The Lady Takes a Sailor


06:30 am - 08:15 am, Saturday, November 15 on Turner Classic Movies ()

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About this Broadcast
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When her boat capsizes, the head of a research institute is rescued by a man in a mysterious underwater vehicle. She is drugged and left onshore, but no one believes her story, so she sets out to track down the man. From the story "The Octopus and Miss Smith" by Jerome Gruskin.

1949 English
Comedy Romance

Cast & Crew
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Jane Wyman (Actor) .. Jennifer Smith
Dennis Morgan (Actor) .. Bill Craig
Allyn Joslyn (Actor) .. Ralph Whitcomb
Robert Douglas (Actor) .. John Tyson
Eve Arden (Actor) .. Susan Wayne
Tom Tully (Actor) .. Henry Duckworth
Lina Romay (Actor) .. Racquel Riviera
Fred Clark (Actor) .. Victor Santell
William Frawley (Actor) .. Oliver Harker
Charles Meredith (Actor) .. Dr. McKewen
Craig Stevens (Actor) .. Danvers
Stanley Prager (Actor) .. Taxi Driver
Kenneth Britton (Actor) .. Davis
Ruth Lewis (Actor) .. Miss Clark
Ruth Lee (Actor) .. Miss Brand
Harry V. Cheshire (Actor) .. Judge Vardon
Sonja Bryden (Actor) .. Arlette
Walter Shumway (Actor) .. Dr. Coombs
Henrietta Taylor (Actor) .. Dr. Anna Sparton
Emil Rameau (Actor) .. Dr. Mittenwald
Leslie Kimmell (Actor) .. Conrad Updike
John Halloran (Actor) .. Homer Benton
Harry Cheshire (Actor) .. Judge Vardon
Ray Erlenborn (Actor) .. Photographer
John McGuire (Actor) .. Coast Guard Officer
Robert Malcolm (Actor) .. Chief of Police
Frank Cady (Actor) .. Mr. Crane
George Spaulding (Actor) .. Adm. Morell
Jack Lee (Actor) .. Capt. Cutter
Joe McTurk (Actor) .. Waiter
Bridget Brown (Actor) .. Hat Check Girl
Hallene Hill (Actor) .. Flower Woman
Dick Ryan (Actor) .. Apartment House Clerk
Wendy Lee (Actor) .. Telephone Operator
Phyllis Godfrey (Actor) .. Hilda
Jack Boyle (Actor) .. Interne
Luther Crockett (Actor) .. Doctor
Nina Prescott (Actor) .. Tyson's Secretary
Olan Soule (Actor) .. Secretary
John Morgan (Actor) .. Constable
Len Hendry (Actor) .. Constable
Josephine Whittell (Actor) .. Reporter
Kenneth Patterson (Actor) .. Reporter
Tom Stevenson (Actor) .. Institute Guide
Ray Montgomery (Actor) .. Lab Man
Russ Conway (Actor) .. Constables

More Information
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Did You Know..
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Jane Wyman (Actor) .. Jennifer Smith
Born: January 05, 1917
Died: September 10, 2007
Birthplace: St. Joseph, Missouri, United States
Trivia: Born Sarah Jane Fulks, Jane Wyman tried to break into films as a child but was unsuccessful despite encouragement from her mother. A decade later, she began her show business career as a radio singer, using the name Jane Durrell. In 1936, she began appearing in films as a chorus girl and bit player. Eventually, she moved into secondary roles and occasional leads, usually playing brassy blondes in comic relief. She broke out of this mold with her performance in The Lost Weekend (1945), in which she demonstrated her talents as a serious actress; this led to better roles as a major star. For her work in The Yearling (1946), she received a Best Actress Oscar nomination, then won an Oscar for her portrayal of a deaf-mute rape victim in Johnny Belinda (1948). She went on to star in many films, demonstrating her versatility in both comedies and tearjerkers. She was twice more nominated for Oscars, for The Blue Veil (1951) and Magnificent Obsession (1954). After 1956, her screen work was infrequent. She returned from retirement in the early '80s to play a regular role on the TV series Falcon Crest. From 1940 to 1948, she was married to Ronald Reagan; their daughter, Maureen Reagan, was a singer-actress. After a long period of inactivity, Wyman died at age 93 in early September 2007.
