Wilson’s final film appearance was an uncredited role in Naked Alibi, starring Sterling Hayden and Gloria Grahame, in 1954. With that, his career was effectively over. He had remarried in 1953, and now in his mid-30s, began concentrating on raising a family. With his new wife Vyola, he had two boys and two girls. “He never really got back into acting again,” said Michael Wilson. “It never quite worked for him.”42 When the Batman TV series was being developed in 1965, Lewis Wilson was 45 years old, only 8 years older than Adam West. If he was galled at seeing another actor have success in a role he originated, he seldom showed it, though when interviewed in May 1966, Wilson said of West, “He’s a fine fellow. He’s a credit to the uniform. He makes a lot of money. I‘m not envious.” His wife added, “Maybe not envious, perhaps ‘agonized‘ would be a better word.” Of his children, then ages 3, 5, 8 and 9, Wilson joked, “When I ask them if they want the original Batman’s autograph, they tell me to put it on a check.”43 He told Newsweek magazine that he’d like to play a villain on the Batman TV series. “I‘m a ham and a heavy at heart,” he said. “I‘m heavier and I could take him.”44
“I guess it was something that he was somewhat embarrassed about, because he wanted to be a serious actor,” said Michael Wilson. “And then I think as he mellowed out in age he took a kind of tongue-in-cheek view of it.”45 By the mid-1960s, Lewis Wilson was firmly out of the business, working at General Foods. “He worked at a plant in Hollywood,” recalled Michael Wilson. “They made pectin out of orange peels. He worked there until he was in his early 50s, and then he had a heart condition and retired. He had open heart surgery twice.”46 When the nostalgia boom hit America in the 1970s, serial Superman Kirk Alyn and other stars of yesteryear reemerged into the limelight and reconnected with fans at conventions around the globe. Lewis Wilson shunned such attention, preferring to live out his final years in peace. “I think he’d gotten over being an actor and he was just a family man, living an aappropriate life,” said Michael Wilson. “I kept on seeing him over the years all the time. I’d bring my kids around to see him on the holidays if we were in Los Angeles. He was always a good storyteller, full of jokes. Loved telling jokes. He told me at one time that he had 400 jokes, and he had the opening line and then the punch line—that’s why he remembered them—on note cards.”47
By that point, although Lewis Wilson was himself no longer interested in movies, his son was deeply involved in one of the biggest film franchises in cinema history. Lewis Wilson’s ex-wife, Dana, married producer Albert R. “Cubby” Broccoli in 1959. Three years later, Broccoli teamed with Harry Saltzman to produce the first James Bond film, Dr. No. The Bond movies became a sensation, and are now produced by Dana Wilson Broccoli’s children, Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson—so Batman’s son is 007’s producer.
Lewis Wilson died on August 9, 2000, at age 80. After he was gone, Michael Wilson wondered about that boxful of jokes on note cards. “I asked my sister to go and see if we could find that,” he said. “No one could ever find it.”48 Had Lewis Wilson’s career gone differently, he might have become a reliable actor in A-budget features, and had a career more befitting of his talents. But although starring in a kiddie serial like Batman may have seemed like a joke at the time, the fact that Wilson was the movies’ first live-action Batman assures that he will never be forgotten. So, in the end, Lewis Wilson had the last laugh.
