Douglas Fairbanks in Wild and Woolly.

Showmanship:
Fairbanks, Mix and Jazz Age Cowboy

W.S. Hart retired from the screen with little fanfare. Amid the jingoistic, streamlined showmanship that had increasingly come to characterize the genre, few seemed to notice his passing. The Jazz Age required a different cowboy, a more glamorous manifestation of the frontiersman -- one more suited to the era’s upbeat tempo.

Preceding both Fairbanks and Hart -- and reaching his prime in their wake -- was Tom Mix. Both a Texas Ranger and rodeo championship winner before entering motion pictures, Mix was a natural cowboy. On screen, however, a breezy and clear-cut persona and an abundance of elaborate stunts detracted from the star’s authenticity. Not that authenticity was ever a priority for Mix, serving as producer/director on many of his own films, he would work hard at devising ingenious, far-fetched scrapes and predicaments for his on-screen counterpart (Fenin and Everson 116). In his first six years in the industry, from 1911 until 1917, Mix shot well over 100 one- and two-reelers for Selig. Increased popularity brought him to the attention of Fox, whom he signed with in 1917. Until the end of his Fox contract in 1928, Mix and his trusty steed Tony enjoyed prestigious productions and ongoing appeal. Made at the height of his popularity, such films as The Daredevils (1919), Rough Riding Romance (1919), and The Lone Star Ranger (1923) exhibited the rollicking, good-natured adventure stories in which Mix excelled. Based on a Zane Gray story, Riders of the Purple Sage (1925) is one of Mix’s most notable ventures, if somewhat atypical in its emphasis on violence.