Dennis Morgan (Actor) .. Bill Craig
Born: December 30, 1910
Died: September 07, 1994
Trivia: Though Dennis Morgan would later allude to Milwaukee, Wisconsin as his hometown, he was actually born in the small burg of Prentice. After attending Carroll College in nearby Waukesha, Morgan acted in stock companies, worked as a radio announcer, and sang with travelling opera troupes. Still using his given name of Stanley Morner, he was signed to an MGM contract in 1936, then spent a frustrating year playing bit parts. What might have been his big break, as soloist in the "Pretty Girl is Like a Melody" number in MGM's mammoth The Great Ziegfeld (1936), was compromised by the fact that the studio dubbed in Allan Jones' singing voice. Morgan then moved to Paramount, where he played supporting roles under the new moniker Richard Stanley. In 1939, he landed at Warner Bros., where he became "Dennis Morgan" for good and all. His Warners roles were better than anything he'd had at MGM or Paramount, though he still was inexplicably prevented from singing. His biggest acting break came about when Warners loaned him to RKO to appear opposite Ginger Rogers in Kitty Foyle (1940). Finally in 1943, he was given a full-fledged singing lead in Warners' The Desert Song. This led to a series of well-received musicals which earned Morgan a faithful fan following--and, for a brief period, he was the studio's highest paid male star. In 1947, Morgan was teamed with Jack Carson for a group of musical comedies which Warners hoped would match the success of Paramount's Hope-Crosby "Road" pictures. Best of the batch was Two Guys From Milwaukee (1947), which had its premiere in that city. When the sort of musicals Morgan starred in went out of fashion in the 1950s, he shifted creative gears and appeared in westerns and adventure yarns. In 1959, he headlined a TV cop series, 21 Beacon Street. For all intents and purposes retired by the 1960s, Dennis Morgan re-emerged to play cameos in two theatrical features, Rogue's Gallery (1968) and Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood (1976).
Allyn Joslyn (Actor) .. Ralph Whitcomb
Born: July 21, 1901
Died: January 21, 1981
Trivia: Allyn Joslyn was the son of a Pennsylvania mining engineer. On stage from age 17, Joslyn scored as a leading man in such Broadway productions as Boy Meets Girl (1936) and Arsenic and Old Lace (1941), appearing in the latter as beleaguered theatrical critic Mortimer Brewster. Joslyn's leading-man qualities surprisingly evaporated on camera, thus he spent most of his movie career playing obnoxious reporters, weaklings, and gormless "other men" who never got the girl. Among his more notable film appearances were as Don Ameche's snobbish rival for the attentions of Gene Tierney in Lubitsch's Heaven Can Wait (1943), and as the jellyfish cardsharp who sneaks onto a lifeboat disguised as a woman in Titanic (1953). In the sprightly "B" picture It Shouldn't Happen to a Dog (1946), Joslyn was for once cast in the lead, even winning heroine Carole Landis at fade-out time. A prolific radio and TV performer, Allyn Joslyn played one-half of the title role on the 1962 TV-sitcom McKeever and the Colonel.
Robert Douglas (Actor) .. John Tyson
Born: November 09, 1909
Died: January 11, 1999
Birthplace: Fenny Stratford, Buckinghamshire
Trivia: After two years' study at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, British actor Robert Douglas ascended to leading-man status on the London stage. Among his earliest film appearances was a co-starring stint with Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon in the Technicolor Alexander Korda production Over the Moon (1936). He spent six years as a pilot in the British Navy, then began his Hollywood career, playing dark-purposed, humorless villains opposite such swashbuckling leading men as Errol Flynn in 1949's The Adventures of Don Juan, Burt Lancaster in 1950's Flame and the Arrow, and Stewart Granger in 1952's The Prisoner of Zenda. He was starred as Benedict Arnold in The Scarlet Coat (1954) and as Agamemnon in Helen of Troy (1955). Rechanneling his energies into directing, Robert Douglas helmed several British and American TV productions, including 18 episodes of the 1960s series 12 O'Clock High. Robert Douglas' only big-screen directorial credit was 1964's Night Train, which starred Sean Flynn, the son of Douglas' Don Juan duelling opponent Errol Flynn.
