The Lives of Robert Ryan

by J. R. Jones

  HOUR OF THE GUN (1967) Director: John Sturges. Producer: John Sturges. Screenwriter: Edward Anhalt. Photography: Lucien Ballard. Editor: Ferris Webster. Music: Jerry Goldsmith. Production: Mirsch-Kappa Production. Distribution: United Artists. Release date: November 1, 1967. Running time: 100 minutes. Cast: James Garner, Jason Robards, Robert Ryan (Ike Clanton), Albert Salmi, Charles Aidman, Steve Ihnat, Michael Tolan, William Windom, William Schallert, Bill Fletcher, Karl Swenson, Austin Willis, Monte Markham, Richard Bull, Sam Melville, Frank Converse, Jon Voight, Robert Phillips. Color, Panavision.

  CUSTER OF THE WEST (1968) Director: Robert Siodmak. Producer: Philip Yordan. Screenwriters: Bernard Gordon, Julian Halevy. Photography: Cecilio Paniagua. Editor: Peter Parasheles, Maurice Rootes. Music: Bernardo Segall. Production: Security Pictures and Cinerama Productions Corp. Distribution: Cinerama Releasing Corporation. Release date: November 9, 1967 (UK); January 24, 1968 (US). Running time: 143 minutes. Cast: Robert Shaw, Mary Ure, Ty Hardin, Jeffrey Hunter, Lawrence Tierney, Marc Lawrence, Kieron Moore, Charles Stalnaker, Robert Hall, Robert Ryan (Sergeant Patrick Mulligan). Color.

  A MINUTE TO PRAY, A SECOND TO DIE (1968) Director: Franco Giraldi. Producer: Albert Band. Screenwriters: Louis Garfinkel, Ugo Liberatore, and Albert Band. Photography: Aiace Parolin. Editor: Alberto Gallitti. Music: Carlo Rustichelli. Production: American Broadcasting Company, Documento Film, Selmur Productions. Distribution: Cinerama Releasing Corporation. Release date: May 1, 1968. Running time: 118 minutes. Cast: Alex Cord, Arthur Kennedy, Robert Ryan (New Mexico Governor Lem Carter), Enzo Fiermonte, Renato Romano, Franco Lantieri, Giampiero Albertini, Mario Brega, Nicoletta Machiavelli. Color.

  ANZIO (1968) Director: Edward Dmytryk. Producer: Dino De Laurentiis. Screenwriter: H. A. L. Craig. Adaptation: Frank De Felitta, Duilio Coletti, and Giuseppe Mangione, from the book by Wynford Vaughan-Thomas. Photography: Giuseppe Rotunno. Editor: Peter Taylor. Music: Riz Ortolani. Production: Columbia Pictures Corporation and Dino De Laurentiis Cinematografica. Distribution: Columbia Pictures. Release date: July 24, 1968. Running time: 117 minutes. Cast: Robert Mitchum, Peter Falk, Robert Ryan (General Carson), Earl Holliman, Mark Damon, Arthur Kennedy, Reni Santoni, Joseph Walsh, Thomas Hunter, Giancarlo Giannini, Patrick Magee, Arthur Franz. Color.

  THE WILD BUNCH (1969) Director: Sam Peckinpah. Producer: Phil Feldman. Screenwriters: Walon Green, Sam Peckinpah. Story: Walon Green, Roy N. Sickner. Photography: Lucien Ballard. Editor: Louis Lombardo. Music: Jerry Fielding. Production and distribution: Warners Bros.–Seven Arts. Release date: June 18, 1969. Running time: 145 minutes. Cast: William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan (Deke Thornton), Edmond O’Brien, Warren Oates, Jaime Sánchez, Ben Johnson, Emilio Fernández, Strother Martin, L. Q. Jones, Albert Dekker, Bo Hopkins, Dub Taylor, Jorge Russek, Alfonso Arau, Chano Urueta, Sonia Amelio, Aurora Clavel, Elsa Cárdenas. Color.

  CAPTAIN NEMO AND THE UNDERWATER CITY (1969) Director: James Hill. Producer: Bertram Ostrer. Screenwriters: Pip Baker, Jane Baker, and R. Wright Campbell, from characters created by Jules Verne. Photography: Alan Hume. Editor: Bill Lewthwaite. Music: Walter Stott (aka Angela Morley). Production and distribution: Omnia Pictures Ltd., through Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Release date: July 1969 (UK); October 7, 1970 (US). Running time: 105 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan (Captain Nemo), Chuck Connors, Nanette Newman, Luciana Paluzzi, John Turner, Bill Fraser, Kenneth Connor, Alan Cuthbertson, Christopher Hartstone. Color.

