JAH: Sounds like you had quite a detour, before you started acting.

WALLACE: After the gigs with Jimmy Fiddler, I took singing lessons. The singing teacher was a friend of Jimmy's, and after about three months, he said to me, "You're going to be a famous singer. Now let's go out and make a lot of money." So the first gig was an amateur night in Glendale, and I laid a bomb. It was terrible! After that evening, the teacher gave up. I started studying with another teacher, named Lillian Sloan. Jan Clayton, who later played the mother in the original Lassie series, and starred in Carousel, was one of her students. I had a great arrangement worked out with her. She knew I had been a greensman at Metro, and at the time her husband was getting on in years and ailing, so she asked me if I would take care of the grounds around their home for two free lessons a week. She said, "I think you have talent, and I'd like to try to bring it out." For four years, I trained. She also recommended that I take drama classes, and find out about acting. So on my GI Bill of Rights, I went to dramatic school at Ben Barnes Dramatic School in Hollywood. Stuart Whitman was in my class, Nicky Blair, who later became the restaurateur. Ross Hunter taught classes there.

JAH: You got into pictures in the early fifties, didn't you?

WALLACE: Yes, I did. Submarine Command was my first picture for Columbia in 1951, with Bill Holden, Nancy Olsen, William Bendix. Holden was a great guy. Our scenes were filmed aboard an actual submarine at the Naval Base in San Diego. Holden was easy to work with, and thoroughly professional. They'd take the sub out about five miles, with the cast and crew and the minimum naval personnel. We shot exteriors out there, as well as doing interiors. One time, the special effects man was supposed to have two Japanese bombers come in on either side of the sub. The effects guy had rigged charges on two booms on either side of the submarine, so when the planes made their descent, and dropped their dummy bombs, there would be explosions. We shot this sequence for a couple of days, and on the last day, the effects guy put such a potent charge on these boom arms, that it shattered glass inside the sub! We had to quit and go back in for the day, so they could make repairs on the sub! There wasn't much time for fun, because we were either on the exterior of the sub, or we were down inside the sub, filming. With the equipment and cameras, and just trying to move around, we were sweaty and hot.

JAH: You did an Esther Williams picture called Million Dollar Mermaid.

WALLACE: Victor Mature was in that. It was a circus type picture, and I played a daredevil pilot, which led me to be cast in The Big Sky with Kirk Douglas, directed by Howard Hawks.  That was fantastic; Howard Hawks was one of the greatest directors who ever worked in Hollywood. My parts were shot at night, out on the old Fox lot. There was an old Western street that was kept muddy. It was all watered down so the wagons and horses had to pull through it. 

Howard Hawks always spoke softly. If there were a thousand people on the set, he would still speak softly. I had a scene in a general store. I was a local tough guy hanging around. Kirk Douglas comes in and orders some supplies. Howard had blocked out the scene for me so while Kirk was at the counter giving his order, I would come up to him and look him up and down, like 'what the hell are you doing in town?'  Just before Howard called "Action" there was a broom hanging down, so I took one of the straws out of the broom and started chewing on it. Howard called "Action," I walked over to Kirk Douglas, and I walked up to him and looked at him with the straw in my mouth, walked away, and " Cut!" So Kirk Douglas went to Howard Hawks, and after that Howard took me aside, and I figured, "Oh, boy, I'm in trouble now!" He said, "The piece you did with the straw, it was just great. Leave it in! It's wonderful! Only this time, take a slow count of three while you're sucking on the straw before you make the turn."

Well, Kirk Douglas had a magnificent wardrobe in that picture, all leather, and he was wearing a tiger tooth or something on a chain around his neck. I go up to Kirk Douglas, and I'm sucking on the straw. I count a three, and he takes the tooth he had hanging around his neck on a chain, and puts it up to his lips. He used my business to dismiss me.

JAH: You were the first actor to portray Commando Cody, Sky Marshall of the Universe, in the Republic serial classic Radar Men to the Moon.

WALLACE: My agent at the time was Maureen Oliver, a sweet little Irish lady who started representing me when I was in dramatic school. She sent me out to Republic for a role as a heavy in some new picture they were doing. So I arrived at 10:00 a.m., and I read for the producer and director. After I read, they asked if I had any footage of myself on me. I had just started in the business, but luckily I had a Fireside Theater episode with Frank Whizbar, Isabelle Jewell, Ann Savage, Jim Mitchum (who was Bob's brother). So I gave them the film and they said "Hang around, we want to take a look at it." So after waiting a couple of hours, I began to get a little upset. I was there till about 3:00, and I was getting ready to go home. Finally they called me in and said, "We saw the film. We're doing a serial called Commando Cody, Sky Marshall of the Universe, and we think you'd be right for the part of Commando Cody."  Now the part I originally auditioned for was the heavy in this serial, that Clayton Moore ended up playing.  After playing the Lone Ranger for four years, Clayton ended up playing the heavy that I auditioned for.

