Film library
In its early years, Republic was sometimes labeled a "Poverty Row" company, as its primary products were B movies and serials. Most of the technical staff had been with Mascot, a serial specialist, and thus was already geared to the steady production of weekly chapter plays. Republic's own serials began in 1936 and developed a following very quickly. Many were live-action adaptations of radio and comic-strip adventures. Dick Tracy (1937), starring Ralph Byrd as the intrepid detective, was so popular that it spawned three sequels. The Lone Ranger (1938) and its follow-up The Lone Ranger Rides Again (1939) were well received, and Adventures of Captain Marvel (1941) reached new heights of visual effects. Serials produced after World War II were more economy-minded, with the running times slashed from 20 minutes per episode to 13 minutes, and with the cliffhanger endings borrowed from older Republic serials and features. The studio also stopped licensing expensive comic-strip and radio properties, and instead created generic cops-and-robbers stories and science-fiction adventures. Despite the obvious economies, the Republic serials still found an audience, the last film being King of the Carnival (1955). Republic kept many of its serials in circulation; they were still playing in local movie theaters well into the 1960s.
The backbone of the company was its feature-length Westerns. Many of its Western film leads — among them John Wayne, Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Bill Elliott, Allan "Rocky" Lane, and Rex Allen — became recognizable stars at Republic. However, by the mid-1940s, Yates was producing better-quality pictures, mounting big-budget fare such as The Quiet Man (1952), Sands of Iwo Jima (1949), Johnny Guitar (1954), and The Maverick Queen (1956). Another distinguishing aspect of Republic Pictures was Yates' avoidance of any controversial subject matter (exploitation films being a staple of B movies), in contrast to the other "Poverty Row" studios that often dodged the Production Code.
Republic's leading female star was Judy Canova, who was enormously popular in Republic's customer base of small towns and rural areas. Republic produced many "hillbilly" rural musicals and comedies featuring Canova and the Weaver Brothers and Elviry.[18] She left Republic after a salary dispute in 1943, but was wooed back into the fold in 1951.
In 1946, Republic incorporated animation into its Gene Autry feature film Sioux City Sue. It turned out well enough for the studio to dabble in animated cartoons. After leaving Warner Bros. in 1946, Bob Clampett approached Republic and directed a single cartoon, It's a Grand Old Nag, featuring the equine character Charlie Horse. Republic management, however, had second thoughts owing to dwindling profits and discontinued the series.[19] Clampett took his direction credit under the name "Kilroy". Republic also released another cartoon series in 1949 (this time without Clampett): a free-wheeling series of animated travelogues called Jerky Journeys, written and produced by Leonard Levinson, but only four cartoons were made.[20]
From the mid-1940s, Republic films often featured Vera Hruba Ralston, a former ice skater from Czechoslovakia who had won the heart of Yates, marrying him in 1952.[21] She was originally featured in musicals as Republic's answer to Sonja Henie, but Yates tried to build her up as a dramatic star, casting her in leading roles opposite important male stars. Yates billed her as "the most beautiful woman in films", but her charms were lost on the moviegoing public while her noticeable Czech accent limited her range, and soon exhibitors complained that Republic was producing too many Ralston pictures. Years later, John Wayne admitted that he had departed Republic in 1952 over the prospect of having to appear in yet another film with her. Yates remained Ralston's most ardent supporter, and she continued to appear in Republic features until its final production, Spoilers of the Forest (1957).
By the mid-to-late-1940s, the American film industry faced an existential threat, the result of years of wartime stress on costs and the postwar exchange and trade restrictions enacted by the nations of Continental Europe (practically closing off the market to smaller studios such as Republic), the Paramount Case (even though Republic never owned more than a handful of theaters), and the rise of television. In 1947, Yates stopped the production of short subjects, reduced the amount of serials, and organized Republic's feature output into four types of films: "Jubilee", usually a Western shot in seven days for about $50,000; "Anniversary", filmed in 14–15 days for $175,000-$200,000; "Deluxe", major productions made with a budget of around $500,000; and "Premiere", which were usually made by top-rank directors who most often did not work for Republic, such as John Ford, Fritz Lang and Frank Borzage, and which could have budgets of $1,000,000 or more.[22] Some of these "Deluxe" films were produced by independent companies and were picked up for release by Republic.
Although Republic released most of its films in black and white, it occasionally produced higher-budgeted films such as The Red Pony (1949) and The Quiet Man in Technicolor. During the late 1940s and 1950s, Yates utilized a low-cost, two-color process called Trucolor (similar to Cinecolor, favoring blues and oranges) in many Republic films, including Johnny Guitar, The Last Command (1955), and Magic Fire (1956). In 1956, the studio devised its own widescreen film process, Naturama, and The Maverick Queen was the first film made in that process.[23]
