A group of people traveling on a stagecoach find their journey complicated by the threat of Geronimo, and learn something about each other in the process.
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Credits: TheMovieDb.

Film Cast:

• Dallas: Claire Trevor
• The Ringo Kid: John Wayne
• Buck: Andy Devine
• Hatfield: John Carradine
• Doc Josiah Boone: Thomas Mitchell
• Lucy Mallory: Louise Platt
• Marshal Curly Wilcox: George Bancroft
• Samuel Peacock: Donald Meek
• Ellsworth H. Gatewood: Berton Churchill
• Lt. Blanchard: Tim Holt
• Luke Plummer: Tom Tyler
• Indian Scout (uncredited): Chief John Big Tree
• Cavalry Scout (uncredited): Yakima Canutt
• Billy Pickett (uncredited): Francis Ford
• Sergeant (uncredited): William Hopper
• Chris (uncredited): Chris-Pin Martin
• Pony Express Agent (uncredited): Paul McVey
• Bartender in Tonto (uncredited): Jack Pennick
• Telegraph Operator (uncredited): Harry Tenbrook
• Indian Chief (uncredited): Whitehorse
• Cavalryman Extra (uncredited): Hank Worden
• Girl in Saloon (uncredited): Dorothy Appleby
• Bit Part (uncredited): Ted Billings
• Bit Part (uncredited): Wiggie Blowne
• (uncredited): Danny Borzage
• Lordsburg Saloon Owner (uncredited): Ed Brady
• Bit Part (uncredited): Fritzi Brunette
• Boone’s Landlady (uncredited): Nora Cecil
• Bit (uncredited): Steve Clemente
• Rancher (uncredited): Bill Cody
• Bartender (uncredited): Jack Curtis
• Mrs. Pickett (uncredited): Marga Ann Deighton
• Bit Part (uncredited): Patricia Doyle
• Bit Part (uncredited): Tex Driscoll
• Small Role (uncredited): Johnny Eckert
• Deputy Frank (uncredited): Franklyn Farnum
• Mrs. Gatewood (uncredited): Brenda Fowler
• Girl in Saloon (uncredited): Helen Gibson
• Ed the Editor (uncredited): Robert Homans
• Bartender (uncredited): Si Jenks
• Capt. Whitney (uncredited): Cornelius Keefe
• Nancy Whitney (uncredited): Florence Lake
• Small Role (uncredited): Al Lee
• Lordsburg Sheriff (uncredited): Duke R. Lee
• Lordsburg Express Agent (uncredited): Theodore Lorch
• Tonto Express Agent Jim (uncredited): Jim Mason
• Tonto Sheriff (uncredited): Louis Mason
• Ogler (uncredited): Merrill McCormick
• (uncredited): J.P. McGowan
• Capt. Sickel (uncredited): Walter McGrail
• Small Role (uncredited): Jack Mohr
• Billy Pickett Jr. (uncredited): Kent Odell
• Lordsburg Bar Patron (uncredited): Artie Ortego
• Hank Plummer (uncredited): Vester Pegg
• Small Role (uncredited): Chris Phillips
• Ike Plummer (uncredited): Joe Rickson
• Rancher (uncredited): Buddy Roosevelt
• (uncredited): Mickey Simpson
• (uncredited): Chuck Stubbs
• Townsman (uncredited): Leonard Trainor
• Lucy’s Infant (uncredited): Mary Kathleen Walker
• Capt. Simmons (uncredited): Bryant Washburn
• Yakima (uncredited): Elvira Ríos

Film Crew:

• Writer: Ben Hecht
• Executive Producer: Walter Wanger
• Producer: John Ford
• Sound Effects Editor: Robert Parrish
• Costume Design: Walter Plunkett
• Screenplay: Dudley Nichols
• Story: Ernest Haycox
• Original Music Composer: Gerard Carbonara
• Director of Photography: Bert Glennon
• Editor: Otho Lovering
• Editor: Dorothy Spencer
• Art Direction: Alexander Toluboff
• Sound Designer: Frank Maher
• Assistant Director: Lowell J. Farrell
• Stunts: Henry Wills
• Music: John Leipold
• Music: Leo Shuken
• Stunt Coordinator: Yakima Canutt
• Music Director: Boris Morros
• Stunts: David Sharpe
• Art Direction: Wiard B. Ihnen
• Stunts: Iron Eyes Cody
• Music: Louis Gruenberg
• Camera Intern: Cliff Shirpser
• Makeup Artist: Norbert A. Myles
• First Assistant Camera: James V. King
• Stunts: Ken Cooper
• Casting: Lee Bradley
• Assistant Director: Wingate Smith
• Special Effects: Ray Binger
• Still Photographer: Ned Scott
• Stunts: Johnny Eckert
• Production Manager: Daniel Keefe

Movie Reviews:

• John Chard: We’re the victims of a foul disease called social prejudice, my child.

  Stagecoach is directed by John Ford and adapted by Dudley Nichols from a story by Ernest Haycox. It stars Claire Trevor, John Wayne, John Carradine, Thomas Mitchell, Andy Devine, Donald Meek and Louise Platt. Director of photography is Bert Glennon and director of music Boris Morros.

  6 people on board a stagecoach bound for Lordsburg, each one very different in character, each one with their own issues in life, and some carrying shame as well as dark secrets. The journey is fraught with danger as the Apache are tracking them thru the desert flats, can all the polar opposites come together to form a united front?

  It’s now written in history that the 1930s was a bad decade for the Western movie. The decade began with expensive flops The Big Trail & Cimarron and from there the big studios pretty much condemned the genre to being nothing more than a B movie production line. Then in 1937 a story called Stage to Lordsburg was published in Collier’s magazine, a story written by Ernest Haycox that itself was inspired by a short story called Boule de Suif written by Guy de Maupassant. John Ford liked the story very much and purchased the rights, trusting Dudley Nichols to rework a screenplay into a classic Western narrative. Meeting resistance from some of the head men at the studios, Ford had to fight hard to not only get the film made, but to also have John Wayne playing The Ringo Kid. Gary Cooper and Joel McCrea were wanted instead of Wayne, and Marlene Dietrich was suggested for the role of Dallas, the role eventually went to Claire Trevor. But Ford stuck to his guns, and rightly so, for now Stagecoach can be seen as a wonderful film that not only launched Wayne to stardom, but also as the film that reignited the Western genre and paved the way for some essential classics that followed.

  John Ford’s first sound Western is rich with character dynamics at play, with the great director exploring what would become a trademark theme of his, that of moral qualities born out of people deemed less pure in society’s eyes. True enough Stagecoach is still very traditional in an early Western movie sense, but the study of different characters under duress is magnificently moulded by director and cast alike. It was something that Orson Welles liked about the film, calling it perfect textbook film making, even claiming it to be a film he watched numerous times whilst crafting Citizen Kane. It’s easy to believe Welles, we obviously remember the stunning Apache pursuit of the rocketing stagecoach, the stunt work, the breathless energy and the majestic location of Monument Valley, but thematically the film sizzles as well. That Ford is able to marry sharp action with real human drama – intimate drama played out on a massive panoramic landscape – is why Stagecoach continually entertains and influences with each passing year.

  From the moment Ford zooms up close on the face of John Wayne, a mega-star was born, but more importantly, from the opening credits to the last second of Stagecoach, the Western movie was reborn. A near masterpiece of the genre. 9/10