Spencer Tracy_ A Biography - James C. Curtis [536]
Note: Tracy replaced Henry Hull in the role of Charlie Riggs and played a week at the Forty-eighth Street Theatre in New York prior to Chicago.
THE LAST MILE
By John Wexley. (Sam H. Harris Theatre, February 13, 1930.) Management: Herman Shumlin. Cast: Spencer Tracy (John Mears), James Bell, Howard Phillips, Hale Norcross, Ernest Whitman, George Leach, Joseph Spurin-Calleia, Don Costello, Herbert Heywood, Orville Harris, Ralph Theadore, Richard Abbott, Henry O’Neill, Clarence Chase, Allen Jenkins, Albert West. Staged by Chester Erskine. 289 performances. Also Chicago.
Note: During Tracy’s absence over the summer of 1930, the part of Mears was played first by Thomas Mitchell, later by Allen Jenkins.
THE RUGGED PATH
By Robert Emmet Sherwood. (Plymouth Theatre, November 10, 1945.) Management: The Playwrights’ Company. Cast: Spencer Tracy (Morey Vinion), Martha Sleeper, Rex Williams, Clinton Sundberg, Lawrence Fletcher, Vito Christi, Kay Loring, Ernest Woodward, Emory Richardson, Gordon Nelson, Jan Sterling, Henry Lascoe, Ralph Cullinan, Nick Dennis, Theodore Leavitt, Paul Alberts, Sandy Campbell, Sam Sweet, Lynn Shubert, Howard Ferguson, William Sands, David Stone, Clay Clement, Edward Raquelo. Staged by Captain Garson Kanin. Eighty-one performances.
APPENDIX II
Film Chronology
TAXI TALKS (VITAPHONE VARIETIES)
Vitaphone Release #995–996. Producer: Murray Roth. Director: Arthur Hurley. Story: Frederick and Fannie Hatton. Photography: E. B. DuPar. Production and distribution: Vitaphone. Release date: June 1930. Running time: 14 minutes. Cast: Evelyn Knapp, Roger Pryor, Mayo Methot, Vernon Wallace, Katherine Alexander, Spencer Tracy (Joe).
THE HARD GUY (VITAPHONE VARIETIES)
Vitaphone Release #1036. Producer: Sam Sax. Director: Arthur Hurley. Story: Betty Ross. Adaptation: Burnet Hershey. Photography: E. B. DuPar. Production and distribution: Vitaphone. Release date: September 1930. Running time: 12 minutes. Cast: Spencer Tracy (Guy), Katherine Alexander, Valli Roberts, Arch Hendricks, Pat Kearney.
Note: Some sources suggest that Tracy appeared in a third Vitaphone subject. The Strong Arm was filmed in the latter half of March 1930, but there is no documentation in either the Warner Bros. Archive at USC or in Tracy’s personal papers to suggest that he was in it. He never claimed to have appeared in a third Vitaphone subject at any point in his career.
UP THE RIVER
Director: John Ford. Staged by William Collier, Sr. Story: Maurine Watkins. Music and lyrics: Joseph McCarthy, James F. Hanley. Photography: Joseph August. Editor: Frank Hull. Production and distribution: Fox. Release date: October 12, 1930. Running time: 92 minutes. Cast: Spencer Tracy (St. Louis), Claire Luce, Warren Hymer, Humphrey Bogart, William Collier, Sr., Joan Lawes, George MacFarlane, Gaylord Pendleton, Sharon Lynn, Noel Francis, Goodie Montgomery, Robert E. O’Connor, Robert Burns, John Swor, Joe Brown, Morgan Wallace.
Note: Existing prints of the film run eighty-four minutes.
QUICK MILLIONS
Director: Rowland Brown. Screenplay: Rowland Brown, Courtenay Terrett. Additional dialogue: John Wray. Photography: Joseph August. Editor: Harold Schuster. Production and distribution: Fox. Release date: May 3, 1931. Running time: 69 minutes. Cast: Spencer Tracy (Daniel J. “Bugs” Raymond), Marguerite Churchill, John Wray, Warner Richmond, Sally Eilers, George Raft, Robert Burns, John Swor, Edgar Kennedy, Harry Myers, Dixie Lee.
SIX CYLINDER LOVE
Associate producer: John W. Considine, Jr. Director: Thornton Freeland. Based upon the play by William Anthony McGuire. Adaptation: William M. Conselman, Norman Houston. Photography: Ernest Palmer. Editor: J. Edwin Robbins. Production and distribution: Fox. Release date: May 10, 1931. Running time: 71 minutes. Cast: Spencer Tracy (William Donroy), Sidney Fox, Edward Everett Horton, Una Merkel, El Brendel, William Collier, Sr., Lorin Raker, Bert Roach, William Holden, Ruth Warren.
GOLDIE
Associate producer: A. L. Rockett.