The funny thing about Clayton Moore and the whole Lone Ranger thing was, all the actors I knew, including myself, went out for that part at the time. That was a massive casting call. They had us all do the test in the mask. We'd stand in a corner, with a mask and a cowboy hat on, and we'd go through this dialogue with some guy off camera feeding us Tonto lines like, "We must go to the West now, Kemo Sabe." Damn silly when you think about it now!  I think I went on the audition for The Lone Ranger when they were trying to replace Clayton, and Johnny Hart got it, and did it for one season. You know, I can empathize with Clay on this, because I never got an answer why I was never asked back to reprise my character of Commando Cody in the series of short films which became the television series, two years after it was released to theaters in the East.  I think it was because I was doing a play in New York at the time, and that's how they got Judd Holdren to do Zombies of the Stratosphere and then carry on with Commando Cody. 

JAH: One would imagine that making a Republic serial was a bit more of a physical workout than it was an acting workout.

WALLACE: In those days, we accepted these parts for what they were. We didn't question story, script, motivation or continuity, that's for sure. To us, it was a job, and we were thankful to have a job. Radar Men to the Moon was a physical challenge. All the moon scenes were shot in Red Rock Canyon, and it was 111 degrees, and here I am in a big leather jacket, with an aluminum helmet, some kind of rocket packs on my back, and regular woolen slacks. It seemed interesting to me that they would costume this character in regular woolen slacks, which could have caught fire in the first take-off, rather than devise some special fireproof pants for their hero. 

It was something I was happy to do. I was just starting in the business, I had a job, and it was a lead, everybody was great in it, everybody treated me beautifully.

There were some difficult special effects sequences, like when they put me on a platform in front of the production screen. The platform they built was about four feet high, and there was a 2x4 that laid flat. I would lay down on the 2x4, and then the crew would put the Rocket Man suit on me, and zip up the jacket around me and the board, so it wouldn't show. As I recall, we did all of that in one day. I believe this rear screen projection system was a process called techna-process.  The same process probably still exists now, under a different name. They took footage of clouds that had been shot from a plane—I believe they do it with helicopters today—stock shots, if you will, and they rear-projected it onto a cyclorama, and put me on a platform in the Rocket Man costume in front of it, and I did the flying sequences. 

JAH: What was Roy Barcroft like?

WALLACE: Roy was a big, wonderful, moose of a guy! A total sweetheart. If we were sitting around the set after a long day, he'd just sit beside you and massage your neck, and tell you, "Hey George, you're a little tense today." Roy had a long career at Republic. He did everything from heroes to heavies to looping voices, the consummate character man. And he was just great to be around. Always interested in how YOU were doing—and that's a rarity these days.

That huge ray gun I steal from Rettick's laboratory was heavy as hell out there in that Red Rock sun. The other thing I remember is the special effects guys rigging a gun with twine and pulling it out of my hand in one of the episodes. The Lydecker Brothers were great to work with. They knew the score. I remember the miniature of Commando Cody's rocket ship which is about 3 or 4 feet long, that you see in its actual size at the end of the show, when it plows through the window and hits Billy Bakewell in the stomach. That miniature rocket was flown on sets that were made to scale by the Lydecker brothers. The Lydecker brothers had everything down to a science. If you shot a certain explosion on land or sea, their techniques would vary between both situations, right down to how many frames per second would be shot on a particular gag. Those two guys were amazing.

I did a good amount of the takeoffs and landings on the moon surface myself. I started off doing them in front of the actual Republic Administration offices. I did that exactly the way David Sharp did it, by having them bury a spot trampoline right in front of my intended takeoff position. Then they had charges wired in the tanks, with some mattresses on the other side so I didn't break my neck. I would run, hit the dials, hit the trampoline and go sailing past the camera, and land on mattresses on the ground on the other side. The director said, after we had done a good amount of these takeoffs, "George, I need to see you more at an up angle." So I said, "Great, put a rocket up my ass and I'll see if I can get up that high for you!" So they incorporated a parallel bar, so after I hit the trampoline I'd catch the parallel bar, and give the cameramen the right angle.

These things were shot out of continuity, so we would have a takeoff day, and that's all we would shoot, is takeoffs—my takeoffs and Tom Steele's takeoffs. In those days, those pictures were put together quicker than any schedules these days. 

I never wore the stunt helmet for Commando Cody. I wore the full-on helmet. So when there'd be a fight scene and I'd take a punch, or I'd fall, or something would collide with that helmet, I'd hear "Boionnnggg!" The sound of the blow was magnified inside the helmet. There would always be a loud ringing in my ears after any blow to the helmet.

JAH: You worked with legendary stuntman David Sharp on other shows?

WALLACE: I knew Davey from so many other films we worked on together. He was the best stunt man in the business. He was sensational. He was a wonderful guy, and a great athlete and acrobat. I heard a story about him that took place in World War II. He was a bombardier, and his plane took a hit, and one of the engines was disabled—it was smoking. The pilot was trying to take it in for a crash landing out in the desert somewhere. Davey opened the bombay doors, precisely judged his jump from the plane, hit the ground and rolled and tumbled on the ground, and he was fine. The plane went on ahead of him and crashed.

JAH: Tell us about Dale Van Sickel.

