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.But the Universal pictures didn t do wellcommercially, costing too much to make a profit from the marketthey were aimed at.He was back riding the range again in 1937, this time at 21184_ch01.qxd 12/18/03 1:42 PM Page 5252 JOHN WAYNEParamount, in Born to the West.Then it was back to Republic tobecome part of a series of films featuring The Three Mesquiteers, a trio of heroes supposedly modeled on The Three Musketeers ofDumas.This trio, however, were cowboys in stetsons and fightingwith six-guns.Despite the Western setting, the series was set in the1930s and featured automobiles and airplanes.A number of Mesquiteer films had already been made, featuringRay Corrigan, Robert Livingston, and Max Terhune, but because ofongoing tension between Corrigan and Livingston, Wayne wasbrought in to replace Livingston.He made the first four in the seriesback-to-back Pals of the Saddle, Overland Stage Raiders, SantaFe Stampede, and Red River Range.They were all directed by George Sherman, who told me, Thosefilms were awful, and it certainly wasn t Duke s fault.They werejust based on a simple formula.Wayne was the romantic herowhose love life was generally the cause of the trouble theMesquiteers found themselves in.Terhune was the so-calledcomedian, and Corrigan was the cowboy who never fell in love! Duke had replaced Livingston to ease the tension on the set,but Corrigan, who was a big star in B Westerns, resented Duke.So they were not happy films to make.Duke hated them becausehe knew that Republic were intent on keeping him a minor starwhile they had bigger plans for Corrigan.You know, in Hollywood,it s true that nobody knows anything, because Duke went on tobecome the biggest movie star of all time, and Corrigan retired intoobscurity in the 1950s. Those films were bread and butter for me and Duke, but forOverland Stage Raiders we had Louise Brooks as the leading lady,and she was a big star in the silent days.She felt that making that filmwas a real comedown for her.She was no longer in demand and veryunhappy about the way her career had gone.But when I introducedher to Wayne, she was really impressed by him. Louise Brooks would later say about Wayne, Looking up athim I thought, this is no actor but the hero of all mythologymiraculously brought to life. She said that Wayne was whatHenry James defined as the greatest of all works of art a purelybeautiful being. 21184_ch01.qxd 12/18/03 1:42 PM Page 53ENTER RINGO 53Overland Stage Raiders was Brooks s last film; she retired after itwas completed in two weeks.Wayne was not ready to retire, but hewas still unhappy with his career, and he was even more unhappy athome.Sherman recalled, Josephine just had no respect for herhusband s profession and couldn t understand his frustrations. Butdespite the rift in his marriage, somehow he and Josephine refused toadmit defeat, and in 1938 she was pregnant again; she gave birthto Patrick in July 1939.But only shortly after Duke was able toannounce he was to be a father again, his own father, Clyde Morrison,died of a heart attack.Wayne loved his father and, remembering howgenerous Clyde had always been, Wayne hoped to emulate himby supporting Clyde s widow, which he did throughout the rest ofher life.With his father gone, Wayne looked ever more to John Ford as asubstitute father.John Carradine said, I think Ford loved the ideathat Wayne would look to him for all the things he would haveneeded from his own father, and Ford really made the most of that.It seemed to me that Ford felt he owned Wayne and that Wayneowed him.But from the time Duke starred in The Big Trail, Forddidn t lift a hand to help him.He sort of kept him in his place untilhe really needed John Wayne. It was in 1938 that John Ford really needed John Wayne.In 1937 John Ford had become interested in a short story called Stagecoach to Lordsburg by Ernest Haycox.It had been publishedin Collier s magazine the previous year, and he and screenwriterDudley Nichols went to work turning it into a screenplay, calling itStagecoach.The result was something quite unique for the time: theyhad taken a basic Western tale about a stagecoach making a perilousjourney across New Mexico and fending off Apaches, and filled itwith fully rounded, three-dimensional characters.Most Westerns upto that time had been the typical John Wayne good guys in white hatsversus bad guys in black hats.Seven years earlier Raoul Walsh hadtried to transform the Western into a more adult and artistic formwith The Big Trail and failed.Among the characters that included a corrupt banker, a mild-mannered whisky peddler, a prostitute with a heart of gold, a cavalry 21184_ch01.qxd 12/18/03 1:42 PM Page 5454 JOHN WAYNEofficer s pregnant and delicate wife, a Southern gambler with fewscruples, a sheriff whose sense of duty did not blind him to truejustice, and the stagecoach driver who provided the comedy relief,there was a new kind of hero.He was the Ringo Kid.He wasdangerous, he was wanted by the law, and he was out to avenge themurder of his brother.In fact, the Ringo Kid was cleverly disguisedby Dudley Nichols as an outlaw, but he turns out to be the hero.Theaudience of the day would not have known for sure which shade ofgray Ringo s hat would turn out to be
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