  THE REASON WHY (1970) Director: Paul Leaf. Screenwriter: From the play by Arthur Miller. Production: Gino Giglio Co. Distribution: Pathé Contemporary Films. Release date: February 13, 1970. Running time: 13 minutes. Cast: Eli Wallach, Robert Ryan (Roger). Color.

  LAWMAN (1971) Director: Michael Winner. Producer: Michael Winner. Screenwriter: Gerald Wilson. Photography: Robert Paynter. Editor: Freddie Wilson. Music: Jerry Fielding. Production: Scimitar Films. Distribution: United Artists. Release date: March 11, 1971 (UK); August 4, 1971 (US). Running time: 99 minutes. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Robert Ryan (Cotton Ryan), Lee J. Cobb, Robert Duvall, Sheree North, Albert Salmi, Richard Jordan, John McGiver, Ralph Waite, John Beck, William C. Watson, Walter Brooke, Robert Emhardt, Charles Tyner, J. D. Cannon, Joseph Wiseman, Richard Bull, John Hillerman. Color.

  THE LOVE MACHINE (1971) Director: Jack Haley Jr. Producer: M. J. Frankovich. Screenwriter: Samuel Taylor, from the novel by Jacqueline Susann. Photography: Charles B. Lang. Editor: David Blewitt. Music: Artie Butler. Production: Frankovich Productions, Columbia Pictures Corporation. Distribution: Columbia Pictures. Release date: August 14, 1971. Running time: 109 minutes. Cast: Dyan Cannon, Robert Ryan (Gregory Austin), Jackie Cooper, David Hemmings, Shecky Greene, William Roerick, Maureen Arthur, Clinton Greyn, Sharon Farrell, Alexandra Hay, Eve Bruce, Greg Mullavey, Edith Atwater, Gene Baylos, Ben Lessy, Elizabeth St. Clair, Claudia Jennings, John Phillip Law, and introducing Jodi Wexler. In color.

  AND HOPE TO DIE (1972) Director: René Clément. Producer: Serge Silberman. Screenwriter: Sébastien Japrisot, from David Goodis’s novel Black Friday. Photography: Edmond Richard. Editor: Roger Dwyre. Music: Francis Lai. Production: Greenwich Film Productions. Distribution: 20th Century-Fox. Release date: September 15, 1972 (France); November 29, 1972 (US). Running time: 99 minutes. Cast: Jean-Louis Trintignant, Robert Ryan (Charley), Lea Massari, Aldo Ray, Jean Gaven, Tisa Farrow. Color.

  LOLLY-MADONNA XXX (1973) Director: Richard Sarafian. Producer: Rodney Carr-Smith. Screenwriter: Rodney Carr-Smith and Sue Grafton, from Grafton’s novel The Lolly-Madonna War. Photography: Philip H. Lathrop. Editor: Tom Rolf. Music: Fred Myrow. Production and distribution: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Release date: February 21, 1973. Running time: 103 minutes. Cast: Rod Steiger, Robert Ryan (Pap Gutshall), Jeff Bridges, Scott Wilson, Katherine Squire, Joan Goodfellow, Tresa Hughes, Gary Busey, Randy Quaid, Season Hubley. Color.

  THE OUTFIT (1973) Director: John Flynn. Producer: Carter DeHaven. Screenwriter: John Flynn, from the novel by Richard Stark (aka Donald E. Westlake). Photography: Bruce Surtees. Editor: Ralph E. Winters. Music: Jerry Fielding. Production and distribution: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Release date: October 1973. Running time: 86 minutes. Cast: Robert Duvall, Karen Black, Joe Don Baker, Timothy Carey, Richard Jaeckel, Sheree North, Felice Orlandi, Marie Windsor, Jane Greer, Henry Jones, Joanna Cassidy, Tom Reese, Elisha Cook, Bill McKinney, Anita O’Day, Archie Moore, Tony Young, Roland La Starza, Edward Ness, Roy Roberts, Toby Andersen, Robert Ryan (Mailer). Color.