WALLACE: The thing I remember about Dale, is Dale would choreograph the fights. I did most of my own fights, under Dale's supervision. In today's terminology, Dale was the Stunt Coordinator, or at least the fight stunt coordinator. I had a fight scene with Clay Moore without the helmet, in a restaurant or something. Dale set the whole fight up like a ballet. Well, either Clay threw one when he shouldn't or I didn't duck in time, but he popped me in the nose, and laid it over to one side. I kept right on going, and the director called "Cut!" After realizing my nose was swelling, they piled me into the company station wagon and took me over to St. Joseph's Hospital in Burbank. The doctor gave me a shot of Novocain, popped my nose back in place. I was driven back to the lot, and was given a cup of coffee and a sandwich. After the short lunch, they told me the remainder of the day's scenes would be done in the helmet so they wouldn't have to worry about shooting my proboscis. We did scenes with me with the helmet on for the next four or five days, so we wouldn't lose any time because of my swollen nose.

Tom Steele and I were also in the James Garner/Lou Gosset, Jr. picture Skin Game. That just shows you Tom's longevity in the business.  

JAH: What was it like working with the late Bob Mitchum?

WALLACE: I did two features with Bob. One was Night of the Hunter. Charles Laughton directed, Shelley Winters was in it. Bob Mitchum was the same at home as he was when the camera rolled. Bob Mitchum was Bob Mitchum. 

I heard a great story about another picture Bob was on. There was a director on there who gave the cast and crew a bad time—he was a screamer. Mitchum comes in one morning, and the director tells Mitch the scenes they're going to do first thing that morning. So Mitch asks him again which scenes they're doing, and the director says, "Scenes 43, 44, 45." Mitch says, "OK, I'll go study my sides."  The director says, "Study it!? "  Bob says, "Yeah!" The director says, "Wait a minute! You're supposed to know your lines when you come to work in the morning.  You study at home the night before!" Mitch says, "Wait a minute, wait a minute!  Nobody pays me to work at home! I get paid when I come on the set! That's when I learn the dialogue!" He already knew the dialogue, and he just took a half hour to teach the director to behave himself!  Mitch had a photographic memory.

I heard there was another incident when he was up in Colorado doing a Western. He was at a bar after the shoot one day, with the crew, and some local comes up to him and says, "Oh, you're the tough guy from Hollywood." Mitch says, "Go away, I'm trying to have a drink and relax." The guy kept baiting Mitch, saying stuff like, "Let's see how tough you are!" So finally Robert turned around and cold-cocked him. Next day the headlines of the local paper read, "Hollywood Actor Assaults Local!" Two days later, in the same paper, on the back page, was a small blurb that the guy Mitch decked was a heavyweight boxing champ in the Army.

JAH: You did a picture with Jane Russell—Drums Across the River.

WALLACE: Yes, that picture drew a lot of controversy because of the dance sequence. It had to be heavily edited because of the wardrobe. But wardrobe was always a problem when you had a Jane Russell picture—and I mean that in the nicest of ways. My wife and I did a show on Broadway with Jane Russell called Company. Jane Russell replaced Elaine Stritch. The play ran for 6 months—the New York audiences loved her. There was that period in the history of film making right around the time that Jane had done The Outlaw, where they'd really hassle you about wardrobe and provocative dances. 

JAH: You were in the remake of Destry over at Universal, weren't you?  How was Audie Murphy to work with?

WALLACE: We shot Destry up in Lone Pine. Audie Murphy was a very quiet young gentleman.  He kept to himself, didn't make friends. He was dedicated to acting, always there on time, knew his dialogue. He always had a thin piece of rope with him, a piece of rope about two feet long.  He'd walk around and tie knots in this piece of rope, and you could tell he was going over his dialogue in his head. I got to know him a little better when we had a scene together. After the scene, I'm standing there and he's looking down, tying the rope in knots. He said, "George," and I said, "Yes, Audie." He said, "The scene that we just rehearsed—is that the way you're going to do it in the take?" I said, "Yes, sir," realizing the whole time that I'm talking to the star of the show and getting a little flustered. And then I muttered, "Yes, I think so." He said, "Uh, just wanted to know," as he continued tying knots in the rope. He was putting me on, and as he walked away he was smiling.  It was just his way of having fun. 

While out on location, some of the guys in the cast and crew found out that you didn't dare knock on his door after a night of revelry at 2:30 in the morning or so. If you did, you could bet on some hot lead coming through the door! He had a bit of a temper. When I worked with him, it was hard for me to grasp the fact that he had killed something like 160 or so of the enemy during World War II. He did superhuman things like jump on top of an enemy tank, turn the gun around and annihilate the enemy crew in their own tank. From my point of view, I saw this quiet man, just walking around the set, doing his job.

JAH: Tell us how you got involved in Forbidden Planet (1956).

WALLACE: There was a man named Leonard Murphy who was one of the top casting guys at MGM. He remembered that I was a chief boson mate in the Navy. The character in Forbidden Planet was the boson. Because of that, I was called into his office, and that’s how I got the part.

JAH: The original ending of Forbidden Planet was a marriage scene, with you conducting the wedding between Anne Francis and Leslie Nielsen.

WALLACE: That’s right. We shot that first, as the conclusion of the picture. Later, the studio heads felt that it didn’t play well, and cut the scene. They went back and shot the ending again.  It was my understanding that the wedding scene was not somber enough for the ending of the picture.

JAH: That film had a great group of actors in it.

WALLACE; Most people today think that Leslie Nielsen has always been a comedian—a comedic actor, that is. When we did Forbidden Planet, he was a serious actor—very straight. He did loads of straight roles after that, both on television and in the movies, everything from heroes to heavies. He was excellent at what he did, but when I saw him doing the comedy things, I couldn’t believe it! It opened up a whole new career for him.

