AN INTERVIEW WITH LASH LARUE """""""""""""""""""""""""""" by Ralph Roberts (This interview done for the Sagebrush Journal in 1986)

PRC (Producers Releasing Corporation) was not a first line movie company in the late forties. When their major star, Buster Crabbe, packed up and left, it looked like hard times ahead indeed. But there was a young guy around the studios called Al LaRue. He wore black in his films and was going by the name of the Cheyenne Kid. He had done some non-Western films, but the first real notice anyone had taken of him was a featured role in Eddie Dean's first starring film, Song of Old Wyoming (1945). LaRue played the Cheyenne Kid, a good/bad guy, dressed all in black, and bearing a resemblance to Humprey Bogart. He snarled and charmed his way through the picture, catching a bullet just before the end. He flat out stole the picture from Eddie it was a foretaste of the starring roles to come. Because of a large volume of fan mail, PRC cast LaRue in another Eddie Dean film, Caravan Trail (1946). He played another "edge of the law" character called Cherokee. Again, he stole the movie from Dean, coming through as the most interesting and believable person. Eddie Dean must have been a glutton for punishment as he let PRC put LaRue in yet another picture with him, this time in Wild West, also in 1946. The fan mail for LaRue continued to pour in. PRC, without meaning to, had created a star, but they soon let him slip away. Today, Lash LaRue is a distinguished, grey bearded hero. He is still very much active with personal appearances, hosting chores on television, and the making of films. He was recently in Stagecoach with Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings. He played the lead in two soon to be released films, Dark Power and Alien Outlaw. "They used to send fan mail to me addressed to 'the guy that wore the black outfit' or to 'the man that used the whip," Lash said, in relating how he became a leading man. "So I got a contract with the studio because of the amount of mail that I got. It was for eight pictures. My first starring picture was Law of the Lash." (PRC February 28, 1947) "Then PRC was bought by an outfit called Eagle Lion, an English corporation. They had assigned me to Harry Thomas, who had been president of PRC. Part of his pay off was that he could take me with him, but I had a rider in my contract my attorney had put in that they could not do that without my permission. So they broke the contract that way. "I had been on tour in the South, and in Charlotte, North Carolina was a man by the name of Francis White. He and a group of theater owners got together to make my pictures. The pictures were then made by theater owners, who had made a thorough investigation as to what my pictures were already doing for them. "They put together a company called Western Adventure Productions and I had a piece of the outfit. But they were smarter businessmen then I was so I wound up with nothing as far as the contract was concerned, except that I got paid for making the pictures. But I didn't wind up with an actual piece of the company like I was supposed to." Lash made eight pictures for PRC/Eagle Lion, then another twelve for Western Adventure Productions. These came between 1948 and 1952. His sidekick was Al "Fuzzy" St. John. The best of these latter films was King of the Bullwhip (1951). It featured a rousing two-man bullwhip scene at the climax, and is a definite must-have for any Western film collector's video library. Obviously, his nickname came from his use of a whip during his movies. Here's what Lash had to say about his start in movies, and how the whip came about. "Well I took dramatics to overcome a speech impediment, and a friend of mine was doing a play in California called Blind Alley. I did the play and wound up

getting a screen test, which resulted in contract at Universal studios. There I did several pictures. I don't even remember all the titles. "One of the things I do remember that I worked in was a serial called The Master Key. Milford Stone, who was Doc in Gunsmoke, he was in it and Dennis Moore. From there I was going to go back to college and take Law, but I wound up doing a picture called Song of Old Wyoming. That's where the whip was introduced." Unlike most of the other B Western stars, Lash LaRue's movie career is still going. "Johnny Cash and Waylon talked about putting me in the next one. I hope they do. Their deals are much better than they were for me years ago. Their pictures are sold before they're made. "Dark Power and Alien Outlaw. they were made here in North Carolina. They haven't been put into distribution yet. They went over to Cannes to try to set foreign distribution. But the fellow put the deal together is not much smarter than I was when I was doing mine, so he didn't have distribution set up before he made them. That's a big mistake." The amazing thing about Lash LaRue, to a first time interviewer, is that there is so much depth to him. He's an intellectual, a poet, a Doctor of Divinity, a thinker. "I've had a wonderful background, and I think I'm about coming of age," he said. "I think I ought to do something worthwhile now, if I can find something. "I've had a very, very interesting life. God opened my spiritual eyes in 1963 and I have a Doctorate in Divinity, but I don't intend to follow that particular line. I had to find out for myself a lot of things. I believe the afternoon and evening of my life will be more important then the earlier part of it." "The principles of it are deep in my heart and I hope to see the end of it. "Principles don't change. When I was a little boy I used to pray to be a cowboy, and I wound up being a cowboy. 'Course my idea of a cowboy was not dirt and cattle. It was the guy that went into town and straightened things out and everybody dug him. "There was a little moral in each film I made. The idea of the whip was to bring them to justice rather than kill them. "There's a little cowboy in everybody, I think, and the children today, I've noticed, are just as enthusiastic about popping a whip and pretending to be a cowboy as they were back in our day. "If we were able to understand the children before we try to make them like us, we would be better off." From the Wikipedia: Alfred "Lash" LaRue (June 14, 1921May 21, 1996) was a popular western motion picture star of the 1940s and 1950s. He had exceptional skill with the bull whip. He was one of the first winners of the Golden Boot Award in 1983.