|
(21 November 1884, Glendive, Montana
- 14 March 1957, Los Angeles, California)
During his long career he appeared in over 315 films.
Bob Burns became one of the busiest bit players/stunt performers in
B-Western history, easily recognizable by his trademark mustache and
straightforward demeanor. Burns entered films in the 1910s, when he
starred in a series of two-reelers from Vitagraph.
He was still starring in two-reelers by 1920 but now for small-scale
independent producers, and sometimes in the early 1920s, a
low-budget concern attempted to turn him into a feature Western star
as well. With character actor Horace B. Carpenter handling the
directional chores and brunette Dorothy Donald playing the leading
ladies, the Burns Westerns never sold as a series but were
distributed by various minor organizations throughout the decade.
Just Traveling (released 1927) has survived and proves Burns to be a
very acceptable Western hero who may even have made the bigtime had
he been given half the chance. But the Burns series was too
low-budget and disappeared in the glut of low-budget Westerns
released in the mid-1920s.
Even busier in sound films and often cast along with brother Fred
and son Forrest, Burns continued to appear in B-Westerns and serials
-- literally hundreds of them -- often cast as stage drivers,
townsmen, deputies, members of the posse, or non-speaking henchmen. |