  EXECUTIVE ACTION (1973) Director: David Miller. Producer: Edward Lewis. Screenwriter: Dalton Trumbo. Story: Donald Freed, Mark Lane. Photography: Robert Steadman. Editor: George Grenville. Music: Randy Edelman. Production: Wakeford/Orloff. Distribution: National General Pictures. Release date: November 7, 1973. Running time: 91 minutes. Cast: Burt Lancaster, Robert Ryan (Robert Foster), Will Geer, Gilbert Green, John Anderson, Paul Carr, Colby Chester, Walter Brooke, Ed Lauter. Color.

  THE ICEMAN COMETH (1973) Director: John Frankenheimer. Producer: Ely Landau. Screenwriter: Thomas Quinn Curtiss, from the play by Eugene O’Neill. Photography: Ralph Woolsey. Editor: Harold F. Kress. Production and distribution: The American Film Theatre. Release date: November 10, 1973. Running time: 239 minutes. Cast: Lee Marvin, Fredric March, Ryan (Larry Slade), Jeff Bridges, Bradford Dillman, Sorrell Booke, Hildy Brooks, Nancy Juno Dawson, Evans Evans, Martyn Green, Moses Gunn, Clifton James, John McLiam, Stephen Pearlman, Tom Pedi, George Voskovec, Don McGovern, Bart Burns. Color.

  part three Notable Radio and Television Broadcasts

  Ryan acted on radio in the late 1940s and early 1950s (on the CBS thriller anthology Suspense and the Mutual Broadcasting System’s Christian dramatic series Family Theater) and on television in the late 1950s and early 1960s (on such anthology series as Goodyear Theatre, Alcoa Theatre, Zane Grey Theater, and Kraft Suspense Theatre). A more complete list of Ryan’s TV appearances (including talk shows with Dick Cavett, David Frost, David Susskind, Johnny Carson, Jack Paar, and Steve Allen) can be found online at the Internet Movie Database. Franklin J
arlett’s Robert Ryan: A Biography and Critical Filmography has a detailed inventory of Ryan’s episodic TV work, as well as his voluminous narrations and audio recordings. But following are Ryan’s more significant radio and TV performances.

  HOLLYWOOD FIGHTS BACK (1947) A live program protesting the House Un-American Activities Committee’s investigation into communist subversion of the movie industry. Broadcast: October 26, 1947, ABC Radio. Cast: Charles Boyer, Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Lauren Bacall, Joseph Cotten, Peter Lorre, June Havoc, John Huston, Danny Kaye, Marsha Hunt, Walter Wanger, Cornel Wilde, Melvyn Douglas, Richard Conte, Evelyn Keyes, Burt Lancaster, Paul Henreid, William Holden, Robert Ryan, Florence Eldridge, Myrna Loy, Robert Young, Lucille Ball, Van Heflin, Henry Morgan, Keenan Wynn, Humphrey Bogart, John Beal, Edward G. Robinson, Paulette Goddard, Norman Corwin, Audie Murphy, William Wyler, Fredric March, John Garfield, Deems Taylor, Harlow Shapley, Artie Shaw, Arthur Garfield Hayes, Elbert Thomas, Harley Kilgore, Archibald MacLeish, Claude Pepper, Glen Taylor, Vincent Price, John Rankin, J. Parnell Thomas. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles.

  CROSSFIRE (1948) A live radio adaptation of the RKO film, for the CBS anthology series Suspense. Broadcast: April 10, 1948, CBS Radio. Running time: 60 minutes. Cast: Robert Young, Robert Mitchum, Robert Ryan (Montgomery), George Cooper, William Phipps.

  ADLAI STEVENSON CAMPAIGN RALLY (1952) A live program from Madison Square Garden, complete with Ryan’s delayed entrance as master of ceremonies. Broadcast: October 29, 1952, WABD-TV, New York City. Running time: 30 minutes. Cast: Lauren Bacall, Robert Ryan, Kenny Delmar, George Hall, Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein, Al Capp, Channing Tobias, Mercedes McCambridge, Lew Parker, Al Kelly, Montgomery Clift, Tallulah Bankhead, Louis Calhern, Benay Venuta, Humphrey Bogart, Carl Sandburg, George Jessel, James A. Farley. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles. Black and white.

  THE ROBERT RYAN STORY (1953) A fanciful reenactment of Ryan’s career for the NBC series The Hollywood Story, with actors playing his mother, his wife, and his mentor, Max Reinhardt, among others. Broadcast: November 28, 1953, NBC Radio. Running time: 30 minutes. Note: Archived at the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, Madison, Wisconsin.