_______________________________
1 Reilly, Sue, “Original batman to Play Villain Role in PTA Play,” The Los Angeles Times, May15, 1966, p. SF_B6
2 Wallace, David, Lost Hollywood, © 2001 L.A. Weekly Books/St. Martin’s Press, p. 12
3 Ibid., p. 13
4 Schatz, Thomas, Boom and Bust: American Cinema in the 1940s, © 1999 University of California Press, p. 62
5 Wallace, David, Lost Hollywood, © 2001 L.A.Weekly Books/St. Martin’s Press, p. 13
6 Schatz, Thomas, Boom and Bust: American Cinema in the 1940s, © 1999 University of California Press, p. 62
7 Ibid., p. 61
8 Ibid., p. 64
9 Benton, Mike, Superhero Comics of the Golden Age, © 1992 Taylor Publishing Co., Dallas, TX, p. 53
10 — “Flothow as Darmour’s Production Aide,” Daily Variety, Aug. 17, 1936, p. 1
11 —, “Larry Darmour Rites Friday; Dies After 3-Month Illness,” Daily Variety, March 18, 1942, p. 1, 4
12 — “Cohn Out As Producer; ‘Crime’ to Flothow,” Daily Variety, April 5, 1943, p. 6
13 —, “Film Popularity Spurs Production,” The New York Times, June 17, 1942, p. 26
14 Schallert, Edwin, “Marcy McGuire Lead in ’Seven Days Ashore,’” The Los Angeles Times, May 8, 1943, p. 7
15 —, “Schoolgirl, 17 and Blond, Chosen as Miss California,” The Los Angeles Times, Aug 12, 1940, p. A1
16 Schallert, Edwin, “Serial Called ‘Bat Man’ Projected at Columbia,” The Los Angeles Times, May 29, 1943, p. 9
17 —, “Revival Tonight for Capek’s ‘R.U.R.’” The New York Times, Dec. 3, 1942, p. 34
18 Hopper, Hedda, “Looking at Hollywood,” Chicago Daily Tribune, Dec. 16, 1942, p. 28
19 —, “Film Houses Set Holiday Records,” The New York Times, Dec. 29, 1942, p. 27
20 Hopper, Hedda, “Looking at Hollywood,” The Chicago Daily Tribune, Dec. 29, 1942, p. 17
21 —”A Little About the Movies on City’s Screens,” The Chicago Daily Tribune, May 9, 1943, p. D7
22 Jone, Isabel Morse, “Screen and Stage: Pianists Provide Music Treat at Philharmonic,” The Los Angeles Times, Feb. 24, 1943, p. A9
23 —, “Wilson To ‘Bat,’” Daily Variety, June 1, 1943, p. 4
24 Magers, Boyd, “The Batman,” Serial Report Chapter 52, Jan.-Mar. 2005, p. 2
25 —, “Typical American Boy Steps Into Movie Role,” Panama City News-Herald, Sept. 21, 1941, p. 1
26 —, “Seattle Lad New ‘Find’ In Fox Film,” The Salt Lake Tribune, Feb. 6, 1942, p. 8
27 —, “Boy Actor Tires of Growing Up,” Oakland Tribune, Oct. 11, 1942, p. B-11
28 Leland-St.John, Sharmagne, email correspondence, July 29, 2009
29 Rawitch, Robert, “J. Carrol Naish, Master Ethnic Character Actor, Dies at 76,” The Los Angeles Times, January 27, 1973, p. B1
30 Harrison, Paul, “Paul Harrison in Hollywood: J. Carrol Naish, Tired of Playing Creepy Roles, Now Writes Bed-Time Stories,” The Burlington, N.C. Daily Times-News, Thursday, July 25, 1940, p. 2
31 Reilly, Sue, “Original batman to Play Villain Role in PTA Play,” The Los Angeles Times, May 15, 1966, p. SF_B6
32 Interview with Michael G. Wilson, conducted July 17, 2009
33 Magers, Boyd, “The Batman,” Serial Report Chapter 52, Jan.-Mar. 2005, p. 2
34 Lahue, Kalton C., Continued Next Week: A History of the Moving Picture Serial, © 1964, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, Oklahoma, p. 147
35 Barlow, John F., “Lee Zahler,” The Internet Movie Database, http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0006343/bio, accessed Oct. 21, 2011
36 Dick, Bernard F., The Merchant Prince of Poverty Row: Harry Cohn of Columbia Pictures, © 1993, The University Press of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky, p. 2-3
37 Leland-St.John, Sharmagne, email correspondence, July 29, 2009
38 Schallert, Edwin, “Grant Will Play Sub Commander in ’Tokyo,’” The Los Angeles Times, June 17, 1943, p. 14 v 39 Interview with Michael G. Wilson, conducted July 17, 2009
40 Ibid.
41 —, “Gladys George Wins Ovation as ‘Rain’ Star,” The Los Angeles Times, August 19, 1948, pg. 21 v 42 Interview with Michael G. Wilson, conducted July 17, 2009
43 Reilly, Sue, “Original batman to Play Villain Role in PTA Play,” The Los Angeles Times, May 15, 1966, p. SF_B6
44 —, “Where Are They Now?” Newsweek, April 25, 1966
45 Interview with Michael G. Wilson, conducted July 17, 2009
46 Ibid.
47 Ibid.
48 Ibid.
Chapter Three: BATMAN ON THE A
IR
“Ah, radio! You just had to be sober enough to read—and not too much time was taken up, either.”