Eve Arden (Actor) .. Susan Wayne
Born: April 30, 1908
Died: November 12, 1990
Birthplace: Mill Valley, California, United States
Trivia: Little Eunice Quedens' first brush with the performing arts came at age seven, when she won a WCTU medal for her recital of the pro-temperance poem "No Kicka My Dog." After graduating from high school, she became a professional actress on the California stock company circuit. Still using her given name, she played a blonde seductress in the 1929 Columbia talkie Song of Love then joined a touring repertory theater. After another brief film appearance in 1933's Dancing Lady, she was urged by a producer to change her name for professional purposes. Allegedly inspired by a container of Elizabeth Arden cold cream, Eunice Quedens reinvented herself as Eve Arden. Several successful appearances in the annual Ziegfeld Follies followed, and in 1937 Arden returned to films as a young character actress. From Stage Door (1937) onward, she was effectively typecast as the all-knowing witheringly sarcastic "best friend" who seldom got the leading man but always got the best lines. Her film roles in the 1940s ranged from such typical assignments as sophisticated magazine editor "Stonewall" Jackson in Cover Girl (1944) to such hilariously atypical performances as athletic Russian sniper Natalia Moskoroff in The Doughgirls (1944). In 1945, she earned an Oscar nomination for her portrayal of Joan Crawford's sardonic but sympathetic business partner in Mildred Pierce. In July of 1948, she launched the popular radio situation comedy Our Miss Brooks, earning a place in the hearts of schoolteachers (and sitcom fans) everywhere with her award-winning portrayal of long-suffering but ebullient high school teacher Connie Brooks. Our Miss Brooks was transferred to television in 1952, running five successful seasons. Less successful was the 1957 TVer The Eve Arden Show, in which the star played authoress Liza Hammond. This failure was neutralized by her subsequent stage tours in such plays as Auntie Mame and Hello, Dolly! and her well-received film appearances in Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and Dark at the Top of the Stairs (1960). In 1967, she returned to TV to co-star with Kaye Ballard on the chucklesome The Mothers-in-Law which lasted two years. And in 1978, she became a favorite of a new generation with her performance as Principal McGee in the phenomenally successful film version of Broadway's Grease. In 1985, Eve Arden came out with her autobiography, The Three Phases of Eve.
Tom Tully (Actor) .. Henry Duckworth
Born: August 21, 1908
Died: April 21, 1982
Trivia: Unable to meet the exacting academic requirements of the Naval Academy, Colorado-born Tom Tully entered the service branch of his choice as a common seaman. Following this, Tully worked as a junior reporter for the Denver Post. He decided to become a radio actor simply because the money was better. After several theatrical flops, Tully managed to hitch himself to a success with Eugene O'Neill's Ah, Wilderness. In 1944, he arrived in Hollywood to appear in I'll Be Seeing You. Among his many tough-but-tender screen characterizations was the role of the first commander of the "Caine" in 1954's The Caine Mutiny, a performance which earned Tully an Oscar nomination. From 1954 through 1960, Tom Tully essayed the role of Inspector Matt Grebb on the TV detective series Lineup (aka San Francisco Beat).
Lina Romay (Actor) .. Racquel Riviera
Trivia: Latin-American singer/actress Lina Romay was active in films from 1942 to 1952. She came to Hollywood under contract to Columbia, then worked briefly at MGM and RKO. In 1949, she began a three-year run as featured vocalist on the TV series Paul Whiteman's Goodyear Revue. Lina Romay's screen credits should not be confused with those of the same-named actress/director of the 1970s and 1980s.
