The Silver Screen Oasis

jdb1 wrote:And all those wonderful, evil bad guys on "Wild Wild West." Those colorful villains are what made that show eminently watchable.

Especially, Dr. Miguelito Quixote Loveless ... played by Michael Dunn


To me, he is the ultimate bad guy on that series and in television in the seventies.

I love him, kingme! He was great.

I always like Claude Akins in "Commanche Station." Lee Marvin is very good in "Seven Men from Now."

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Miss Goddess:

"There was an actor who played a "Comanchero" who kidnapped Miss Kitty on one of the later episodes of "Gunsmoke", and he was really good. Perhaps someone here recalls his name. He had a very strong presence and was a big guy, too, so he really was a threat to Matt. I wish I could remember his name or the name of the episode. One of most impressive villains I've seen."

Miss G:

I can't believe I found this post so quickly, from Aug. 2, I've been thinking about your question, and although I knew exactly who you meant, I never knew what the man's name was, then today is his birthday. August 10, 2011. His name is Alexander D'Arcy, born: 1908, died: 1996. When I saw his photo I screeched. I hope my neighbors didn't hear.

Lee Marvin is just so good in SEVEN MEN FROM NOW and as Liberty Valance.
But Jack Palance has equal menace in SHANE. A pity they didn't go up against each other !
Of course, Lee Van Cleef in anything. That piercing stare - maybe he needed glasses.

One of the most sinister Western badmen is also one of the most overlooked: Donald Pleasance in WILL PENNY. He's one mean sonofagun as Preacher Quint. Psychotic, to boot.

And for good measure Bruce Dern is cast as one of Quint's equally evil sons.

MissGoddess, I think the actor you may be referring to is William Smith. Big Bill specialized in playing intimidating bad guys.

I wrote him a fan letter after seeing him in Rich Man, Poor Man. Never got a reply...

Thanks for posting those pix, knitwit. Still haven't learned how to do that, technological dinosaur that I am.

Remember Big Bill Smith well from his role as the evil, patch-eyed Falconetti. Too bad he never responded to your fan letter. From what I understand, he's a frequent guest at autograph shows.

He is so scary, and intense... Love those big bad guys. One of his very first roles was in Meet Me in St.Louis(Louie) as one of the kids at the Halloween bonfire.

And I am still struggling with this IPad, pictures and editing are difficult. Maybe I ought to read the manual.

Yes, and Smith was also one of the kids who torments the little girl the monster befriends in GHOST OF FRANKENSTEIN.

And get this (from Wikipedia): Smith earned a Bachelor of Arts from Syracuse and a Master's degree in Russian Studies from UCLA. He taught Russian at UCLA before abandoning his Ph.D. studies for an MGM contract. He also studied at the Sorbonne in Paris and the University of Munich while learning languages through the military. Smith is fluent in Russian, Serbo-Croatian, French and German. During the Korean War he was a Russian Intercept Interrogator and flew secret ferret missions over Russia. He had both CIA and NSA clearance and intended to enter a classified position with the U.S. government, but his marriage to a French actress meant the loss of security clearance.

And to think he made his mark playing outlaws, criminals, vampires and bikers!

Everyone mentioned so far, and...


Ben Johnson as Bob Amory in One-Eyed Jacks, of course. His first unrelenting villain and one of his best. Though when it comes to Ben's bad guys (and he played many of them through the years), the one that really shivers my timbers is his racist rapist in the Gunsmoke episode "Quint-Cident."

A whole slew of character actors in b-westerns -- Kenneth MacDonald, Pierce Lydon, Terry Frost, Harry Woods, etc. -- usually they were townie types with sinister slickster mustaches, backed up by a bunch of familiar faces playing their henchmen, guys like Charlie King, Roy Barcroft, Marshall Reed, and Lane Bradford (though I saw Bradford playing a nice guy just the other day). There are literally dozens of these fellows making trouble for the B-western heroes and virtually all of them are great fun to watch. The head villains and their boys (and sometimes their equally bad girlfriends whom they truly love) often form extraordinarily entertaining outlaw families with their own internal dramas and backstabbing.

Lee Marvin in The Man Who Was Liberty Valance. Oh, how I want to pound his face into that steak he throws on the floor! A walking id or superego or whatever you want to call it. He's a great big oversize demon baby.

Henry Fonda in Once Upon a Time in the West. The coldest blue eyes ever.

Bruce Dern. HE KILLED JOHN WAYNE. *gasp*

Glenn Ford in 3:10 to Yuma. One of those villains who uses the truth to screw with your head. Gives me the creeps. (Russell Crowe is pretty good in the remake, though the original is still by far the best.)

Charles Kemper in Wagon Master. That unctuous fake-polite tone masking a deep and abiding nastiness... ick! Kemper could play sweet fellas too... just a great all around character actor.

William S. Hart. He was bad... until he was good. ;) Usually because he fell in love with a sweet young lady and he would then see the error of his ways. :)

Man, I gotta check out that "Gunsmoke" episode. Gentle Ben as a racist-rapist. Know he could play mean when he had to, but this character really sounds like a bad'un.