Robert Allen

Robert Allen

Born: March 28, 1906
Died: October 9, 1998
in Mount Vernon, New York, USA
Robert "Tex" Allen (also credited as Bob Allen) was a leading actor in both feature films and B-movie westerns between 1935 and 1944.

Born as Irvine E. Theodore Baehr on March 28, 1906 in Mount Vernon, New York, Allen went on to graduate from the New York Military Academy in 1924, where he rode in the academy cavalry and from Dartmouth College in 1929 with a degree in English. In vacations he had driven a truck as a labourer. He worked for a bank which soon failed in the Great Depression. He flew briefly with the Curtis Flying service as a commercial pilot. He first came to the screen in 1926 before signing a standard acting contract with Paramount Pictures, in 1929. He appeared in the famous Marx Brothers movie Animal Crackers and several other small parts. Then, he signed with Columbia Pictures in 1935. He also later contracted with 20th Century Fox.

Allen's first notable role was the male lead in Love Me Forever (1935), for which he won a Box Office Award. He gained additional notice as the star of When You're in Love (1936), opposite Grace Moore. The same year, he was nominated for an Academy Award for his performance in the title role in the film The Life of Lafayette.

After the departure of cowboy star Ken Maynard, Allen was plugged into producer Larry Darmour's formulaic Ranger pictures. Along with sidekick Wally Wales (played by Hal Taliaferro), he redefined the role, starring in six films for director Spencer Gordon Bennet in that year alone. These films became known as the Bob Allen Ranger series. However, the studio was looking for a singing cowboy to compete with Gene Autry and Allen was eventually replaced by Roy Rogers. He appeared in two dozen films after that, however.

He had acted on Broadway in the original productions of Show Boat and Kiss Them for Me. In 1956 he appeared in the original production of Auntie Mame, opposite Rosalind Russell, and later Greer Garson. He appeared in other Broadway plays, in touring productions, in soap operas, documentaries and commercials. He became a real estate broker in 1964 but returned to the stage from time to time, including an appearance as J.B. Biggley in the 1972 Equity Library Theatre revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

Description above from the Wikipedia article Robert (Tex) Allen, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia.

Movies for Robert Allen...

