Tex Ritter Movies
As a college student, Tex Ritter (born Woodward) began studying cowboy ballads and southwest folklore, and later dropped out of law school to launch a stage and radio folk-singing career. He debuted on Broadway in 1930; his first screen appearance was in Song of the Gringo (1936). Almost immediately, he rivalled Gene Autry in popularity (as a singing cowboy) among movie fans; from 1937-41 and 1944-45 he was on the top-ten Western stars list, and ultimately he appeared in 85 films. He was often referred to as "America's most beloved cowboy." In the latter half of the '40s he stopped making films, instead touring with White Flash, his horse, in live shows; he also continued his successful recording career. He went on to provide the title songs of five Westerns, narrate a sixth, and appear on TV's "Zane Grey Theater." He moved to Nashville and became a weekly fixture at the Grand Ole Opry. He also founded a restaurant franchise, "Tex Ritter's Chuck Wagons." In 1966 he had a prominent role in the film The Girl from Tobacco Row and was featured in cameos as himself in two others. In 1970 he ran in the Republican primary for U.S. Senator in Tennessee, but lost. He was the only entertainer to be elected to both the Cowboy Hall of Fame and the Country Music Hall of Fame. He was married to actress Dorothy Fay; their son is actor John Ritter. ~ All Movie Guide- 1984
This documentary concerns the legion of B-westerns made from the end of the silent era to the present, including stock footage of all the classic cinema cowboys. ~ John Bush, All Movie Guide
- 1967
In this countrified musical, a C&W singer does all he can to avoid fame and fortune because that is what destroyed his famous daddy. His managers have other plans though; musical mayhem ensues as they insure that he spends his life before an audience and not around cows. Songs include: "We've Got the Best There Is," "Don't Look Back," "I'll Make It Up to You," "Auctioneer," "What Am I Bid?" "When a Boy Becomes a Man" (Nash), "I Never Got to Kiss the Girl" (Tex Ritter). ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Stephanie Hill
- 1966
Waylon Jennings stars as an up-and-coming country & western singer in this low-budget musical drama. Arlin Grove (Jennings) has just finished a hitch in the Army and finds he's stranded in the small town of Morgan's Corner after being robbed by drunken rednecks. Grove is taken in by pretty Molly Morgan (Mary Frann) and her father, and it doesn't take long for Molly to become infatuated with the rugged stranger while nursing him back to health. Arlin and Molly soon marry, and after playing a few songs at a local honky-tonk, Grove becomes a professional musician when he's offered 75 dollars a week for a standing Saturday night gig. Word about Grove begins to spread, and entertainment lawyer Wesley Long (Gordon Oas-Heim) offers to take over his management and take him to the big time. Long's paramour Margo (CeCe Whitney) helps give Arlin's act some polish, and before long the singer is knocking 'em dead on the country circuit, and even playing the Grand Old Opry. However, Long takes it upon himself to break up Arlin and Molly's marriage, convinced it would be better for Grove's career if he were single, and Molly, now expecting a baby, is left heartbroken. Arlin soon finds himself of the other side of Long's machinations when the manager wrongly suspects his new client is having an affair with Margo; Long sabotages Grove with a booking at a ritzy supper club, and thinking his career is over, Grove turns to the bottle. Along with Jennings in his big screen debut, Nashville Rebel features vintage performances from Loretta Lynn, Faron Young, Porter Wagoner, Tex Ritter, Sonny James, and Henny Youngman. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Waylon Jennings
Ron Ormond, the Carolina-based purveyor of bottom-budget "regionals," was producer of The Girl From Tobacco Row. Per its title, the film concerns a young lady from a tobacco-growing community, played by Rachel Romen. Surrounded by a flock of inbred boyfriends who won't take no for an answer, Rachel struggles to rise above her poverty-stricken surroundings. Legendary singing cowboy Tex Ritter, who certainly didn't need the money, is top billed in this inexpensive melodrama. Co-directed by producer Ormond and his wife June, this drama features their son Tim Ormond in the cast. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- 1956
This musical performance video takes you to the Ryman Auditorium in Nashville for a country-western variety show! ~ All Movie Guide
- 1955