Walter Pidgeon was a very distinguished gentleman. He had the air of an aristocrat and was very nice. He was one of the reasons why I later appeared on Broadway. (Composer) Richard Rodgers was on the lot doing Oklahoma. He came over to visit Walter—they were friends—and Rodgers mentioned that he was going to do a Broadway musical called Pipe Dream based on John Steinbeck’s book Sweet Thursday. Walter told him, “Well, you should hear George sing! He’s great!” So one day during my lunch break, I went to Rodgers’ office—with my Forbidden Planet costume on—and auditioned for him. I got the part and, when they finished the movie, I started in Pipe Dream.

JAH: Frankie Darro played Robby the Robot.

WALLACE: In the morning, until the lunch break, Robby the Robot was great. After lunch, Robby would do his scenes a little slower. He’d hit his marks, and finally he’d start falling over.  They put up with that for about three days, then they replaced (Darro). Frankie Carpenter finished the picture as Robby. (Marvin Miller provided the voice for Robby.)

JAH: You appeared with Dean Martin and Joey Bishop in 1966 on a show called Texas Across the River.

WALLACE: Our call would be 6:30 a.m. We were on location, and the cast and crew would be sitting around waiting. Around 9:30, Dean would appear, he would take a golf bag out of the back of his car, remove a mess of golf balls, get his driver from the bag and start hitting them into the middle of nowhere. He's fooling around and taking his time getting his makeup done during his golfball hitting ritual, and around 11:00 a.m. we'd actually start shooting. 

There was one scene with Joey Bishop, who played a character called Cronk. He had a black wig on. During rehearsal, a guy is supposed to get shot by an Indian's arrow, and someone was supposed to come to this guy's aid, and pull out a knife and cut his pants and take the arrow out of him so he didn't bleed to death. So during rehearsal, the guy would make a sound like tearing cloth, instead of actually cutting the guy's clothes. When the cameras rolled on the first take, he made the cutting sound instead of doing the actual cutting! In the meantime, there's 100 Indians coming down the hill. So after the poor guy blew the take, everyone had to go back up the hill, and that took an hour. 

Dean would crack up during the takes, he'd just look over at Joey Bishop and start to laugh, so take after take went by, with 100 Indians going back up the hill again! This went on for hours and hours! The director had a big white circle around his mouth, from all the antacid tablets he ate, because he was so upset that they were doing take, after take, after take! They had sequences they had to shoot of cattle who were thirsty, going to a pond and drinking water. And the cattle, who were anything but thirsty, wouldn't go near the pond! They tried to throw feed on top of the water to get the cattle to drink, and the cattle couldn't have cared less. The poor director was going out of his mind!  The cows just stood there, and instead of drinking, just mooed at the wranglers! 

JAH: You worked with James Garner and Louis Gosset, Jr., on a classic 70's film called Skin Game.

WALLACE: That was a classic flim-flam con artist comedy. The premise of that film was a white guy and a black guy used the emancipation of the blacks to do certain shady dealings with slave traders, with both of them profiting, and cooking up the scams. Lou and Jim were just great to work with. I played a slave auctioneer. I had a big handlebar mustache. There I am, the skin scalper, raffling off Lou Gosset. So I'm taking bids, and 'round the corner comes John Brown (a historical character who went around the country freeing the slaves), with all of his men, and whips the hell out of me with a horsewhip. 

Wallace, at the time of this interview had just completed work on a new Warner Brothers sitcom, All Right, Already, and it would seem that there is no end to the high-flying adventures of the screen's original Commando Cody.

In 2005, this writer had the pleasure of spending time with Mr. Wallace at the Hollywood Collectibles Show. He was hale and hearty, but unfortunately things would change quickly.  While on holiday in Pisa, Italy, he was injured in a fall, and succumbed from complications of this injury on July 22, 2005.

George was a great guy, a person you would want to have met and spent time with. He should always be remembered as a great character actor, and a great friend, and of course above all else, the original Commando Cody, Sky Marshall of the Universe, in a universe that we have no control over.

A Republic Serial in 12 Chapters, 1941

Starring Tom Tyler, Frank Coghlan, Jr.,

Louise Curry, William Benedict

Now if I were stranded on a desert island and I could only see a flick from each genre of Hollywood's Golden Age, when it came to the serial department this is the one I'd reach for every time. This could be the best sound serial ever made, and I know some would be willing to debate this point, but CAPTAIN MARVEL has everything a serial should have, and a little more.

The story is a simple one: An archeological expedition in Siam locates the tomb of the Golden Scorpion, who was a symbol of the god Scorpio. This golden idol had the power to transform mere granite to solid gold, as well as wielding a mean death ray that could melt mountains, and cause small explosions and earthquakes. Each member of the expedition except for the wise but youthful Billy Batson (effectively played by Frank Coghlin, Jr.), is given a lens from this curio to safeguard. Soon after, the party is attacked by the dastardly Scorpion, and his Siamese/Arabic henchmen. 

Back in the tomb, Billy Batson was paid a visit by a wiser-than-wise man, Shazam (Nigel DeBrulier), who pronounces him the new Captain Marvel, whose duty it is to protect the Golden Scorpion from evil-doers. This origin of Captain Marvel of the films is far different than the comic book origin of Captain Marvel, which took place in an abandoned subway tunnel.