Raiders of the Living Dead
Title: Raiders of the Living Dead
Character: Dr. Carstairs
Released: March 9, 1986
Type: Movie
In an abandoned prison, a doctor has revived executed convicts as the living dead. Teenager, Jonathan creates a laser gun from a videodisc player and pursues the walking dead, aided by his girlfriend and grandfather. Also tracking down the zombies is a tabloid reporter.
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Pie in the Sky
Title: Pie in the Sky
Character: Brill's Father
Released: January 1, 1964
Type: Movie
Rural runaway finds himself in Manhattan.
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Title: Naked City
Character: Chief Attorney (uncredited)
Released: September 30, 1958
Type: TV
Naked City is a police drama series which aired from 1958 to 1963 on the ABC television network. It was inspired by the 1948 motion picture of the same name, and mimics its dramatic “semi-documentary” format. In 1997, the episode “Sweet Prince of Delancey Street” was ranked #93 on TV Guide’s “100 Greatest Episodes of All Time”.
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Title: Omnibus
Released: November 9, 1952
Type: TV
Omnibus is an American, commercially sponsored, educational television series.
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Title: Tales of Tomorrow
Released: August 3, 1951
Type: TV
Tales of Tomorrow is an American anthology science fiction series that was performed and broadcast live on ABC from 1951 to 1953. The series covered such stories as Frankenstein, starring Lon Chaney, Jr., 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea starring Thomas Mitchell as Captain Nemo, and many others featuring such performers as Boris Karloff, Brian Keith, Lee J. Cobb, Rod Steiger, Bruce Cabot, Franchot Tone, Gene Lockhart, Walter Abel, Leslie Nielsen, and Paul Newman. The series had many similarities to the later Twilight Zone which also covered one of the same stories, "What You Need". In total it ran for eighty-five 30-minute episodes.
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Title: Lux Video Theatre
Character: Skipper
Released: October 2, 1950
Type: TV
Lux Video Theatre is an American anthology series that was produced from 1950 until 1959. The series presented both comedy and drama in original teleplays, as well as abridged adaptations of films and plays.
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City of Chance
Title: City of Chance
Character: Fred Walcott
Released: January 13, 1940
Type: Movie
Texas girl goes to New York, becomes a newspaper reporter, and tries to get her gambler boyfriend to come home.
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Winter Carnival
Title: Winter Carnival
Character: Rocky Morgan
Released: July 28, 1939
Type: Movie
A divorced glamour girl keeps warm with a professor amid sports and romance at Dartmouth College's Winter Carnival.
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Winner Take All
Title: Winner Take All
Character: Tom Walker
Released: March 29, 1939
Type: Movie
When a waiter makes a lucky hit and wins a benefit prizefight, gamblers rig some fights for him; but a reporter arranges for a real boxer to put him in his place.
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Everybody's Baby
Title: Everybody's Baby
Character: Dick Lane
Released: March 24, 1939
Type: Movie
The Jones family encounters new theories of childrearing when an author arrives in town to lecture on the topic.
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Tail Spin
Title: Tail Spin
Character: Charlie
Released: February 19, 1939
Type: Movie
Trixie is a female pilot looking to win a big race to advance her career. During one race, however, her plane becomes damaged, and she needs help to repair it. She meets a Navy pilot named "Tex" Price and tries to gain his aid. Tex soon meets another pilot, Gerry, a novice who seeks to win an important upcoming race. Tex, concerned for Gerry's safety, tries to convince her not to race. But Gerry, now a rival of Trixie's, is determined to fly.
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Fighting Thoroughbreds
Title: Fighting Thoroughbreds
Character: Greg Bogart
Released: January 6, 1939
Type: Movie
A prize-winning stallion breeds off-guard with a mare owned by his rival. The colt is trained to race from birth, eventually running in the Kentucky Derby against another horse owned by its sire.
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Kentucky
Title: Kentucky
Character: Man Dancing with Sally (uncredited)
Released: December 30, 1938
Type: Movie
Young lovers Jack and Sally are from families that compete to send horses to the 1938 Kentucky Derby, but during the Civil War, her family sided with the South while his sided with the North--and her Uncle Peter will have nothing to do with Jack's family.
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Meet the Girls
Title: Meet the Girls
Character: Charles Tucker
Released: October 6, 1938
Type: Movie
Entertainers lose their jobs and their fares from Honolulu back to San Francisco so they must become stowaways.
