James Cruze


James Cruze was a silent film actor and film director.
James Cruze is best known today among film buffs as the director of the epic silent Western The Covered Wagon.

Personal life

Born Jens Cruz Bosen in Ogden, Utah of Mormon parents, Cruze acquired his middle name solely by virtue of his birth date. As Cruze's longtime friend and colleague, actor Luke Cosgrave, explained in a 1930 interview:
Did you hear how Jimmy and I came together? I was playing in Boise with Charley Murray and we needed a young fellow for the good looking hero parts and I wired for Chester Stevens, who was in San Francisco, sending him a ticket to Boise. He got a job right then and handed the ticket to another young fellow. I met the train two days after I had expected Chester and thought how young he seemed. He soon informed me that he was not Chester but Jens Bosen of Ogden. You see, young Jens was born on March 27 and his mother wanted to name him after some famous man born on the same day, so she looked in the almanac, but no great man had a birthday on that date. But she did find it was the anniversary of the battle of Vera Cruze , so she called him Jens Cruze Bosen.

Birth name notwithstanding, Bosen and/or his parents decided well before his professional stage debut to anglicize at least his given name, as evidenced by the impassioned 8th grade commencement speech he delivered, as James Bosen, at Ogden's Central School in June 1898.
Cruze was first married to a fellow Latter Day Saint, identity unknown, circa 1901 until her death in 1907; they had five children. By no later than 1914, he had married actress Marguerite Snow, and they had a daughter, Julie Jane. They divorced in 1923. He married actress Betty Compson on October 14, 1924; they were divorced in 1930. He married Alberta Beatrice McCoy in June 1941, and they were still wed when he died.

Career

Cruze acted in, directed and or produced over 100 films, mainly during the silent era. His first known acting job was at Lubin Manufacturing Company in 1910. He started at Thanhouser Company in 1911 with She, which is where the majority of his body of work was produced, much of it as the leading man.
After leaving Thanhouser in 1916, he worked for several other companies as director and producer. He became a major director when his 1923 Paramount Pictures production The Covered Wagon became a smash success. This expensive Western was filmed under rugged outdoor conditions, lending Cruze's scenes a realism and stature not seen in routine Saturday-matinee Westerns. Cruze became one of Paramount's top directors, and in 1926 he scored another success with the seagoing saga Old Ironsides, with large-scale action scenes filmed in an experimental widescreen process.

Turning point

When the new sound films replaced silent films, Cruze—then an important enough name to command respect in the industry—became a partner in an ambitious independent film company, Sono Art-World Wide Pictures. Its first production, produced and directed by Cruze, was a musical, The Great Gabbo. In typical Cruze fashion it was an epic musical, with elaborate musical pageants filmed in color. The storyline was much too heavy and macabre for a light musical, however: a crazed ventriloquist falls in love with a dancer who loves another, and the ventriloquist's dummy takes on a life of its own, advising and taunting his master.
The Great Gabbo fell far short of expectations at the boxoffice and Cruze, now on the Sono Art staff, found himself directing the company's routine, low-budget melodramas.
Cruze left Sono Art when the company reorganized in 1932, and sought work at his former home studio, Paramount. He was given a chance to direct one sequence in the omnibus feature If I Had a Million. Cruze was battling a problem with alcohol abuse, and the assignment did not lead to further employment. Will Rogers offered him work directing two of the Rogers features at Fox, and the association might have continued had Rogers not died in a plane crash in 1935.
Carl Laemmle, president of Universal Pictures, loved action Westerns and he wanted to make a big outdoor spectacle, along the lines of the well remembered The Covered Wagon. Laemmle hired Cruze for a new film, Sutter's Gold, chronicling the California gold rush of 1849. The studio assembled a "name" cast of popular character players including Edward Arnold, Lee Tracy, Harry Carey, and Binnie Barnes. Unfortunately neither the studio nor the film had any big "star" names to attract moviegoers, and—dooming the project—Laemmle had given director Cruze carte blanche to make the film and Cruze spent money lavishly, as was his custom in the silent days. The expenditure was too lavish for the budget-conscious Universal, and the no-star spectacle failed disastrously. Sutter's Gold damaged James Cruze's standing irreparably and it ruined Universal. A consortium of investors ousted Carl Laemmle and took over the company. The only real benefit Universal derived from Sutter's Gold was its value as stock footage; Cruze's carefully staged outdoor scenes were often edited into the studio's low-budget adventures, Westerns, and serials.
Cruze, with the notoriety of the Sutter's Gold fiasco haunting his career, found work at Republic Pictures, a "budget" independent studio specializing in action and Western fare. Cruze directed four undistinguished features there in 1937 and 1938. His Republic contract was not renewed, which brought an end to James Cruze's career. During his decline he descended further into alcoholism, and he spent the last four years of his life unemployed. His fortunes had a temporary lift when he remarried in 1941, but his happiness was short-lived and he died by his own hand on August 3, 1942, at his home in Hollywood, California, aged 58. His cremated remains are interred at Hollywood Forever Cemetery.