Fred Clark (Actor) .. Victor Santell
Born: March 09, 1914
Died: December 05, 1968
Trivia: American actor Fred Clark embarked upon his lifelong career immediately upon graduation from Stanford University. With his lantern jaw, bald pate and ulcerated disposition, Clark knew he'd never be a leading man and wisely opted for character work. After several years on stage, during which time he was briefly married to musical comedy actress Benay Venuta, Clark made his movie debut in Ride the Pink Horse (1947), playing one of his few out-and-out villains. The actor's knowing portrayal of a callous movie producer in Sunset Boulevard (1949) led to his being typecast as blunt, sometimes shady executives. Clark's widest public recognition occurred in 1951 when he was cast as next-door neighbor Harry Morton on TV's Burns and Allen Show; when Clark insisted upon a larger salary, producer-star George Burns literally replaced him on the air with actor Larry Keating. Dividing his time between films and television for the rest of his career, Clark earned latter-day fame in the 1960s as star of a series of regionally distributed potato chip commercials. Though most of his fans prefer to remember the disappointing Otto Preminger farce Skiddoo (1968) as Fred Clark's screen farewell, the truth is that Clark's last performance was in I Sailed to Tahiti with an All-Girl Crew (1969).
William Frawley (Actor) .. Oliver Harker
Born: February 26, 1887
Died: March 03, 1966
Birthplace: Burlington, Iowa, United States
Trivia: American actor William Frawley had hopes of becoming a newspaperman but was sidetracked by a series of meat-and-potatoes jobs. At 21, he found himself in the chorus of a musical comedy in Chicago; his mother forced him to quit, but Frawley had already gotten greasepaint in his veins. Forming a vaudeville act with his brother Paul, Frawley hit the show-business trail; several partners later (including his wife Louise), Frawley was a headliner and in later years laid claim to having introduced the beer-hall chestnut "Melancholy Baby." Entering films in the early 1930s (he'd made a few desultory silent-movie appearances), Frawley became typecast as irascible, pugnacious Irishmen, not much of a stretch from his off-camera personality. Though he worked steadily into the late 1940s, Frawley's drinking got the better of him, and by 1951 most producers found him virtually unemployable. Not so Desi Arnaz, who cast Frawley as neighbor Fred Mertz on the I Love Lucy TV series when Gale Gordon proved unavailable. Frawley promised to stay away from the booze during filming, and in turn Arnaz promised to give Frawley time off whenever the New York Yankees were in the World Series (a rabid baseball fan, Frawley not only appeared in a half dozen baseball films, but also was one of the investors of the minor-league Hollywood Stars ball team). Frawley played Fred Mertz until the last I Love Lucy episode was filmed in 1960, then moved on to a five-year assignment as Bub, chief cook and bottle-washer to son-in-law Fred MacMurray's all male household on My Three Sons.
Charles Meredith (Actor) .. Dr. McKewen
Born: August 27, 1894
Died: November 28, 1964
Trivia: A handsome, dark-haired silent-screen leading man with a widow's peak, Charles Meredith appeared opposite some of the era's great leading ladies, including Marguerite Clark, Blanche Sweet, Mary Miles Minter, Katherine MacDonald, and Florence Vidor. Between 1924 and 1947, Meredith concentrated on the legitimate stage, then returned to film as a distinguished character actor, playing the judge in Joan Crawford's Daisy Kenyon (1947), the High Priest in DeMille's Samson and Delilah (1949), and an admiral in Submarine Command (1952). Continuing well into the television era, the veteran actor had continuing roles in two short-lived series: Rocky Jones, Space Ranger (1954) and Erle Stanley Garner's Court of Last Resort.
Craig Stevens (Actor) .. Danvers
Born: July 08, 1918
Died: May 10, 2000
Birthplace: Liberty, Missouri
Trivia: Craig Stevens abandoned all plans for a career in dentistry when he became involved in student productions at the University of Kansas. Trained at Pasadena Playhouse and Paramount's acting school, Stevens was signed to a stock Warner Bros. contract in 1941. He was well showcased as a soft-hearted gangster in At the Stroke of Twelve, a 1941 two-reel adaptation of Damon Runyon's The Old Doll's House, but his feature film roles were merely adequate at best. By 1950, Stevens was reduced to playing a standard mustachioed villain in the Bowery Boys epic Blues Busters. His saving turnaround came about when Stevens was cast in the title role of the 1958 Blake Edwards-produced TV private eye series Peter Gunn. Though obviously imitating Cary Grant in the early episodes of this three-season hit, Stevens eventually developed a hard-edged acting style all his own. He later re-created his TV role in the 1967 theatrical feature Gunn. Subsequent TV-series assignments for Stevens included the British-filmed weekly Man of the World (1962) and CBS' Mr. Broadway (1964). Craig Stevens was married to actress Alexis Smith (with whom he toured in such stage productions as Critic's Choice) from 1944 until her death in 1993.