The camp, after taking flaming spears and a wicked machine gun barrage, evacuates, leaving Billy to try out his new powers, showing the Scorpion's henchmen who's the boss by generally putting on a one-man annihilation expedition. This is some of the most thrilling serial footage ever shot, and the flying sequences (staged by the legendary Lydecker Brothers), mixed with the stunt work by the amazing Dave Sharpe, have never been duplicated, either by the ROCKETEER or the modern day Christopher Reeves SUPERMANs. 

Some of CAPTAIN MARVEL's methods may be considered too violent for today's politically correct audiences. The fact that Captain Marvel thinks nothing of picking up his enemies' machine gun and using it to mow them down, holding his antagonist over a bed of nails, or throwing them off cliffs, through doors (preferably closed!), or pulling their escaping elevator back up to the top floor of a multilevel garage and terrorizing them, might offend some.  For action/adventure hounds, this is the lure. 

William Benedict and Louise Curry are effective yet restrained in their portrayals of Captain Marvel's sidekicks. John Davidson adds Eastern intrigue in his portrayal of the archeological expedition's only Siamese member.

Each of these twelve chapters never fails to thrill. This is well photographed, beautifully directed, serial fare at its best. If you've never seen a movie serial, we would recommend that this be your first outing into the genre. 

The irony of this is that of all the people in the universe that this could have happened to, it was Steve Hodel, who just happens to have had an extensive career in law enforcement (over 23 years as a homicide detective at Hollywood Division, as well as a patrol officer on robbery detail for the LAPD, and a private investigator). If the saying is true that lightning never strikes twice in the same place, the saying is wrong in Mr. Hodel’s case because the object of his search is none other than his most revered father, Dr. George Hodel! At this point, most folks would have had a mega-meltdown and would seek out the nearest mental health care professional, but not Steve Hodel.  Instead, he began a cathartic quest which produced one of the most compelling true crime tomes of the new millennium. Meticulously researched (both visual evidence and documentation), Black Dahlia Avenger was not only a compelling page-turner but an obsessive read for this reviewer. This is due to the fact that each revelation was so shocking that the reader assumes that the information is so horrible that it can’t be topped, and that’s where the literary rug gets pulled out from under them.

This reviewer read the first edition of Black Dahlia Avenger (in hardback from Arcade Books 2003) several years ago and was thoroughly mesmerized. But this Harper paperback edition has so many additions and updates and corrections, that this is the version that true crime fans will want in their libraries.

Steve Hodel’s writing style is both informative and innovative, and the reader will feel that they are a part of the investigation as they are propelled through the seedy streets of Los Angeles of the late 1940s.

There’s a Who’s Who list of Los Angeles and Hollywood heavyweights, and a James Ellroy Forward that proclaims “Now we know who killed her and why.” Even Thad Stefan (a former LAPD, LASD, and private investigator who Helen Bessolo hired to find out who killed her son George Reeves) makes an appearance in the Dahlia fable.

There aren’t enough words to recommend this highly acclaimed book. I can only say for this writer…it blew the top of my head off!

In its 23-year existence, Republic Studios represented a variety of things to a variety of people.  For the rural movie-goers in the 30's, 40's, and 50's, Republic Studios provided constant entertainment in their local movie theaters. Small town exhibitors found Republic's economical rental rates and no-nonsense approach to film making both financially plausible and aesthetic to their communities. To the big city cinema critics, Republic was a defenseless whipping boy.  Often dubbed "The Little Studio in the Valley," or "Repulsive Pictures," these critics nitpicked at stock shots, silly plots, and budget-minded productions.

When compared with the output of such B movie studios as Monogram or PRC, Republic's product had the gloss and production values of A features. This was due in no small part to the wizardry of special effects technicians Howard and Theodore Lydecker.  These two brothers worked in close collusion to conjure effects that were both budget acceptable and believable.

Theodore Lydecker, the eldest, was born on November 7, 1908 in Inglewood, New Jersey.  His father, John Howard Lydecker, moved the family to Havana, Cuba; as head engineer he supervised the raising and restoration of the battleship Maine. Howard Lydecker was born on June 8, 1911, in Havana. The Lydecker family then moved to Balboa, California, where John Howard's engineering skills were applied to the construction of tuna boats and the design of miniature golf courses.

From tuna boats to Hollywood movie studios: John Howard served as Assistant Art Director to Cameron Menzies in 1924's Douglas Fairbanks production of The Thief of Baghdad. This may have been how young Howard was exposed to the motion picture business.

The family remained in Balboa.

"The great depression was a devastating time for all of us," recalls the late Mrs. Theodore Lydecker. "Both Howard and Ted had graduated from high school, and Howard went to work immediately at the old Mack Sennett Studio, which became Mascot Studio, and finally in 1935, Republic. Ted had moved to Idaho and was a real, honest-to-goodness cowboy. Both the brothers were making a dollar a day at their respective jobs; but Ted, being a cowboy, got bed and board on top of that. We were all lucky to survive."