  LINCOLN’S DOCTOR’S DOG (1955) A filmed episode of the NBC anthology series Screen Directors Playhouse. Director: H. C. Potter. Teleplay: Christopher Morley. Photography: James Wong Howe. Editor: G. E. Luckenbacher. Broadcast: December 14, 1955, NBC-TV. Running time: 30 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan (Abraham Lincoln), Charles Bickford, Richard Long, Willis Bouchey, Howard Wendell, Johnny Lee, Paul Keast, Mack Williams, John Craven, Dennis King Jr. Black and white.

  THE GREAT GATSBY (1958) A taped performance for the CBS anthology series Playhouse 90. Director: Franklin Schaffner. Producer: Martin Manulis. Adaptation: David Shaw, from the novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald. Music: Milton Anderson. Broadcast: June 26, 1958, CBS-TV. Running time: 88 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan (Jay Gatsby), Rod Taylor, Jeanne Crain, Patricia Barry, Phillip Reed, Virginia Grey, Barry Atwater. Black and white. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles.

  30TH ANNUAL ACADEMY AWARDS A live program from the RKO Pantages Theatre in Hollywood; Ryan and actor Wendell Corey present the award for Best Costume Design. Director: Alan Handley. Producer: Jerry Wald. Broadcast: March 26, 1958, NBC-TV. Running time: 120 minutes. Black and white. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles.

  “A CALL FROM …” (1960) A documentary on the United Nations’ World Refugee Year. Directors: Jack Orbison, William F. Wallace. Producer: Marsha Hunt. Writer: Robert Presnell Jr. Broadcast: February 10, 1960, KCOP-TV, Los Angeles. Running time: 60 minutes. Cast: Steve Allen, Harry Belafonte, Richard Boone, Spring Byington, Jeff Chandler, Bing Crosby, Burl Ives, Louis Jourdan, Phyllis Kirk, Paul Newman, David Niven, Robert Ryan, Jean Simmons, Joanne Woodward. Black and white. Note: Archived at the UCLA Film and Television Archive, Los Angeles. Restored in 2009 as A Call from the Stars.

  THE SNOWS OF KILIMANJARO (1960) A live performance from CBS Television City in Los Angeles, for the anthology series Buick-Elektra Playhouse. Director: John Frankenheimer. Producer: Gordon Duff. Teleplay: A. E. Hotchner, from the story by Ernest Hemingway. Broadcast: March 25, 1960, CBS-TV. Running time: 87 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan (Harry Walters), Ann Todd, James Gregory, Liliane Montevecchi, Brock Peters, Janice Rule, Mary Astor, Clancy Cooper, Norma Crane, Clegg Hoyt, Albert Paulson, Frank Puglia. Black and white. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles.

  THE BELL TELEPHONE HOUR (1964) Ryan hosts this musical variety program, performing the narration to Aaron Copland’s A Lincoln Portrait. Director: Sid Smith. Producer: Charles Andrews. Broadcast: February 11, 1964, NBC-TV. Running time: 60 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan, Al Hirt, The Brothers Four, Joan Sutherland, Donald Voorhees, Suzanne Farrell, Patricia Neary, Conrad Ludlow. Color. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York and Los Angeles.

  THE COMPLETE STORY: WORLD WAR I (1964–65) A twenty-six-episode documentary series, produced by CBS News and narrated by Ryan. Music: Morton Gould. Broadcast debut: September 22, 1964, CBS-TV. Total running time: 660 minutes. Black and white. Note: Released on DVD by CBS DVD home video.

  THE PRESIDENCY: A SPLENDID MISERY (1964) Ryan provides the voice of Abraham Lincoln for this historical documentary. Broadcast: September 23, 1964, CBS-TV. Total running time: 60 minutes. Cast: Dana Andrews, Ed Begley, Sidney Blackmer, Macdonald Carey, James Daly, Fredric March, E. G. Marshall, Herbert Marshall, Gary Merrill, Dan O’Herlihy, Jason Robards, Robert Ryan. Black and white.

  GUILTY OR NOT GUILTY (1966) A filmed TV pilot that was ultimately broadcast on the NBC anthology series Bob Hope Presents the Chrysler Theatre. Broadcast: March 9, 1966, NBC-TV. Running time: 60 minutes. Directors: Roland Kibbee, David Lowell Rich. Producer: Richard Lewis. Teleplay: Evan Hunter, Roland Kibbee, Guthrie Lamb. Cast: Richard Beymer, Robert Duvall, Leif Erickson, Diana Hyland, Leslie Nielsen, Robert Ryan (Andrew Dixon), Pippa Scott. Color.