Stanley Prager (Actor) .. Taxi Driver
Born: January 01, 1916
Died: January 01, 1972
Kenneth Britton (Actor) .. Davis
Ruth Lewis (Actor) .. Miss Clark
Ruth Lee (Actor) .. Miss Brand
Born: January 01, 1895
Died: August 03, 1975
Trivia: In films from 1932, American actress Ruth Lee was an expert at portraying middle-America matriarchs. One of Lee's largest roles was as the "June Cleaver" mother in the classic 1939 promotional feature The Middleton Family at the World's Fair. From 1939 to 1943, Lee was a regular in the Robert Benchley one-reelers at both MGM and Paramount, superbly cast as the gently bellicose Mrs. Benchley. Ruth Lee remained active until 1962, when she essayed a minor role in Sergeants Three.
Harry V. Cheshire (Actor) .. Judge Vardon
Born: January 01, 1892
Died: June 16, 1968
Trivia: American character actor Harry Cheshire was usually billed as "Pappy," and, like S. Z. "Cuddles" Sakall, he certainly lived up to his nickname, both visually and temperamentally. After a long career on stage and in radio, Cheshire came to films in 1940, appearing in many of Republic's "hillbilly" musicals and westerns. In larger-budgeted films, he was usually seen in minor roles as businessmen, ministers, justice of the peaces and the like. He played Dr. Campbell in the Yuletide classic It's a Wonderful Life (1946), the stage manager of the ill-fated Iroquois theater in The Seven Little Foys (1955) and the Elvis-hating mayor in Loving You (1957). He also showed up in a few of the Ma and Pa Kettle entries, and was afforded a rare opportunity at all-out villainy in Dangerous Mission (1954). TV western fans will remember Harry Cheshire as Judge Ben Wiley on the Gene Autry-produced weekly Buffalo Bill Jr. (1954).
Sonja Bryden (Actor) .. Arlette
Walter Shumway (Actor) .. Dr. Coombs
Born: October 26, 1884
Died: January 13, 1965
Trivia: The husband of actress/writer/producer Corra Beach, Walter Shumway made his screen debut opposite his wife in What Becomes of the Children? (1918), an "uplift" melodrama dealing with divorce. The couple remade the film as a talkie in 1936, this time with Shumway directing Robert Frazer and Natalie Moorhead. As an actor, the tall, dark-haired Shumway usually played villains in low-budget Westerns and would continue to appear in bit parts onscreen until at least 1950. He died at the Motion Picture Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, CA.