At Mascot, Howard worked under the supervision of Jack Coyle, whose forte' was in art direction.  (An uncredited Jack Coyle supervised Republic's special effects department in the formative years.) In 1936, after the merger between Mascot, Monogram, Liberty and Herbert J. Yates' Consolidated Film Industries, Howard summoned his brother Ted from the wide open spaces of Idaho. Republic's first feature release was Westward Ho! starring John Wayne, followed by The Tumblin' Tumbleweeds with singing cowboy Gene Autrey. In 1936, Republic produced its first serial, Darkest Africa with Clyde Beatty. This was a showcase of the Lydecker's special effects mastery. Miniature jungle cities and flying batmen, volcanoes and earthquakes, along with Clyde Beatty's world famous lion taming, made this most satisfying Saturday matinee fare.

Darkest Africa is filled with thrills, chills, excitement, and the Lydecker' first flying dummies.  While the serials are what the Lydeckers are best remembered for, this was not the brothers' main focus, as Ted’s son George Lydecker recalls. "To my father and Uncle Howard, the serials were more or less the proving ground for the gags in the features. They knew that the Saturday matinee crowd, which was basically kiddies, would be watching this, and be more easily fooled than the adults. That's not to say they weren't proud of their serial work, but it's just that they held the features in higher regard."

Undersea Kingdom, also made in 1936, relied heavily on the special effects department.  Starring Ray "Crash" Corrigan and Lon Chaney, Jr., this featured undersea vessels, tanks, and flying miniature airplanes.

It seemed the Lydecker's specialty was making believable the unbelievable. Ed Newman, George Lydecker's boyhood friend, remembers Theodore Lydecker's input into their amateur filmmaking. "You could say George and I lived every kid's dream. We had one of Hollywood's foremost special effects men as our technical advisor. When we first started making these films, there was an incident where Mr. Lydecker came home after work, and found that we had rigged his paint compressor to a miniature submarine in the pool, and were filming a sequence which had the sub rising to the surface and emitting an oil slick. Whereas most parents might have blown a gasket, he merely remarked, 'Very interesting project, boys. Be sure to put all the tools away.' It was when he found out we were planning on including explosions in these amateur productions that he stepped in and began to take an active role. We would build the miniatures on our own, but when it came to detonating them Mr. Lydecker supervised and did the detonations himself, saving our fingers and his sanity. One problem that we had that Mr. Lydecker pointed out to us many times, is that due to our budgetary restrictions our miniatures were just that—small miniatures.

"With their work at Republic and then the later stuff on their own, the Lydeckers would base the size of the miniature on what speed the gag was to be filmed at. The larger the model, the less speed it was filmed at. So, we would build the miniatures after school and wait for Mr. Lydecker.  He'd bring charges and D cells home from the studio, and blow up our cars and flying saucers for us."

George Lydecker agrees. "I used to tell my Dad, 'You've got the job all us kids dream about—building models and blowing them up!'  And while Dad and Uncle Howard thought it was a great job, their attitude toward it was that it was a job. Dad couldn't wait to retire so he could go camping and fishing. He had an Indian friend named Starwall, whom Dad used to go hunting with in the backwoods. Dad had a real rough and tumble life.

"Dad used to bring his camera pack home to blow up our various models. He also taught us the secret of how they flew everything from airplanes, to flying saucers, to Captain Marvel, to Rocket Men—the same technique was employed. So many incorrect things have been written about how this was done, it's laughable. It was great, because Ed and I were taught these things first hand."

Veteran actor that late Frank Coghlan, Jr., in his book They Still Call Me Junior published by McFarlane Press in early 1992, gives an accurate description of how Captain Marvel flew.

One of the contributing factors to the success of Adventures of Captain Marvel was the outstanding work of the Lydecker brothers, Howard and Ted. These young special effects experts made all the flight scenes of Captain Marvel completely believable. Part of this was accomplished by the use of a papier-mâché dummy of Marvel that measured seven feet from head to toe.  This dummy was used in several ways.

I saw it suspended on a cable that must have reached nearly 200 yards as the Lydeckers had it photographed "flying" down a location on Mulholland Boulevard in the Santa Monica Mountains. I swear this cable didn't sag an inch as the dummy of Captain Marvel traversed its length.

Close-ups of Captain Marvel flying were duplicated on the sound stage with Tom Tyler himself suspended in a harness with invisible wires as clouds passed by him at high speed in the background in this process form of photography where Director of Photography Bud Thackery held forth.

The Lydeckers even had the dummy "fly" from ground level to the roof of the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles in one exciting scene in the serial. First you saw Tom Tyler make his spring into the air, then a cut of the dummy, then a shot of David Sharpe making his landing, then a close shot of Tyler, supposedly landing on the roof. When the film editors put it all together it looked very plausible.

The transitions of Billy Batson turning into Captain Marvel were also very lifelike. While these transitions in the Superman serial were done by animation, ours were done in live action on film.  When Billy said "Shazam," there was always a puff of smoke. When the haze cleared, there stood Captain Marvel ready to protect the innocent. To accomplish this there was always a trough of flash powder that was ignited electrically by the Lydeckers. When the smoke enveloped Billy, the cameraman would cut. Then Tom Tyler would take my place, the camera would turn, and the smoke charge would be set off again. As the air cleared this time, Tom would bound off to do what was required of him. After the film editors did their splicing, the transition was very credible.

There were times on outside locations, when the wind was blowing from an unfavorable direction, that I lost a few eyebrow hairs from the unexpected powder flash in my face.

