HISTORY VERSUS MOVIES

[Margaret-Anne Moore]

YOUR FORUM REMINDED ME OF TWO MOVIES I LOVE VERY MUCH BUT WHICH ARE SO INACCURATE AS TO BE LAUGHABLE--THE MASK OF ZORRO AND THE LEGEND OF ZORRO.

THE FIRST FEATURED HIS LORDSHIP SIR ANTHONY AS THE ORIGINAL ZORRO AND ANTONIO BANDERAS AS JOAQUIN MURRIETA'S YOUNGER BROTHER AND ZORRO'S PROTEGE.

[C. F. 'Charley' Eckhardt]

A guy by the name of McCullers wrote the original Zorro stories in Argosy All-Story magazine back in the '20s.  They were all fiction.  The 1st 'movie Zorro' was Douglas Fairbanks, Sr.  Clayton Moore, TV's Lone Ranger, actually played Zorro in a serial in the late '40s.  George W. Tremble, who was producing the Lone Ranger radio series, saw him in that serial & offered him the LR role on TV.  Moore played the part for the 1st 2 yrs of the series--52 episodes a year--& left in a contract dispute.  Jon Hall--Daktari--played the LR for the next year.  Then Moore & Tremble came to terms & Moore played the part until the series ended in 1957.  Jay Silverheels played Tonto for the whole run, but when he was out sick 'Dan Reid, the Lone Ranger's nephew' filled in as sidekick.  A little more LR trivia--Britt Reid, The Green Hornet, was supposed to be Dan Reid's son & the LR's grand nephew.  He kept a portrait of his illustrious great uncle in his newspaper office.  Tremble produced both the LR & GH radio shows & the TV version of LR, but I don't think he did the TV GH.