page_title: Randolph Scott
section_title: Zane Grey apprenticeship
hierarchical_section_title: Randolph Scott / Paramount / Zane Grey apprenticeship
caption_attribution_description: English: Man of the Forest (1933), directed by Henry Hathaway, with Randolph Scott and Verna Hillie
context_page_description: George Randolph Scott was an American film actor whose career spanned the years from 1928 to 1962. As a leading man for all but the first three years of his cinematic career, Scott appeared in a variety of genres, including social dramas, crime dramas, comedies, musicals, adventure tales, war films, and a few horror and fantasy films. However, his most enduring image is that of the tall-in-the-saddle Western hero. Out of his more than 100 film appearances over 60 were in Westerns; thus, "of all the major stars whose name was associated with the Western, Scott [was] most closely identified with it."
  Scott's more than 30 years as a motion picture actor resulted in his working with many acclaimed screen directors, including Henry King, Rouben Mamoulian, Michael Curtiz, John Cromwell, King Vidor, Allan Dwan, Fritz Lang, Sam Peckinpah, Henry Hathaway, Ray Enright, Edwin L. Marin, Andre DeToth, and most notably, his seven film collaborations with Budd Boetticher. Scott also worked with a diverse array of cinematic leading ladies, from Shirley Temple and Irene Dunne to Mae West and Marlene Dietrich.
context_section_description: Scott's first role under his new Paramount contract was a small supporting part in a comedy called Sky Bride (1932) starring Richard Arlen and Jack Oakie.
  Following that, however, Paramount cast him as the lead in Heritage of the Desert (1932), his first significant starring role and also the one that established him as a Western hero. As with Women Men Marry, Sally Blane was his leading lady. Henry Hathaway made his directorial debut with Heritage of the Desert. The film was popular and Scott would go on to make ten "B" Western films loosely based on the novels of Zane Grey.
  (Around the same time, Fox also remade some Zane Grey titles that they owned, with George O'Brien as their star.)
  Many of these Grey adaptations were remakes of earlier silent films. In an effort to save on production costs, Paramount utilized stock footage from the silent version and even hired some of the same actors, such as Raymond Hatton and Noah Beery, to repeat their roles. For the 1933 films The Thundering Herd and Man of the Forest, Scott's hair was darkened and he sported a trim moustache so that he could easily be matched to footage of Jack Holt, the star of the silent versions.
  
  In his book, The Hollywood Western: Ninety Years of Cowboys and Indians, Train Robbers, Sheriffs and Gunslingers, film historian William K. Everson refers to the Zane Grey series as being "uniformly good". He also writes:
  To the Last Man was almost a model of its kind, an exceptionally strong story of feuding families in the post-Civil War era, with a cast worthy of an "A" feature, excellent direction by Henry Hathaway, and an unusual climactic fight between the villain (Jack LaRue) and the heroine (Esther Ralston, in an exceptionally appealing performance).
  Sunset Pass... was not only one of the best but also one of the most surprising in presenting Randolph Scott and Harry Carey as heavies.
  The Zane Grey series were a boon for Scott, as they provided him with "an excellent training ground for both action and acting".
  In between his work in the Zane Grey Western series, Paramount cast Scott in several non-Western roles, such as "the other man" in Hot Saturday (1932), with Nancy Carroll and Cary Grant.
  Scott returned to Zane Grey Westerns with Wild Horse Mesa (1932), then was the romantic male lead in Hello, Everybody! (1933), an odd one-shot attempt to make a film star out of the popular but heavy-set radio singer Kate Smith.
  The Thundering Herd (1933) was another Zane Grey Western with Hathaway, then he was in two horror movies, Murders in the Zoo (1933) with Lionel Atwill and Supernatural (1933) with Carole Lombard.
  After the Western Sunset Pass (1933), Paramount loaned Scott to Columbia, to play Bebe Daniels's love interest in a minor romantic comedy called Cocktail Hour (1933).
  Back at Paramount Scott did the Westerns Man of the Forest (1933) and To the Last Man (1933), both with Hathaway from Grey novels. He was loaned to Monogram Pictures for Broken Dreams (1933) then was back with Hathaway for The Last Round-Up (1934).
  Scott did three more Zane Grey Westerns without Hathaway: Wagon Wheels (1934) directed by Charles Barton, Home on the Range (1935) from Arthur Jacobson, and Rocky Mountain Mystery (1935) with Barton.
caption: Barton MacLane, Tom Kennedy, Noah Beery, Sr., Scott and Verna Hillie in Man of the Forest, 1933
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