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Keep Smiling
Title: Keep Smiling
Character: Stanley Harper
Released: August 12, 1938
Type: Movie
Jane breaks into the film business while also reviving the flagging career of her film director uncle and getting him hooked up with his secretary.
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Gateway
Title: Gateway
Character: Reporter
Released: August 5, 1938
Type: Movie
Irish immigrant meets returning war correspondent on a liner bound for New York. When she resists the amours of another passenger, charges result in her being detained at Ellis Island.
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Hold 'Em Navy
Title: Hold 'Em Navy
Character: Midshipman
Released: November 4, 1937
Type: Movie
Two football players fight over the same girl.
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The Awful Truth
Title: The Awful Truth
Character: Frank Randall
Released: October 20, 1937
Type: Movie
Unfounded suspicions lead a married couple to begin divorce proceedings, whereupon they start undermining each other's attempts to find new romance.
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The Rangers Step In
Title: The Rangers Step In
Character: Bob Allen
Released: August 8, 1937
Type: Movie
Tom Martin wants to buy the Jed Warren ranch as he knows the railroad wants it for the right-of-way, but Jed refuses to sell...
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Reckless Ranger
Title: Reckless Ranger
Character: Jim Allen / Bob Allen
Released: May 29, 1937
Type: Movie
When Jim Allen is lynched, his identical twin brother Bob, a Texas Ranger, takes his place in an attempt to flush out the man responsible.
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Law of the Ranger
Title: Law of the Ranger
Character: Ranger Bob Allen
Released: May 11, 1937
Type: Movie
Working undercover, Rangers Bob and Wally arrive to take up ranching. Out to stop them is Bill Nash and his men. When Bob plans to file on a ranch, Nash finds out and heads for the Registrar ahead of him.
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Let's Get Married
Title: Let's Get Married
Character: Charles
Released: April 14, 1937
Type: Movie
Let's Get Married is a 1937 American comedy film starring Ida Lupino, who plays the daughter of a political consultant, Joe Quinn. From Wikipedia
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Ranger Courage
Title: Ranger Courage
Character: Bob Allen
Released: January 10, 1937
Type: Movie
The Harper wagon train is carrying money and Bull and his gang are after it. When their first attack is foiled by the rangers, Allen trails them. But he is captured and his ranger badge used to divert the rangers away leaving the wagon train unprotected.
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Rio Grande Ranger
Title: Rio Grande Ranger
Character: Bob Allen
Released: December 11, 1936
Type: Movie
Sayres and his outlaw gang operate out of a town just across the border and out of the jurisdiction of the Texas Rangers. Ranger Bob Allen is sent across the border where he poses as an outlaw hoping to lure the gang back into Texas. He gets into Sayres' gang displacing the gang boss but the disgruntled ex-boss is able to expose the hoax and Bob is made a prisoner.
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Craig's Wife
Title: Craig's Wife
Character: Gene Fredericks
Released: September 25, 1936
Type: Movie
Harriet, Walter Craig's wife, is an upper-class woman obsessed with control, material possessions and social status whose behavior makes difficult her relationship with domestic service and family members.
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The Unknown Ranger
Title: The Unknown Ranger
Character: Bob Allen
Released: September 15, 1936
Type: Movie
Bob Allen in his starring debut gets a job on Wright's ranch where he hopes to find the rustlers no one else has been able to locate. Everyone is looking for men when the actual rustler is a horse.
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White Lies
Title: White Lies
Character: Arthur Bradford
Released: December 27, 1935
Type: Movie
A powerful publisher John Mitchell whose pursuit of sensational headlines at the expense of all else takes a personal toll when his daughter Joan is implicated in a murder.
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Crime and Punishment
Title: Crime and Punishment
Character: Dmitri
Released: November 22, 1935
Type: Movie
A man is haunted by a murder he's committed.
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Guard That Girl
Title: Guard That Girl
Character: Larry Donovan
Released: November 2, 1935
Type: Movie
Attorney Joshua Scranton hires "Budge" Edwards and Larry Donovan, who has just bought into Edwards' detective agency, to protect Estelle Hudson, a client of his who is to inherit three-million dollars the next Thursday. He tells them he has reason to believe the girl is in danger from five relatives who stand to benefit from her death.
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The Black Room
Title: The Black Room
Character: Lt. Albert Lussan
Released: July 15, 1935