  INAUGURAL EVENING AT FORD’S THEATRE (1968) A live program from Ford’s Theatre in Washington, DC. Broadcast: January 30, 1968, CBS-TV. Running time: 59 minutes. Producer: Don Hewitt. Cast: Roger Mudd, Hubert Humphrey, Helen Hayes, Fredric March, Robert Ryan, Henry Fonda, Harry Belafonte, Nina Foch, Andy Williams, Richard Crenna, Patricia Brooks, Odetta, Carmen De Lavallade. Color. Note: Archived at the Paley Center for Media, New York, and the UCLA Film and Television Archive, Los Angeles.

  SIMON AND GARFUNKEL: SONGS OF AMERICA (1969) Ryan delivers a brief introduction to the program. Broadcast: November 30, 1969, CBS-TV. Running time: 53 minutes. Director: Charles Grodin. Producers: Paul Simon, Arthur Garfunkel, Mike Jackson. Photography: Abbot Mills, Peter Powell. Editors: Luke Bennett, Ellen Giffard. Cast: Paul Simon, Art Garfunkel, Charles Grodin. Color. Note: Released as part of the Columbia/Legacy CD/DVD reissue of Bridge Over Troubled Water.

  THE FRONT PAGE (1970) A taped performance of the play by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur, with some cast members from the 1969 Broadway production. Director: Alan Handley. Producer: Lewis Freedman. Production: Metromedia Producers Corporation, Plumstead Playhouse. Broadcast: January 31, 1970, Hughes Sports Network. Running time: 90 minutes. Cast: Robert Ryan (Walter Burns), George Grizzard, Helen Hayes, Vivian Vance, Estelle Parsons, Harold J. Kennedy, Susan Watson, John McGiver, Charles White. Color.

  THE MAN WITHOUT A COUNTRY (1973) A TV movie, for the series ABC Movie of the Week. Director: Delbert Mann. Producer: Norman Rosemont. Screenwriter: Sidney Carroll, from the story by Edward Everett Hale. Photography: Andrew Laszlo. Editor: Gene Milford. Production: Norman Rosemont Enterprises, American Broadcasting Company. Broadcast: April 24, 1973, ABC-TV. Running time: 78 minutes. Cast: Cliff Robertson, Beau Bridges, Peter Strauss, Robert Ryan (Lieutenant Commander Vaughan), Walter Abel, Geoffrey Holder, John Cullum. Color.

  Notes

  Introduction

  1. Harold Kennedy, No Pickle, No Performance:
An Irreverent Theatrical Excursion from Tallulah to Travolta (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1978), 125.

  2. Martin Scorsese, “Scorsese Screens,” TCM Now Playing, November 2013, 11.

  3. Margaret McManus, “Robert Ryan Speaks Out on Reagan,” Bridgeport (Connecticut) Telegram, November 6, 1966.

  4. Millard Lampell, interview with Franklin Jarlett, March 10, 1987, private collection.

  5. Robert Ryan, as told to Jane Kesner Ardmore, “What Makes an Actor Tick?” (ca. 1957), Jane Ardmore Papers, Margaret Herrick Library Special Collections, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Beverly Hills, California.

  one Inferno

  1. “Chicago Makes Kaiser’s Wake Wild Bedlam.” Chicago Tribune, November 12, 1918, 1, 3.

  2. Robert Ryan, “The Full Text of Ryan’s Letter,” Chicago Reader, October 29, 2009, http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/actor-robert-ryans-letter-to-his-children/Content?oid=1223014.

  3. Illinois Political Directory 1899 (Chicago: W. L. Bodine, 1899), 144.

  4. Ryan, “The Full Text of Ryan’s Letter.”

  5. Ibid.

  6. Ibid.

  7. Ibid.

  8. Ibid.

  9. Ibid.

  10. Jeanne Stein, “Robert Ryan: Unlike Most Handsome Actors He Was Willing to Be a Heavy,” Films in Review 9, no. 1 (January 1968): 9.

  11. William M. Tuttle Jr., Race Riot: Chicago in the Red Summer of 1919 (New York: Atheneum, 1970), 10.

  12. Ryan, “The Full Text of Ryan’s Letter.”