Filmed around the same time as Gunfight at the OK Corral, Wichita is a more modest--and to some, more entertaining--slant on the Wyatt Earp legend. Joel McCrea does his usual smooth, underplayed job as Earp, who aims to bring law and order to the wide-open cow town of Wichita. His least popular move is to take away the guns of everyone in town, no matter how important. Only when town banker McCoy (Walter Coy) is hit with a personal tragedy does Earp's no-guns edict begin to make sense. Linking the episodic storyline is an offscreen ballad, sung High Noon style by Tex Ritter. Interestingly, Joel McCrea would later star in the 1959 TV western Wichita Town--though not, of course, as Wyatt Earp (Hugh O'Brien was busy with that character on another network!) ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Joel McCrea, Vera Miles, (more)
- 1955
Longtime B-western favorites Tex Ritter and Ray "Crash" Corrigan are among the supporting players of the Columbia oater Apache Ambush. Star of the proceedings is Bill Williams, cast as Indian scout James Kingston. In the last days of the Civil War, President Lincoln (James Griffith) selects Kingston and two other men -- cattle driver O'Roarke (Ray Teal) and "reconstructed" Confederate major McGuire (Don C. Harvey) -- to help speed along a major cattle shipment from Texas to the Northern states. One of the obstacles facing the three men is Mexican fanatic Joaquin Jironza (Alex Montoya), who wants to get his hands on the Henry Repeating Rifles which Kingston and his confreres carry with them. Undermining the good guys is embittered ex-rebel Lee Parker (Richard Jaeckel), who is in cahoots with Jironza. So much happens in the first five reels that the titular Indian ambush is almost anticlimactic (a warning to more sensitive viewers: neither the Apaches nor the Mexicans are shown in a particularly sympathetic light). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Bill Williams, Richard Jaeckel, (more)
This film traces the history of the American cowboy right up to modern times. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1953
To fully appreciate the western comedy The Marshal's Daughter, one must be aware that its star, a zaftig, wide-eyed lass named Laurie Anders, was in 1953 a popular TV personality. A regular on The Ken Murray Show, Anders had risen to fame with the Southern-fried catchphrase "Ah love the wi-i-i-ide open spaces!" Striking while the iron was hot, the entrepreneurial Murray produced this inexpensive oater, which cast Anders as Laurie Dawson, the singing daughter of a U.S. marshal (Hoot Gibson). Teaming with her dad to capture outlaw Trigger Gans (Bob Duncan), Laurie briefly disguises herself as a masked bandit. Amidst much stock footage from earlier westerns and a plethora of lame jokes and dreadful puns, The Marshal's Daughter is a treat for trivia buffs, featuring such virile actors as Preston S. Foster, Johnny Mack Brown, Jimmy Wakely and Buddy Baer as "themselves." Ken Murray himself makes a supporting appearance as a leering frontier wiseacre named "Sliding Bill Murray." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Laurie Anders, Hoot Gibson, (more)
This Western classic stars Gary Cooper as Hadleyville marshal Will Kane, about to retire from office and go on his honeymoon with his new Quaker bride, Amy (Grace Kelly). But his happiness is short-lived when he is informed that the Miller gang, whose leader (Ian McDonald) Will had arrested, is due on the 12:00 train. Pacifist Amy urges Will to leave town and forget about the Millers, but this isn't his style; protecting Hadleyburg has always been his duty, and it remains so now. But when he asks for deputies to fend off the Millers, virtually nobody will stand by him. Chief Deputy Harvey Pell (Lloyd Bridges) covets Will's job and ex-mistress (Katy Jurado); his mentor, former lawman Martin Howe (Lon Chaney Jr.) is now arthritic and unable to wield a gun. Even Amy, who doesn't want to be around for her husband's apparently certain demise, deserts him. Meanwhile, the clocks tick off the minutes to High Noon -- the film is shot in "real time," so that its 85-minute length corresponds to the story's actual timeframe. Utterly alone, Kane walks into the center of town, steeling himself for his showdown with the murderous Millers. Considered a landmark of the "adult western," High Noon won four Academy Awards (including Best Actor for Cooper) and Best Song for the hit, "Do Not Forsake Me, O My Darling" sung by Tex Ritter. The screenplay was written by Carl Foreman, whose blacklisting was temporarily prevented by star Cooper, one of Hollywood's most virulent anti-Communists. John Wayne, another notable showbiz right-winger and Western hero, was so appalled at the notion that a Western marshal would beg for help in a showdown that he and director Howard Hawks "answered" High Noon with Rio Bravo (1959). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Gary Cooper, Grace Kelly, (more)