"I think Frank's description of the papier-mâché dummy is the closest you'll get," George Lydecker commented. "I read in a magazine in the mid-Sixties that the flying dummies were rigged on the shoulders and the heels with small pulleys. This is absolutely false. Dad and Uncle Howard always went for the simplest way possible. Less time, less pain. A pulley system with piano wire would have hung up in the wind nine times out of ten. All the flying models—people, planes, and flying saucers—ran on two lines, which were piano wire. The size of the model dictated the gauge of the piano wire. Eyelets were put into the models, with copper tube guides inside, so that the wires would run from—say in Rocket Man's case—from shoulder to heel, with the copper tubing guiding the model. For lubrication they used talcum powder, which also cut the glare of the piano wire. The piano wires had wooden dowels at the top end, with the other end tied off out of frame, so the operators could make the dummies and models bank and do slight turns. By giving these lines slack and tension, landings and takeoffs for things like the rocket ships and planes could be achieved

They tried using miniature propellers on the planes, but found these didn't look right in the Dailies, so they switched to wire brushes which photographed like real plane propellers.

"One of the trickiest situations with the models occurred during the filming of The Flying Tigers" George remembers. “They had gone to New Mexico and built towers on which to fly the Flying Tiger models and the models of the Japanese Zeros. As it was so early in the war, Dad and Uncle Howard had to rely on stories told to them by actual pilots, as to what the Japanese Zeros actually looked like. Their estimates were pretty close, seeing as Americans were just beginning to see this type of aircraft in actual combat.

"One of the other problems was in-flight collisions and explosions. They would rig the models with some sort of timers or fuses, which had a tendency to ignite the explosives either early or late, resulting in retakes. But the most humorous of these situations was actually with the crew, who after all the years of working with the brothers, would exit their tents and forget and walk through all the lines that had been set up before filming.

George continues, "But things like going on location and having a second unit were rarities at Republic in those days. Uncle Howard handled the second unit on The Fighting Seabees and Dad did the special effects.

"Another incident on Flying Tigers involved a plane crash. During a production meeting, Uncle Howard and Dad pointed out to the producers and director that if they waited until the model plane crash was filmed, it would be a simple matter for the prop men to match the full size prop to the way the model ended up in the crash, insuring good continuity. Three weeks later, they found out that they had already filmed the full scale crash, so they had to manipulate the model to copy what the prop men had done with the full size plane. They hid the trick by blowing a lot of dust and smoke around when the model crashed.  They also wiped out a camera when one of the planes went out of control.

"The capper on Flying Tigers though, was when they took the special effects shots to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for Oscar consideration," George Lydecker continues. "They were in the projection room with the entire award committee and began the picture. There was one 20-minute dogfight sequence, during which Farsio Eduard (who developed a dual rear projection system for Paramount) remarked, "Do we have to sit through the whole goddamn picture?" Howard got his back up and said, "Every airplane you've seen is a special effect. There's not one real airplane you've seen in any of this footage!"  And Eduard called him a liar.  Howard and Ted stormed out of the room and that was the end of that.  They never again tried for Academy consideration. The truth of the matter was there were stock shots and newsreel footage interspersed with that of the models in Flying Tigers. But even the full size mockups that John Wayne and the rest of the cast got into were just that—battery powered mockups."  These mockups were also employed in such serials as Spy Smasher, and Flying Disk Man from Mars for the flying saucers taxiing out of frame.

"Dad and Uncle Howard handled all the explosions personally, the miniature and the life size. I remembered Dad studying for the Pyrotechnical certificate every year. This was something they were most concerned with. Safety was always first."

The late actor John Agar picks up the story. "When it came time to do all the work with the live charges on Sands of Iwo Jima, Howard and Ted took us through the scene and showed us exactly where the charges were to go off and explained to us how big the explosions were.  These guys were thoroughly professional and did everything in their power to avoid accidents, which happened those days, and happens these days. They would take hours choreographing our runs through the sand with those charges set to go off."

Agar's costar in Sands of Iwo Jima, the late Richard "Captain Midnight" Webb, reflected on his work with the Lydeckers both on The Sands of Iwo Jima and the 1950 serial The Invisible Monster. "Both Ted and Howard were consummate professionals. There were none better in the business. But I do remember an incident where they squared off with the studio brass on The Sands of Iwo Jima. The producers wanted them to overload the charges, thus creating bigger explosions. Now, having put on military explosive exhibitions for three years myself, I was well aware of the problems that can ensue by making these explosions bigger. The concussion alone is a concern, not to mention the fire hazards and shrapnel. But one of the things I admired about the Lydecker brothers, is they quietly and politely told the brass that when they came to their senses they could find them in a restaurant across the street on Ventura Boulevard having coffee.  Then, and only then, they could come over and discuss the alternatives for the shot. The same was true on the serial that I did at Republic called The Invisible Monster. I never had to worry with Howard and Ted taking care of the special effects—I knew I was in good hands. And they were the nicest guys."

"The interesting thing to me was the mechanics of the explosions", recounts George Lydecker.  "For example, the volcano eruption in Fair Wind to Java when Krakatoa erupts—Dad told me an interesting trick to make the eruption more believable. They put whole bags of cement in the miniature, so when they set it off the powdered cement flung into the air would make beautiful white trails as it exploded, and would look like realistic chunks of rock and lava.