Type: Movie
In a 16th-century European town, the ruling family has been given a prophecy that, should there ever be twin boys born, the younger will murder the older; so is dismayed when twins are born to the popular baron. The older grows to be a selfish, slovenly man, who inherits the castle at his father's death and becomes ruler over the formerly happy villagers. He enjoys his power until he learns his younger brother is returning from abroad and, afraid of the prophecy, he determines to murder his sibling, hide his body in the "black room" - an old torture chamber sealed away behind the fireplace - and then impersonate him, right down to his withered arm. In this way he hopes to not only avoid the prophecy, but also escape consequences of his other criminal deeds and obtain marriage to a local girl of the nobility...
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Love Me Forever
Title: Love Me Forever
Character: Phillip Cameron
Released: June 28, 1935
Type: Movie
A man who loves an aspiring opera singer is prepared to sacrifice everything to help her with her career, even though he knows she doesn't love him.
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Air Hawks
Title: Air Hawks
Character: Bill Lewis
Released: May 7, 1935
Type: Movie
A small, independent air delivery service is menaced by a mad scientist with a death ray machine that blows up planes in mid-flight.
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Party Wire
Title: Party Wire
Character: Roy Daniels
Released: April 27, 1935
Type: Movie
When a small-town girl's boyfriend leaves in disgrace, gossips spread false reports of her pregnancy.
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Fighting Shadows
Title: Fighting Shadows
Character: Constable Bob Rutledge
Released: April 18, 1935
Type: Movie
Mountie Tim O'Hara is sent to Indian River to investigate a fur trading racket. But he quickly finds himself in trouble when he is accused of shooting a prisoner in the back and is then put in jail by a fellow Mountie.
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I'll Love You Always
Title: I'll Love You Always
Character: Joe
Released: March 19, 1935
Type: Movie
Nora Clegg, an actress, marries Carl Brent, an unemployed young engineer, whose estimation of his worth and ability keeps him from getting a job. He finally acquires a position that will require him to go to Russia for a period of time, while Nora goes back to the stage during his absence. But he loses out on the job at the last minute, and rather than tell Nora he has failed again, he steals a roll of money from his prospective employer to buy some things for Nora and go out and have a good time before, she things, his departure. His departure is to jail rather than Russia and he hides the truth from Nora by having an acquaintance mail his letters from Russia. He then finds out that Nora is pregnant.
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The Revenge Rider
Title: The Revenge Rider
Character: Chad Harmon
Released: March 18, 1935
Type: Movie
Cowboy Tim McCoy becomes an instrument of revenge when he discovers his parents have been killed.
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Death Flies East
Title: Death Flies East
Character: Baker
Released: February 28, 1935
Type: Movie
Evelyn Vail (Florence Rice) is a nurse convicted of poisoning a patient. Out on parole, Evelyn decides to fly to Sing-Sing and confront death row inmate who accused her of the deed in the first place. On board the airliner, Evelyn makes the acquaintance of John Robinson Gordon (Nagel), who is transporting a revolutionary munitions formula to Washington, D.C. Another passenger, Baker (Robert Allen), complains of having been poisoned and leaves the plane during a stopover in Dallas. Back in the air, Gordon's bodyguard, Lieutenant O'Brien (Fred Kelsey), suffers the same fate, but this time the poison proves fatal. The plane returns to Dallas, where Police Captain Barrie (William B. Davidson) accused poor Evelyn of the crime. Happily, Gordon can prove otherwise and the real culprit is unmasked.
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Law Beyond the Range
Title: Law Beyond the Range
Character: Johnny Kane
Released: February 15, 1935
Type: Movie
Tim is dismissed from the Rangers for letting his friend Kane who is accused of murder escape. When newspaper editor Alexander dies, Tim takes over to continue that fight against Heston and his stooge Sheriff. He also hopes to find the notorious leader of an outlaw gang and to also help Kane prove his innocence.
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Jealousy
Title: Jealousy
Character: Jim Rainey
Released: November 23, 1934
Type: Movie
Larry O'Roark is a boxer who's insanely posssesive and jealous of his fiancee, Jo. the sight of her and her employer, Mr. Lambert, at ringside during his big fight distracts Larry and he is knocked out. He then promises never to be jealous again and marries Jo. When she realizes that they're broke she asks Lambert for a job (she had quit on marrying Larry.) One thing leads to another and Larry, enraged with jealousy, end up killing Lambert. He then wanders off in a daze, and Jo takes the rap for the murder. Larry descends from his amnesiac fog just in time to interrupt the announcement of the jury's verdict in Jo's trial. then it's off to the chair for Larry. Or is it?