Henrietta Taylor (Actor) .. Dr. Anna Sparton
Emil Rameau (Actor) .. Dr. Mittenwald
Born: January 01, 1877
Died: January 01, 1957
Leslie Kimmell (Actor) .. Conrad Updike
John Halloran (Actor) .. Homer Benton
Born: October 19, 1907
Trivia: John Halloran seldom played roles with extensive dialogue during his 24-year screen career, but filmgoers found him a memorable figure from his mere physical presence. A martial arts expert and judo champion, he came to films in middle age after a career in law enforcement that was interrupted over his devotion to those very skills that made him so valuable to the police in the first place. In his larger screen roles, starting with the sinister Captain Oshima in Frank Lloyd's Blood on the Sun (1945), he often made use of his specialized fighting skills, while in smaller parts his size and imposing presence were sufficient. The actor's birth name was John R. Sergel -- he was an American citizen born in Argentina in 1902 to Edwin J. Sergel and the former Belle Russell. His interest in martial arts dated at least from the 1920s. According to various sources, Sergel was part of the San Fernando Dojo in 1932, and set several records in judo competitions at the end of the 1930s. He was a member of the Los Angeles Police Department, holding the rank of sergeant in the early '40s, one of several martial arts experts in the employ of the LAPD at the time. But Sergel was singled out for attention by federal authorities after he took several students, including women, to the notorious Manzanar internment camp -- where many of the Japanese-Americans in the Los Angeles area were being held -- to get them graded in judo. This led to investigations by both the federal government and the local police; Sergel's loyalty to the United States was beyond question, and his police credentials were impeccable, but his admiration and respect for Japanese culture proved to be too controversial in 1944. He resigned from the police force in October of that year. Almost immediately, Sergel was tapped by actor James Cagney, who was then in the process of starring in and producing the movie Blood on the Sun, to serve as a technical advisor as well as the hero's greatest physical nemesis, Captain Oshima. With this commencement of Sergel's movie career, the martial artist and actor took on the stage name John Halloran. The movie got mixed reviews and was not a huge box-office success, but everyone who has ever seen it remembers the climactic judo fight between Cagney and Halloran that destroys just about everything in the room in which it takes place, as well as savaging the two characters. After that, Halloran went on to appear in more than 60 movies and television shows, sometimes cast as sinister heavies in Westerns, and other times making use of his special skills in more exotic and modern settings. Indeed, for a time he became the judo equivalent of Mushy Callahan, the prize fighter who trained countless screen actors and served as technical advisor on a generation's worth of movies about boxing. Halloran worked with Cagney again on pictures, and in movies as different as the Anthony Mann Western The Far Country (1955) and the Kurt Neumann sci-fi thriller Kronos (1957). He also appeared as himself, referred to as "Jack Halloran," in the Abbott & Costello Show episode "Police Rookies," as a martial arts expert demonstrating various judo holds and moves (udenage, kata guruma, etc.). He worked steadily in pictures almost right up until his death in 1968, and his last screen appearance was in the movie Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice (1969).
Harry Cheshire (Actor) .. Judge Vardon
Born: August 16, 1891
Ray Erlenborn (Actor) .. Photographer
Died: June 04, 2007
Trivia: A superior Hollywood craftsperson, Ray Erlenborn moved from acting into a highly specific arena -- that of sound effects artistry -- where he established himself as something of a maestro, not only with the engineering of aural special effects but with his own provision of voices for animated characters. A singer from the age of three, Erlenborn first toured with Hugo Hamlin's Proteges, and then Buddy Erlen and Dodo Reid on the vaudeville belt, followed by appearances as Spike of the Rinkeydink Gang in the "Winnie Winkle" shorts, and in scattered musical roles in Roy Rogers films. Erlenborn earned his most widespread fame decades later, however, by providing the voice of Rabbit in the Winnie the Pooh animated cartoons. During the 1960s and '70s, he also dubbed voices and laugh tracks for such series as The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and The Carol Burnett Show.
John McGuire (Actor) .. Coast Guard Officer
Born: January 01, 1911
Died: January 01, 1980
Robert Malcolm (Actor) .. Chief of Police
Born: September 23, 1918
Frank Cady (Actor) .. Mr. Crane
Born: September 08, 1915
Died: June 08, 2012
Trivia: Balding, long-necked character actor Frank Cady was a stage actor of long standing when he moved into films in 1947. He was usually cast as a quiet, unassuming small town professional man, most memorably as the long-suffering husband of the grief-stricken alcoholic Mrs. Daigle (Eileen Heckart) in The Bad Seed (1957). A busy television actor, he spent much of the 1950s on The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet as Ozzie Nelson's neighbor Doc Willard. The "TV Generation" of the 1960s knows Cady best as philosophical storekeeper Sam Drucker on the bucolic sitcoms Petticoat Junction (1963-1970) and Green Acres (1965-1971). Whenever he wanted to briefly escape series television and recharge his theatrical batteries, Frank Cady appeared with the repertory company at the prestigious Mark Taper's Forum.