—Gary Merrill1
Visitors to the New York World’s Fair in 1940 were able to take home a special comic book prepared especially for the fair-goers, called New York World’s Fair Comics. The cover featured Superman with Batman and Robin, though the stories inside had Superman and Batman in separate adventures. The one-off comic book would inspire a new comic book series for National Comics. In Spring of 1941, the company introduced World’s Best Comics # 1 with the Man of Steel and the Dynamic Duo on the cover. For the second issue, the comic book’s name was changed to World’s Finest Comics, the title it would carry until its last issue, # 323, in January 1986. Initially, as in New York World’s Fair Comics, the heroes would appear in separate, individual adventures. But the editors at National would eventually have them working together, first in a story that appeared in Superman # 76 in May/ June 1952, and then in World’s Finest beginning with issue # 71 in 1954. On radio, however, they had been working in tandem for nearly a decade.
Superman was the first of National’s heroes to become a radio star. The Adventures of Superman debuted on Monday, February 12, 1940 as a syndicated series; it would later find a permanent home on the Mutual network. The show starred Clayton “Bud” Collyer as the Man of Steel for most of its run. It was very popular with children, so it would seem that a spin-off Batman series would be a natural idea. Consequently, sometime after Batman arrived on movie screens in a Columbia serial in 1943, a pilot for a possible Batman radio series was produced, with Scott Douglas voicing Bruce Wayne and Batman. The actual recording of the pilot broadcast has been lost to history, but the script remains, though it indicates no date and it is unclear who authored it. Called “The Case of the Drowning Seal,” it based its interpretation of the character more on Columbia’s movie serial than the comic books. The World War II story had Bruce Wayne as a government agent, on the trail of the Nazi spies that killed Robin Grayson’s parents, who were FBI agents (yes, Dick Grayson’s name was changed to Robin Grayson in the pilot). When Wayne donned the “black horned mask and cape” of Batman, he disguised his identity by adopting a British accent. Scott Douglas played another comic book hero, MLJ (Archie) Comics’ The Black Hood, on a short-lived radio series that same year.
Though the Batman series was never sold and never aired, Batman did eventually come to radio, but as a guest star rather than a featured attraction. On Wednesday, February 28, 1945, The Adventures of Superman concluded with the Man of Steel saving not only Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen from drowning in the bay, but also a boy in a capsized rowboat wearing a cape and a red leather vest with the letter ‘R‘ on it. Superman recognized the boy as Robin, Batman’s companion. Once revived, Robin told Superman that Batman, working on “the biggest case of his life,” had disappeared. Thus began “The Mystery of the Waxmen,” in which a villain named Zoltan was turning people into wax statues. Stacy Harris provided the voice of Batman for the broadcasts, while a young but seasoned radio actor named Ronald Liss played Robin. Alfred the butler was voiced by Jackson Beck, the show’s narrator, with a British accent.
Born in Big Timber, Quebec, Stacy Harris worked as a sports reporter and cartoonist before becoming an actor. He appeared in five Broadway plays, including a starring role in 1941’s Song Out of Sorrow, in which he played the lead role of Victorian poet Francis Thompson, and as one of the soldiers in the ensemble cast of A Sound of Hunting, a 1945 play in which a young Burt Lancaster made his debut. In between, Harris was very active in radio, appearing five afternoons a week in the NBC radio serial Pepper Young’s Family in 1943, and later joining the cast of the popular Gangbusters program. He also served a stint as a merchant seaman during World War II.
Ronald Liss was a real-life boy wonder. In 1933, at age of 3, he was part of the New York Baby Orchestra, a 26-piece ensemble composed of children whose ages ranged from 2 to 7. When they made their debut at the Greenwich Presbyterian Church on 145 West 13th Street in New York, with their ranks cut to 16 due to a measles outbreak, Liss took the conductor’s baton for part of the 90-minute show and also played and sang “Lightly Row.”2 When he was old enough to properly speak, he became a popular child performer on radio, appearing on the Bright Horizons series with a young Skip Homier.