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Menace
Title: Menace
Character: Andrew Forsythe
Released: November 22, 1934
Type: Movie
A psychotic man stalks three innocent people whom he believes are responsible for his brother's death.
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The Captain Hates the Sea
Title: The Captain Hates the Sea
Character: Undetermined Secondary Role (uncredited)
Released: November 2, 1934
Type: Movie
Alcoholic newspaperman Steve Bramley boards the San Capador for a restful cruise, hoping to quit drinking and begin writing a book. Also on board are Steve's friend Schulte, a private detective hoping to nab criminal Danny Checkett with a fortune in stolen bonds. Steve begins drinking, all the while observing the various stories of other passengers on board, several of whom turn out not to be who they seem to be.
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Girl in Danger
Title: Girl in Danger
Character: Reporter (uncredited)
Released: September 11, 1934
Type: Movie
Inspector Steve Trent tracks the stolen Cortez emerald, last pilfered by a murdered gangster.
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Social Register
Title: Social Register
Character: Socialite (uncredited)
Released: March 10, 1934
Type: Movie
Chorus girl Patsy Shaw crashes a high-society party, meets playboy Charlie Breen, they fall in love, and are on their merry way to wedded bliss. However, Charlie's snobbish, ever-loving mama doesn't think that Patsy is worthy and sets out to prove it.
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Racetrack
Title: Racetrack
Character: Bit Role (uncredited)
Released: February 25, 1933
Type: Movie
Joe Tomasso is an Italian-American bookmaker and gambler who, outwardly, is hard but soft-hearted inwardly. He becomes fond of a homeless waif, Jackie Curtis, and begins to look upon him as the son he never had. But when Jackie's mother appears, Joe has a hard decision to make.
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The Reckless Hour
Title: The Reckless Hour
Character: Hal - Allen's Friend (uncredited)
Released: August 15, 1931
Type: Movie
Seduced and abandoned, with child, by a charming cad, a former New York fashion model learns to detest the male race in general until befriended by a warm-hearted artist-type who shows her that life -- and men -- ain't so bad in this early talkie drama.
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Night Nurse
Title: Night Nurse
Character: Party Guest (uncredited)
Released: July 16, 1931
Type: Movie
Lora Hart manages to land a job in a hospital as a trainee nurse. Upon completion of her training she goes to work as a night nurse for two small children who seem to be very sick, though something much more sinister is going on.
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Big Business Girl
Title: Big Business Girl
Character: Graduate at Dance (uncredited)
Released: June 12, 1931
Type: Movie
A young woman goes to New York and finds success in advertising thanks to her legs while her boyfriend spends the summer in Europe with his band.
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Party Husband
Title: Party Husband
Released: June 6, 1931
Type: Movie
Party Husband finds ex-Ziegfield Girl Dorothy playing the better half of a thoroughly “modern marriage” whose openness threatens to bring about its premature end. Fellow Ziegfield alum Mary Doran plays the coquette whose intended conquest of the free-thinking hubby (James Rennie) starts to throw the couple’s “understanding” awry.
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Animal Crackers
Title: Animal Crackers
Character: House Party Guest (uncredited)
Released: August 8, 1930
Type: Movie
The well-known explorer and hunter Captain Spaulding has just returned from Africa, and is being welcomed home with a lavish party at the estate of influential society matron Mrs. Rittenhouse when a valuable painting goes missing. The intrepid Captain Spaulding attempts to solve the crime with the help of his silly secretary Horatio Jamison, while sparring with the anarchic Signor Emanuel Ravelli and his nutty sidekick The Professor.
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The Quarterback
Title: The Quarterback
Character: Football Player (uncredited)
Released: October 11, 1926
Type: Movie
Elmer Stone, quarterback of the 1899 Colton College football team vows to remain a student until Colton beats its biggest rival, State University. Twenty-seven years later, Elmer is still in school and is a classmate of his son, Jack. Other than driving a milk wagon in his spare time, Jack is also the quarterback of the football team. A matter of his eligibility comes up but he is cleared and goes out to do-or-die for Colton against State University. Maybe they will win The Big Game, and Jack's father can get a life...and a job.