Profile of Dub Taylor on Famous Like Me

Dub Taylor (February 26, 1907—October 3, 1994) was a prolific American character actor who worked extensively in Westerns.

Taylor was born Walter Clarence Taylor III in Richmond, Virginia in 1907. His name was usually shortened to "W" by his friends, and "Dub" was derived from that.

In 1939, just after he’d debuted in Capra’s You Can’t Take It With You, Taylor appeared in The Taming of the West, for which he originated the character of “Cannonball,” a role he continued to play for the next ten years, in over fifty films. “Cannonball” was a comic sidekick to “Wild Bill” Saunders, and continued so through a baker’s dozen of features – during which Bill Elliott’s character became “Wild Bill” Hickock, and began, with King of Dodge City (1941), a productive relationship with Tex Ritter as his co-hero. That partnership lasted through ten films, but Taylor left after the first one, carrying his “Cannonball” over to a new series with Russell “Lucky” Hayden. (“Wild Bill” brought in Frank Mitchell to play a very different character, also named “Cannonball,” in the remainder of his shows with Tex Ritter.) Taylor moved again to a series with Charles “Steve” Starrett, who eventually became “The Durango Kid,” always with his sidekick, “Cannonball.” These films had been produced at Columbia – Capra’s studio – and had a certain quality of production that was lacking when, in 1947, Taylor brought his “Cannonball” character over to the Monogram lot. There he joined up with Jimmy Wakely for a concluding run of 16 films (in two years). These final episodes may have been unpleasant experiences for Taylor, as he never thereafter wanted to talk about them. After 1949 Taylor turned away from “Cannonball,” and went on to a busy and varied career, but for many growing up in this period, this character is the one they call to mind when they remember Dub Taylor.

His acting talents, even during his “Cannonball” period, were not confined to these films. He had bit parts in a number of classic films, including Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (1939), A Star Is Born (the 1954 version), and Them! (1954), along with dozens of television roles. Taylor seemed to have found his niche in Westerns, however, and appeared in dozens of them over his career. He joined Sam Peckinpah's famous stock company in 1965's Major Dundee as a treasure hunting cowboy, and appeared subsequently in that director's The Wild Bunch (1969, as a prohibitionist minister who gets his flock shot up by the Bunch in the film's infamous opening scene), Junior Bonner (1972), The Getaway (1972), and Pat Garrett and Billy The Kid (1973, as an aging, eccentric outlaw friend of Billy's).

Arguably his most memorable role was playing the father of Michael J. Pollard's C.W. Moss in Bonnie and Clyde (1967). He continued a prolific career as a character and bit actor until his death of heart failure in October 1994.

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