has to go with him in order to protect Jack.  Jack reveals that he knows about her past and he doesn’t care.  He then confronts Nick, who pulls a knife on him.  OH NO!  Fortunately, Mr. Roarke appears and literally tosses Nick 20 feet into the air.  I’m not kidding, either.  MARJOE GORTNER GOES FLYING!

With Nick taken care of, Jack and Pamela have an incredibly tacky wedding.  Mr. Roarke walks Pamela down the aisle because apparently, Pamela has no family.  That’s kind of sad.

But the important thing is that everything worked out.  To be honest, neither fantasy was that interesting but I’m always happy to see Marjoe Gortner.  No one glowered quite like Marjoe!

Retro Television Reviews: Fantasy Island 2.18 “Casting Director/Pentagram/A Little Ball”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986.  The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

This week, we have a special, super-sized episode of Fantasy Island!

Episode 2.18 “Casting Director/Pentagram/A Little Ball”

(Dir by George McCowan and Michael Vejar, originally aired on February 17th, 1979)

This week, we get three fantasies, instead of the usual two!

Sister Mary Theresa (Lisa Hartman) is a nun who has been struggling with her faith even since the death of her mentor.  Her fantasy is a chance to meet the only mortal man that her mentor ever loved.  Colin McArthur (John Saxon) is tall, dark, handsome, and he loves animals!  Not only does he seem like the perfect guy but he’s also played by John Saxon.  Today, Saxon is best-known for appearing in horror movies and for playing B-movie villains and it’s easy to forget that he could also be quite a charming actor when given the chance.  That said, as charming as he is, Colin just can’t compete with God and Sister Mary Theresa once again dons her habit before leaving the Island.

Meanwhile, Felix Birdsong (Don Knotts) has spent his life fantasizing about being a big time Hollywood casting agent and he gets his chance when he comes to the Island and is put in charge of selecting the woman who will star in a film called The Most Beautiful Girl In The World.  Felix soon discovers that Hollywood isn’t as glamorous as he thought.  (Uh, yeah, no doubt.)  The film’s producer (Abe Vigoda) is a sleaze.  The film is being funded by a combination of gangsters and oil sheikhs (one of whom is played by Cesar Romero) and all of them expect Felix to select their girlfriends for the role.  Felix ends up very disillusioned, though you have to wonder what type of sheltered existence he experienced before coming to the island.  I mean, he’s shocked to discover that Hollywood can be a heartless place and that rich men have mistresses!  In the end, Felix announces that all 20 of the women will be cast as The Most Beautiful Girl In The World and that every single one of them will get the prize money.  Yay!  Of course, now the production is probably out of money so it’s not as if the film will ever actually be made.  Actually, if I was a contestant in a beauty pageant and the judge just declared a 20-girl tie instead of giving me the prize, I would probably think he was the biggest jerk in the world.  Boooo!  Felix, you jerk!

Finally, Jane Garwood (Florence Henderson, continuing the tradition of Brady Bunch cast members showing up on the island) is a television news reporter who recently gained a lot of attention for a report she filed on Satanic cults.  As a result of the report, a Satanic priest put a curse on Jane.  Jane laughed it off until all of the men in her life started dying.  Jane’s fantasy is to learn whether the curse is real.  Mr. Roarke’s solution is to become the new man in Jane’s life.  When he doesn’t die, Jane will see that the curse is not real….

Except, the curse is real!  The cult has followed Jane to the Island and now they’re not only trying to kill her but Mr. Roarke as well!  I have to admit that I’ve always assumed that Mr. Roarke was meant to be a supernatural being and I also assumed that he was immortal.  Apparently, that’s not completely true.  Still, despite the cult leader kidnapping Jane and dancing around with a cobra, Roarke is able to reveal that the cult leader is not only not a supernatural being but that he’s also Jane’s ex-boyfriend!

This episode was a fun mix of cartoonish comedy, sincere romance, and ludicrous melodrama.  It was entertainingly silly in the way that only Fantasy Island could be at its best.  I mean, with the exception of The Brady Bunch Hour, how many other shows would have the guts to give us Florence Henderson being menaced by a Satanic cult?  For that, you have to go to Fantasy Island!

Retro Television Reviews: Half Nelson 1.3 “The Deadly Vase”

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing Half Nelson, which ran on NBC from March to May of 1985. Almost all nine of the show’s episodes can be found on YouTube!

The pilot for Half Nelson was pretty good!  Now, let’s see if this rest of the show lived up to its promise.

Episode 1.3 “The Deadly Vase”

(Directed by Alan Cooke, originally aired on March 29th, 1985)

I cannot escape Robert Reed.

Seriously!  Robert Reed is one of those actors who seems to show up every week in my retro television reviews.  If he wasn’t starring in The Brady Bunch Hour, he was guesting on The Love Boat or Fantasy Island.  And now, he’s the guest villain in this week’s episode of Half Nelson!

Reed, with his graying perm and his aging porn star mustache, plays Seymour Griffith.  Griffith is a fabulously wealthy Beverly Hills attorney who is planning on becoming even more wealthy by stealing a valuable vase and selling it to a crooked antiques dealer named Morgan (Cesar Romero).  Unfortunately, while stealing the vase, Griffith kills the owner.  (Griffith is also having an affair with the dead man’s wife.)  Somewhat inconveniently, for Griffith, the dead man was a client of the Beverly Hills Patrol!  Rocky Nelson is on the case, both because he’s romantically pursuing the dead man’s daughter (Michelle Johnson) and also because Rocky believes in justice.