George Spaulding (Actor) .. Adm. Morell
Born: January 01, 1881
Died: January 01, 1959
Jack Lee (Actor) .. Capt. Cutter
Joe McTurk (Actor) .. Waiter
Born: January 01, 1897
Died: January 01, 1961
Bridget Brown (Actor) .. Hat Check Girl
Hallene Hill (Actor) .. Flower Woman
Born: January 01, 1876
Died: January 01, 1966
Dick Ryan (Actor) .. Apartment House Clerk
Born: August 25, 1896
Died: August 12, 1969
Trivia: Actor Dick Ryan made his first movie appearance in Monogram's Smark Alecks (1942), and his last in Paramount's Summer and Smoke (1961), an artistic stretch if ever there was one. Ryan usually plays doctors, judges, and prison wardens, with a few beat cops and bartenders thrown in. Accordingly, most of his screen characters were identified by their professions rather than by proper names. One of Dick Ryan's larger assignments was in the 1957 Rowan and Martin vehicle Once Upon a Horse, which nostalgically featured several Hollywood old-timers in choice roles.
Wendy Lee (Actor) .. Telephone Operator
Born: January 01, 1922
Died: January 01, 1968
Phyllis Godfrey (Actor) .. Hilda
Jack Boyle (Actor) .. Interne
Luther Crockett (Actor) .. Doctor
Nina Prescott (Actor) .. Tyson's Secretary
Olan Soule (Actor) .. Secretary
Born: February 28, 1909
Died: February 01, 1994
Trivia: Olan Soule was so familiar as a character actor in movies and television during the 1950s and 1960s -- and right into the 1980s -- that audiences could be forgiven for not even reckoning with his 25-year career on radio. Soule was born in 1909 in La Harpe, Illinois, to a family that reportedly could trace its ancestry back to three passengers on the Mayflower. He began acting in tent shows in his teens, and made his first appearance on radio in 1926. With his rich, expressive voice -- which frequently seemed to belong to characters that audiences thought of as more physically imposing than the slightly built, 135-pound actor -- he quickly found himself in demand for a multitude of roles. Soule ultimately became closely associated with two series, spending more than a decade on the radio soap opera Bachelor's Children, and a nine-year run on The First Nighter, starting in the 1940s. He made the jump to television in 1949, but even in the visual medium his voice was initially part of his fortune -- one of his early movie assignments was as the narrator of the feature film Beyond The Forest (1949), starring Bette Davis. And many of those early on-screen assignments in features were uncredited, such as his appearance as Mr. Krull in Robert Wise's The Day The Earth Stood Still (1951). Still, Soule did attract attention, with his signature thin physique and the fact that he seemed to show up dozens of times a year, all over television and in movies. By the start of the 1960s, he'd amassed literally hundreds of screen appearances, making him one of the most recognizable character actors of the time period.One producer who took full advantage of Soule's skills early and often was Jack Webb, himself a radio veteran, who cast him in well over two dozen episodes of the original in 1950s Dragnet television series, principally in the recurring role of Ray Pinker. When Webb revived Dragnet in the second half of the 1960s, Soule was no less active, showing up at least a half dozen times each season, often in the role of police-lab scientist Ray Murray. Soule's studious, cerebral portrayal of Murray was reminiscent of the lab technician portrayed by Webb himself in He Walked By Night, the movie that led Webb to create Dragnet in the first place. In between those assignments, Soule appeared in dozens of features and was seen on the small screen in everything from Bonanza and Petticoat Junction to My Three Sons and the Herschel Bernardi series Arnie. Later in his career, Soule returned to his roots, lending his vocal talent to the animated series Super Friends.
John Morgan (Actor) .. Constable
Len Hendry (Actor) .. Constable
Died: January 01, 1981
Josephine Whittell (Actor) .. Reporter
Born: January 01, 1883
Died: June 01, 1961
Trivia: Stage actress Josephine Whittell began appearing in films in 1919, often acting opposite her then-husband Robert Warwick. In the first year of the talkies, Whittell cornered the market in middle-aged flirts, as witness her saucy scenes with comedian Robert Woolsey in Caught Plastered and Peach o' Reno (1931). When the Production Code came in, Whittell's characters became a little more respectable, if a bit on the naggy side; W.C. Fields fans will remember her as the mother of troublesome Baby LeRoy in It's a Gift (1934). Josephine Whittell remained active in films until the late '40s.
