In 1979, marking the 30th anniversary of The Lone Ranger's television debut, producer Jack Wrather was beginning the process of making the first movie to feature the Ranger in more than 20 years. However, fearing that the original TV Ranger, Clayton Moore, would undercut the pending movie with his continuing personal appearances as the Ranger (the series was in syndication at the time, airing on WPIX in New York, for example), and filed suit against Moore.
Moore counter-sued, and the fight would rage on. Moore was profiled a year later on Real People in a segment narrated by John Barbour. As the segment ends, Moore joins Barbour, Skip Stephenson, Byron Allen, and Sarah Purcell on stage.
Luckily, the story has a happy ending. Two months before his passing in the summer of 1984, Wrather dropped the suit. 1981's "Legend of The Lone Ranger" was a monumental flop, though the 2013 version with Armie Hammer & Johnny Depp was much worse. Wrather felt he could still make some money off the Ranger franchise, as if the residuals off the reruns weren't enough. The lawsuit seemed to reek of pettiness on the part of Wrather, ignorant of the increase in popularity of the TV series.
Clayton Moore left us in 1999. There have been two films since then, including the Hammer/Depp flop, the other being an ill-advised TV movie for the WB network. There are the periodic comics from Dynamite Entertainment. Nothing, though, will match the work Moore put in, forging the legend of the Masked Rider of The Plains.
2 comments:
I remember this brew ha ha (and the Real People segment!) and Wrather DID look bad.
How often do you have an actor who literally became his character? Who took it upon himself to be the righteous, upstanding hero and role model he was on TV? Heaven knows, we need more people (actor or no) like Clayton Moore! Even though I wasn't even born when his show was first run, I was one of those kids who saw it in syndication on Ch.11 and my parents not only saw his adventures on TV, but heard them on the radio as well! Clayton Moore WAS The Lone Ranger!
I saw the 1981 movie on cable years later and, yes it was inferior! It might have been a smarter move on Wrather's part had he had the radial notion to have Moore reprise the role, as an older ranger, who looked to pass on the mantle (perhaps to his nephew Dan Reid?) and continue the tradition of bringing law and justice to the West. I have not even bothered to watch the Depp version of the film - the trailers alone ensured I would not like it!
Imagine if the internet as we know it existed in 1979 when this broke??
Sadly, how many people under 40 know about the character, much less actor Clayton Moore??
There are the occasional comic books (Dynamite holds the license), including one that came out earlier this year and is out in trade paperback. I have some of those old radio shows, TV episodes, and the two movies from the 50's that Moore & Silverheels made, all on DVD or CD. I became a fan as a youth, thanks to the radio reruns that were playing on WQBK and the WPIX broadcasts.
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