Booth Tarkington 150 -- March 14, 2018

Time, 31-December-1929

Indiana author Booth Tarkington was born 150 years ago, on 14-March-2018.  I don't think people read his stories and novels much today.  When I was a kid, the only thing I knew about him was that he wrote the novel that Orson Welles used as the basis for The Magnificent Ambersons.  I was already in college when I learned that F Scott Fitzgerald was a great admirer of Tarkington.  Inspired by this, I went to the Anza Branch Library and took out Penrod: His Complete Story, a collection of stories about a boy who grows up.

Seattle Star, 23-January-1915

Booth Tarkington and Harry Leon Wilson wrote a play called Cameo Kirby.  It has been filmed several times.  Dustin Farnum, who had played the role on stage, starred in the 1914 version.  John Gilbert played the part in a 1923 version directed by John Ford.  Irving Cummings directed a 1930 version which starred J Harold Murray.  I have never heard of him, either.

Motion Picture Magazine, February, 1922

As far as I can tell, 1922's Penrod, starring Wesley Barry and directed by Mickey Neilan, was the first movie based on a Penrod story.  Ben Alexander played Penrod in a 1923 adaption of Penrod and Sam, also directed by Mickey Neilan.  Ben Alexander played Jack Webb's first partner on the television version of Dragnet.

Billy Mauch played Penrod in three talkies, Penrod and Sam (1937), Penrod and His Twin Brother and Penrod's Double Trouble, both in 1938.

www.listal.com

Monsieur Beaucaire was a play by by Booth Tarkington and Evelyn Greenleaf Sutherland.  Rudolph Valentino and Bebe Daniels starred in a 1924 version.  Bob Hope and Joan Caulfield appeared in a 1946 adaption.

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In 1942 Orson Welles based his second feature film on The Magnificent Ambersons, but the movie got butchered by the studio after he left for another project.  There was also a television adaption in 2002.