The teaming of Superman and Batman was popular enough that the Dynamic Duo returned to the Man of Steel’s radio program six months later, with Stacy Harris and Ronald Liss reprising their roles. In an adventure called “Dr. Blythe and the Confidence Gang,” which began broadcasting on September 5, 1945, Lois Lane was made to take the fall for a moll named Dixie Lamar, whom she resembled, who faced the electric chair for having murdered a federal agent. In this adventure, it became apparent that Clark Kent knew Batman’s secret identity, but Batman, whom the comic books called “the world’s greatest detective,” couldn’t see past Kent’s eyeglasses to recognize him as Superman. However, when Lois was put on trial for murder, with circumstantial evidence planted by Blythe mounting against her, it was Batman’s detective skills that helped locate the real murderess and clear Lois. For the final episodes of the adventure, Batman’s voice changed—after a brief absence, he was played by another actor, Matt Crowley.
Crowley, who was born June 20, 1904, was no stranger to comic book heroes. He was radio’s Jungle Jim beginning with the show’s debut on November 2, 1935. After three years, he left the series, succeeded by Gerald Mohr. He was also the second actor to play the title role in radio’s Buck Rogers in the 25th Century (with Ronald Liss as his side-kick, Buddy), and was Paul Drake in radio’s Perry Mason series. Like Harris, Crowley also appeared on Broadway; in October of 1942, he had a role in Maxwell Anderson’s play, The Eve of St. Mark, one of the first serious dramas inspired by America’s involvement in World War II.3 In the same year that he appeared on The Adventures of Superman, Crowley also made his TV debut, playing Walter Burns in a broadcast of the popular Charles MacArthur-Ben Hecht play, The Front Page.
Batman next appeared near the end of a long multi-part story that pitted Superman against Atom Man, a German soldier that a Nazi scientist, Der Tuefel (the German name for the Devil; interestingly, the character was played by Matt Crowley with a heavy Teutonic accent), had turned into a weapon of mass destruction by injecting Kryptonite into his veins. After Superman defeated Atom Man, the remains of the Nazi spy ring that helped fund his creation came into possession of still more Kryptonite. In programs broadcast beginning December 6, 1945, Clark Kent looked to Batman for help in locating the Scarlet Widow, who had obtained some of the deadly substance. When Kent arrived at Bruce Wayne’s mansion, he goofed by addressing Wayne as Batman, making Wayne instantly suspicious. To gain his confidence, Kent had to reveal his own identity, which he shared with Bruce Wayne on the following day’s program. However, when Dick Grayson entered the room, Bruce and Kent chose not to reveal the secret to Robin.
Batman and Robin helped Superman find the remaining Kryptonite and round up the Nazi spies, appearing on almost all of the programs until the story wrapped up on January 8, 1946. In this adventure, Ronald Liss again played Robin, but the Caped Crusader was now played by yet another actor, Gary Merrill. While Crowley’s smooth, somewhat soft voice had a slight air of sophistication befitting a millionaire playboy, Merrill’s Batman and Bruce Wayne sounded more blue collar than blueblood. His voice had a tinge of gruffness, and in these episodes, Batman and Robin were written as hard-boiled characters that traded sarcastic wisecracks when in dire jeopardy. At the conclusion of the 26-episode story, Batman and Robin rescued Superman, after the Man of Steel was trapped in a cyclotron and bombarded by kryptonite radiation.
A graduate of Bowdoin College, Gary Merrill was born in Hartford, Connecticut on August 2, 1915. He began as an actor in summer stock plays, until he joined the Army Air Force and was cast in Winged Victory, a play created by the military as a morale booster and fundraiser for the Army Emergency Relief Fund.
The Moss Hart drama opened on Broadway on November 20, 1943, its run ending only so that the cast could travel to Hollywood to make the film version in 1944. When it went before the cameras, Merrill made his movie debut, along with Red Buttons, Kevin McCarthy, Judy Holliday, Jeanne Crain, and Martin Ritt (who would later become a noted director). The cast also featured George Reeves, several years before he became TV’s Superman. Returning to New York, Merrill stayed busy with radio work, which he felt offered a special kind of freedom. “I could dress as I pleased,” he wrote in his autobiography. “Forget about wardrobe, fittings and make-up—just be the voice.”4 He also joined the cast of Broadway’s Born Yesterday. “During the day I performed on radio doing the early version of the soap operas Young Dr. Malone, The Second Mrs. Burton, and The Right to Happiness—and appeared in Born Yesterday in the evening,” wrote Merrill, adding, “We spent one hour in rehearsal for a fifteen- minute show. Except for Superman, which I played occasionally. That took even less time.”5
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