Kenneth Patterson (Actor) .. Reporter
Born: January 01, 1982
Died: January 01, 1990
Tom Stevenson (Actor) .. Institute Guide
Born: February 22, 1910
Trivia: Handsome British stage actor Tom Stevenson had played the homicidal husband in the stage version of Gaslight before making his screen debut as the gravedigger in The Wolf Man (1941). Freelancing, Stevenson played minor supporting roles at almost every Hollywood studio, often portraying supercilious headwaiters or forbidding military officers. When MGM filmed Gaslight in 1944, Stevenson played Williams, the constable, and he was Reverend Hyslip in Bette Davis's Mr. Skeffington later that year. Stevenson, who also appeared in early television shows, returned to the legitimate stage in 1950.
Ray Montgomery (Actor) .. Lab Man
Born: January 01, 1920
Trivia: Ray Montgomery was a gifted character actor who spent his early career trapped behind a too-attractive face, which got him through the studio door in the days just before World War II, but limited him to callow, handsome supporting roles. Born in 1922, Montgomery joined Warner Bros. in 1941 and spent the next two years working in short-subjects and playing small, uncredited parts in feature films, including All Through The Night, Larceny, Inc., Air Force, and Action In The North Atlantic -- in all of which he was overshadowed by lead players such as Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, and John Garfield, and the veteran character actors in supporting roles (including Alan Hale, William Demarest, Frank McHugh, Barton McLane, and Edward Brophy) at every turn. And even in The Hard Way as Jimmy Gilpin, he was overshadowed (along with everyone else) by Ida Lupino. Montgomery went into uniform in 1943 and didn't return to the screen until three years later, when he resumed his career precisely where he left off, playing a string of uncredited roles. He got what should have been his breakthrough in 1948 with Bretaigne Windust's comedy June Bride, and his first really visible supporting role -- but again, he was lost amid the presence of such players as Robert Montgomery and Bette Davis and a screwball-comedy story-line. It was back to uncredited parts for the next few years, until the advent of dramatic television. In the early 1950s, after establishing himself on the small-screen as a quick study and a good actor, Montgomery finally got co-starring status in the syndicated television series Ramar of the Jungle, playing Professor Howard Ogden, friend and colleague of the Jon Hall's title-character in the children's adventure series. The show was rerun on local television stations continuously into the 1960s. By then, Montgomery had long since moved on to more interesting parts and performances in a multitude of dramatic series and feature films. He proved much better with edgy character roles and outright bad guys than he had ever been at playing good natured background figures -- viewers of The Adventures of Superman (which has been in reruns longer than even Ramar), in particular, may know Montgomery best for two 1956 episodes, his grinning, casual villainy in the episode "Jolly Roger" and his sadistic brutality in "Dagger Island", where his character convincingly turns on his own relatives (as well as a hapless Jimmy Olsen). He could do comedy as well as drama, and was seen in multiple episodes of The Lone Ranger, The Gale Storm Show, and Lassie, in between movie stints that usually had him in taciturn roles, such as Bombers B-52 (1957) and A Gathering of Eagles (1963). During the 1960s, the now-balding, white-haired Montgomery was perhaps most visible in police-oriented parts, as a tough old NYPD detective in Don Siegel's Madigan (1968) and as an equally crusty (but sensitive) LAPD lieutenant in the Dragnet episode "Community Relations: DR-17". Montgomery's last screen appearance was in the series Hunter -- following his retirement from acting, he opened a notably successful California real estate agency.
Russ Conway (Actor) .. Constables
Born: April 25, 1913
Trivia: American actor Russ Conway was most at home in the raincoat of a detective or the uniform of a military officer. Making his movie bow in 1948, Conway worked in TV and films throughout the '50s and '60s. Some of his films include Larceny (1948), My Six Convicts (1952), Love Me Tender (1956) (as Ed Galt, in support of Elvis Presley) Fort Dobbs (1958) and Our Man Flint (1966). TV series featuring Conway in guest spots included The Beverly Hillbillies, The Munsters and Petticoat Junction. Russ Conway settled down in 1959 to play Lieutenant Pete Kyle on David Janssen's private eye TV weekly Richard Diamond.

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