John Russell (actor)

Born in Los Angeles to insurance company executive John Henry Russell and his wife, Amy Requa, John Lawrence Russell was the eldest of three children.^[3] He attended the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) as a student athlete.^[4]

Following the start of World War II, he joined the United States Marine Corps, though he was initially rejected because of his height (6 ft 3 in (1.91 m)).^[5] He was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant on November 11, 1942, and was assigned to the 6th Marine Regiment. His division was sent to Guadalcanal, where he served as an assistant intelligence officer. He contracted malaria and returned home with a medical discharge.^[6]

Russell signed a contract with 20th Century Fox in 1945 and made his first film appearance as a guard in A Royal Scandal. He played several supporting parts while at Fox, acting the role of a junior law partner in the Clifton Webb comedy Sitting Pretty (1948) as well as a navy pilot in Slattery's Hurricane (1949). He primarily played secondary roles, often in Western films, including William A. Wellman's 1948 Yellow Sky. Later, however, he signed with Republic Pictures, where he was cast in a starring role opposite Judy Canova in Oklahoma Annie (1952).

In 1955, Russell landed the lead role in a television drama series called Soldiers of Fortune. This half-hour syndicated adventure show placed him and his sidekick (played by Chick Chandler) in a dangerous setting each week. While the show proved popular with young boys, it did not draw enough adult viewers to its prime slot and was canceled in 1957. That same year, he returned to films briefly to appear as a corrupt agricultural magnate in the Warner Brothers low-budget exploitation film Untamed Youth. A year later he returned to the small screen as gunslinger Matt Reardon, in "The Empty Gun" episode of the ABC/Warners Western series, Cheyenne, starring Clint Walker. In 1958 Russell appeared as Saylor Hornbook on Cheyenne in the episode titled "Dead to Rights".

In 1958, Russell was cast in his best-known role: the stolid, taciturn Marshal Dan Troop, the lead character in Lawman, an ABC/Warners hit Western series that ran for four years. Co-starring alongside Peter Brown, who played Deputy Johnny McKay, and Peggie Castle as Birdcage Saloon owner Lily Merrill, Russell portrayed a US frontier peace officer mentoring his younger compatriot.

Russell also appeared in other motion pictures for Warner Bros., notably as a Sioux chieftain in Yellowstone Kelly (1959), as well as a rich, corrupt cattle rancher, Nathan Burdette, in the highly successful Howard Hawks Western Rio Bravo (1959), starring John Wayne.

At the same time, Russell guest-starred in an episode of NBC's adventure series Northwest Passage. In 1969, Russell appeared in five episodes of the Robert Wagner series, It Takes a Thief: "Guess Who's Coming To Rio?" (January 9, 1969), "Saturday Night In Venice" (September 25, 1969), "The Blue, Blue Danube" (October 30, 1969), "Payoff In The Piazza" (November 13, 1969) and "A Friend In Deed" (November 27, 1969).

Throughout the remainder of his movie career, he played secondary roles in more than 20 films, including several A.C. Lyles Westerns and three films directed by his friend Clint Eastwood, most notably as Marshal Stockburn, the chief villain in Eastwood's 1985 film Pale Rider. Earlier,he appeared as Bloody Bill Anderson in Eastwood's 1976 "The Outlaw Josey Wales. A now bearded Russell, has minimal dialogue and dies within the first fifteen minutes of this Western; notably in the arms of Eastwood.

Russell also appeared in the second season of the Filmation children's science-fiction series Jason of Star Command. He played Commander Stone, a blue-skinned alien from Alpha Centauri. He replaced James Doohan, who had played the commander in the previous season, but left to start working on Star Trek: The Motion Picture (1979).

Russell died of complications from emphysema in 1991.^[1] He married Renata Titus in 1943.^[7]

• John Russell at IMDb
• John Russell at Find a Grave
• Unofficial Lawman Western TV Series Homepage