- 1950
Little Lippert Studios wasn't really equipped to produce large-scale musicals, but the company can't be faulted for trying. Holiday Rhythm stars David Street as Larry, a TV producer who plans a big musical spectacular. Knocked unconscious, Larry dreams of all the wonderful acts he intends to corral for his project. Guest stars include Tex Ritter, the Chuy Reyes and Ike Carpenter orchestras, George Arnold and his "Rhythm on Ice" show, The Cass Country Boys, The Four Moroccans, and (drum roll please) Bill Burns and His Birds. Distributed to most markets in a 60-minute version. Holiday Rhythm was made available in a 70-minute format to selected cities. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Mary Beth Hughes, David Street, (more)
- 1945
In this western, the Texas Rangers must stop a range war between sheepherders and cattle ranchers from erupting. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
A great old Western filled with Tex Ritter's songs, this one revolves around a manhunt by the Texas Rangers who are trying to find the outlaw gang who, years before, broke into a safe and hid the money. Good Western comedy. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide
- 1945
The penultimate entry in the Texas Rangers lineup, PRC's super-low-budget rival to Republic Pictures' Three Mesqueteers series, Frontier Fugitives once again stars Tex Ritter, Dave O'Brien, and Guy Wilkerson. This time, the trio are on to a gang that preys on both traders and Indians. Trailing the main suspect in the killing of Trader Williams (George Morrell), Tex is accused by a fake Indian agent (Jack Ingram) of murdering a brave. The latter, however, proves to be merely another member of the gang in disguise but before he can clear his good name, Tex has to get himself out of jail. When not battling crooked Indian agents and comic opera braves, Ritter performs Al Dexter's "Too Late to Worry, Too Blue to Cry" and "I'll Wait for You, Dear." The Western was filmed on location at Chatsworth, CA. ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
- 1945
A gang which frees criminals and kills them to collect their reward is broken up by the Texas Rangers who plant one of their men in jail in order to be freed by the gang. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1944
In this western, a rancher turns his property into a dude ranch for soldiers after he is drafted. Featured upon this ranch are entertaining shows with music from Tex Ritter, Roy Acuff, and the Mills Brothers. Songs include: "Spot In Arizona," "You Man You," "Wait For The Light To Shine," "Walking Down The Lane With You," and ""Lazy River."" ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1944
In this western, two cowboys go to buy fresh horses for the cavalry and end up taking on two badguys and a female vigilante. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
In this western, the Texas Rangers ride out after "The Whispering Skull" an enigmatic killer who murders his victims in the dead of night. Following the death of a town sheriff, one of the Rangers begins posing as the phantom. This forces the real killer to reveal his identity. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1944
Replacing James Newell, country and western crooner Tex Ritter joins Dave "Tex" O'Brien and Guy Wilkerson in the last eight of PRC's "Texas Rangers" western series. In his initial effort, Ritter, as Sheriff Tex Haines, is again confronted with Bart Kern (I. Stanford Jolley) and his gang of cutthroats who once before terrorized the community of Red Rock and are now back for a second helping. Despite joining forces with Texas Rangers Dave Wyatt (O'Brien) and Panhandle Perkins (Wilkerson), Tex comes up short against Kern's trigger-happy gangsters. But when a henchman (Charles King) kills the town's mayor, Frank Merritt (Harry Harvey), in cold blood, Mrs. Merritt (Betty Miles) and telegraph owner Jane Deering (Patti McCarty) demand to be sworn in as Texas' first female rangers. To boost the morale of this inexperienced but ultimately victorious group of frontier lawmen and women, Tex sings his own and Robert McGimsey's "Please Remember Me" as well as Tim Spencer's "He's Gone Up the Trail" and "Ride, Ranger, Ride". ~ Hans J. Wollstein, All Movie Guide