This week’s villains

The tone of The Vase is notably different from the pilot that preceded it.  The Pilot had its comedic elements (such as Rocky continually borrowing famous cars from the studio) but it was ultimately fairly serious and it even ended on something of a down note, with Police Chief Parsons (George Kennedy) committing suicide rather than face justice for the murders that he committed.  In the pilot, Rocky was definitely out-of-place as a New Yorker in Los Angeles but, at the same time, he was finding his way around his new town and learning how to fit in.

The Deadly Vase, on the other hand, reimagines Rocky as a short, Italian version of Eddie Murphy’s Axel Foley from Beverly Hills Cop.  Chester (Fred Williamson), who was a supportive boss in the pilot, is suddenly a bit uptight about Rocky investigating a crime in Beverly Hills.  He even sends his newest recruits, Kurt and Beau (played by Bubba Smith and Hang Time‘s Dick Butkus), to follow Rocky around Beverly Hills and make sure that Rocky doesn’t offend any rich people with his New York attitude.  This episode pretty much just duplicates the plot of Beverly Hills Cop.  During one car chase, The Heat Is On plays on the soundtrack and it’s hard not to notice that the other musical cues are almost identical to the ones heard in Beverly Hills Cop.

Smith and Butkus aren’t the only new members of the cast.  Dependable character actor Gary Grubbs joins the show as Detective Hamill, who is far less a fan of Rocky’s than Parsons was.  Hamill shows up long enough to order Rocky to stay off the case and to get growled at by Rocky’s pit bull.  Hamill also gets to have a conversation with Dean Martin about whether or not Frank and Sammy and Shirley MacClaine would be willing to do a benefit for the Beverly Hills police department.  Dean is only onscreen for a few minutes but it’s still nice to see him there.

Joe Pesci, who was so strong in the pilot, spends most of this episode looking more than a little annoyed so I’m going to guess that he may not have been happy with the show’s new direction.  About the only time Pesci seems to be having fun is when Rocky is hired to play a hot dog in a commercial.  The director of the commercial is played by Donald O’Connor and yes, Pesci does wear a hot dog costume.

Joe Pesci getting dressed up like a hot dog pretty much saved this episode as the mystery itself was fairly bland and Robert Reed never really felt like a worthy opponent to Rocky.  Hopefully, next week’s episode will be a bit of an improvement …. or, at least, let’s hope the show finds another excuse to put Joe Pesci in a hot dog costume.

Frontier Marshal (1939, directed by Allan Dwan)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

When Wyatt Earp (Randolph Scott) arrives in the town of Tombstone, he takes the law in his own hands by preventing a local outlaw named Indian Charlie (Charles Stevens) from destroying the saloon owned by Ben Carter (John Carradine).  For his trouble, Earp is beaten up by Carter’s men.  Earp, however, does get a  job as the town’s new marshal.

After some initial weariness, Wyatt befriends an alcoholic dentist and gunfighter named Doc Holliday (Cesar Romero).  While Earp keeps the peace in Tombstone, Doc is torn between two women, dancehall girl Jerry (Binnie Barnes) and his ex-girlfriend, Sarah (Nancy Kelly).

With Carter and his man planning on robbing a payroll train and also kidnapping frontier performer, Eddie Foy (played by the real Foy’s son, Eddie Foy, Jr.), it is only a matter of time before Earp takes on Carter at the legendary O.K. Corral.

Frontier Marshal was only the second sound film to be made about Wyatt Earp’s time in Tombstone and it was the first to use Earp’s name.  (In the first film version of the story, also called Frontier Marshal, Earp’s name was changed to Michael Wyatt.)  This was because Wyatt’s widow was offended by some of the material that was included in the biography that served as the basis for Frontier Marshal and threatened to sue anyone who wanted to make a movie out of it.  In order to get her permission to make the film, 20th Century Fox agreed that no reference would be made to Wyatt’s marriage in the film.  Mrs. Earp ended up suing anyways.  20th Century Fox settled.

As for the film, it’s in no way historically accurate and it pales in comparison to My Darling Clementine, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, Tombstone, and the Star Trek episode where Kirk, Spock, and McCoy thought they were in the old west.  It is, however, better than The Gunfighters episode of Dr. Who.  Randolph Scott is convincing as an upright and law-abiding Wyatt Earp, quite a contrast to the real Wyatt.  The movie though is stolen by Cesar Romero, who plays Doc Holliday as being pathologically self-destructive.  Cesar Romero is not necessarily the first name that comes to mind when you think of a great western actor but he’s very convincing here.  John Carradine is a perfect villain and keep an eye out for Lon Chaney, Jr. as one of his henchmen.  Unfortunately, the final gunfight feels rushed and, for all the build up, it isn’t as exciting as it should be.  Frontier Marshal will mostly be of interest to those curious to see how Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp, Tombstone and the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral were portrayed in films before they became a sacrosanct part of the mythology of the Old West.

Frontier Marshal was later remade, as My Darling Clementine, by John Ford.  Ward Bond, who played Morgan Earp in Ford’s film, plays the original town marshal in Frontier Marshal.  Charles Stevens, who plays Indian Charlie in Frontier Marshal, was often falsely described by the Hollywood publicity mill as being the real-life grandson of Geronimo.  He also appeared in My Darling Clementine, once again playing the role of Indian Charlie.  It was one of the nearly 200 films he made before he died in 1964.