"One of the most interesting miniature stories in Fair Wind to Java was how they got the squarerigger to location on Mono Lake. The squarerigger was 26 feet long, so they had to devise a trailer to turn it on its side so it could get through the various tunnels on the way up to Mono Lake.  The funniest thing on Fair Wind to Java is when they sent an efficiency expert up to monitor Uncle Howard and Dad's activities. Uncle Howard had absolutely no use for this guy.  He was always underfoot and annoying both of them. What you have to understand is Dad and Uncle Howard had built a very large miniature model of Krakatoa in the middle of Mono Lake, which if I'm not mistaken still stands today. In fact, when we were kids Dad would take us up to Mono Lake on the way to another camping site nearby and show us the miniature. They made it out of concrete, so it will probably stand the test of time. There were times of the day when Mono Lake was calmer than any other time, which was when Dad and Uncle Howard would travel over with the crew to photograph their scenes. So when this efficiency expert showed up, after several days of aggravation Uncle Howard decided that it would be a grand idea to take this executive out and show him how the miniature work was progressing.  He made sure the lake was at its choppiest, and sent the gentleman packing with an incurable case of seasickness.

"Basically, what it boiled down to," George recalls, "Was Dad took care of the shop while Howard did the politics, like dealing with the brass from the front office. And that could get a little bit crazy! They were always on them for budget, and when they'd view the special effects rushes, some of the producers would ask why you have to waste so much film at the beginning of the shot before the actual stunt happened. This was a simple problem that the two of them overcame with the editors. The reality of the situation was those old Mitchell cameras took time to come up to speed, so there was always dead film that wasn't leader before the effect took place. Since the execs at Republic couldn't understand why film was being wasted, the two of them went to the editors and made sure that the dailies were edited of the excess film at the beginnings and ends, therefore fooling the brass, who had no technical understanding of special effects."

One of the other Lydecker signature special effects was the melting caves. This effect was achieved by printing a portion of the film onto 4x5 stereoptican plates with a soft emulsion.  Using heating elements placed under these plates, the emulsion runoff mimicked liquid lava.  This effect was first explored by Jack Coyle and Howard Lydecker in the Gene Autrey Mascot serial The Phantom Empire, where they melted caves and cities. This trick was effectively recycled in such serials as 1937's S.O.S. Coast Guard, 1941's The Adventures of Captain Marvel, King of the Rocket Men, and Radar Men to the Moon. 4x5 stereopticans were a popular replacement for Coming Attractions on film in the 30's and 40's. The budget minded theater owners could rent these plates for a fraction of the cost of the 35mm trailer, and project beautiful full color studio ad mattes with canned background music as accompaniment.

In 1959 Republic Pictures closed its doors and the brothers went their separate ways—not as a family, but where they were employed. Howard worked at 20th Century Fox on such projects as Irwin Allen's Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea and Lost in Space.  Theodore had gone from Republic to Disney, which he did not care for, and ended up at Universal until his retirement in the mid-70's.

George Lydecker recalls, "Dad did the miniature bird models on Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds.  He also worked on The Andromeda Strain. I remember coming home late from school one day, and hearing Dad complain about some rookie stunt man who didn't think Dad could rig a stunt correctly. The effect involved a pulley and the stunt man jumping off a building, with the pulley and a winch decreasing the speed of the stunt man's descent.

“This never would have happened at Republic," George continues. "Guys like David Sharpe, Dale Van Sickel, and of course Tom Steele made it easy for Uncle Howard and Dad to work.  There simply wasn't the cooperation at Universal that there was at Republic. Those stunt guys at Republic, the directors, and the entire crew knew their stuff, and I guess Dad missed that. He retired as early as possible and went fishing.

"Both Universal and Uncle Howard tried to get Dad out of retirement on two separate occasions.  Universal sought his services on Earthquake, but he refused to come out of retirement.

Uncle Howard had put together a deal to go to England to film Sink the Bismarck, and approached Dad. I distinctly remember this because I was there and running in and out of the house during their meeting. By this time, Uncle Howard had already had a stroke, and Dad didn't travel well due to an old football injury. Once again, even Howard couldn't get him to come out of retirement and away from his beloved hunting and fishing."

Howard Lydecker passed away on September 26, 1969, of a cerebral hemorrhage, and elder brother Ted passed away on May 25, 1990. Their pioneering, larger than miniature models, photographed in natural light, provided the blueprint for the Lucas/Spielberg school of special effects, and beyond.  As Frank Coghlan, Jr., commented, "Even Spielberg and Lucas admit that their inspirations came from the old Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, and our Captain Marvel serials.

Ed Neuman reflects, "When you watch those old Republic pictures now, they hold up. This is because the actors, the crew, and especially the brothers made films based on their real life experiences, as opposed to the new generation of film makers, who base their cinematic efforts on what they've seen in the old films. George's Dad and his Uncle were guys who had more in common with, say, Ernest B. Shoedsack and Merian C. Cooper, who were real adventurers."

Ten years before his death, John Agar mused, "Just imagine...if the Lydeckers had the budgets and the effects gizmos of today, what they could do!"

But as George Lydecker concludes, "To Dad it was just a job—a GREAT job, mind you, but a job."

Photos courtesy of Jan Henderson and George Lydecker

December 2007