Filmography

As director

The Wrong Road Sutter's Gold Two-Fisted David Harum Helldorado Mr. Skitch with Will RogersI Cover the Waterfront with Claudette ColbertWashington Merry-Go-Round with Lee TracyIf I Had a Million 8 directors; Cruze directed segment with Gene Raymond and Frances DeeSalvation Nell based on the play by Edward SheldonOnce a Gentleman The Great Gabbo with Erich von Stroheim and Betty CompsonA Man's Man with William HainesThe Duke Steps Out The Mating Call produced by Howard Hughes starring Thomas Meighan, Evelyn Brent, and Renée Adorée The City Gone Wild with Louise Brooks—lost filmOld Ironsides partly filmed in experimental widescreen process MagnascopeMannequin with Alice Joyce, Warner Baxter, Dolores CostelloThe Pony Express Beggar on Horseback based on the play by George S. Kaufman and Marc ConnellyWelcome Home with Lois WilsonMerton of the Movies based on the novel by Harry Leon Wilson and the play by Kaufman and ConnellyThe [City That Never Sleeps (film)|The City That Never Sleeps] The Enemy Sex The Fighting Coward with Cullen Landis, Mary AstorThe Covered Wagon Hollywood lost filmRuggles of Red Gap To the Ladies One Glorious Day with Will RogersThe Dictator with Wallace Reid, Lila LeeLeap Year with Fatty ArbuckleCrazy to Marry with ArbuckleGasoline Gus with ArbuckleThe Dollar-a-Year Man with ArbuckleThe Fast Freight with ArbuckleThe Charm School with Wallace ReidThirty Days with Reid and HawleyFood for Scandal An Adventure in Hearts with Robert WarwickHawthorne of the U.S.A. with ReidThe [Valley of the Giants (1919 film)|The Valley of the Giants] with ReidYou're Fired with Reid and Wanda HawleyThe Roaring Road with Reid

As actor

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde The Covered Wagon .... Indian The Slave Market Johnny Get Your Gun .... The Duke of BullconiaUnder the Top .... 'Foxy' StillmoreThe Source .... LangloisLess Than Kin .... JinxThe City of Dim Faces .... Wing LungBelieve Me, Xantippe .... Simp CallowayWild Youth .... Li ChooThe Hidden Pearls .... Koro LeonNan of Music Mountain .... Gale MorganThe Call of the East .... JanzoOn the Level .... OzmunWhat Money Can't Buy .... Ferdinand VaslofThe Web of Life .... Tom WilsonHer Temptation .... Walton MaynardThe Snowbird .... Bruce MitchellArmstrong's Wife .... Harvey ArnoldHis Guardian Auto The Patriot and the Spy .... PietroThe Heart of the Princess Marsari Zudora .... Hassam Ali/Jim Baird, Reporter From Wash to Washington The Million Dollar Mystery .... Jim NortonRivalry A Dog of Flanders A Debut in the Secret Service The Cat's Paw The Desert Tribesman Cardinal Richelieu's Ward .... RichelieuA Leak in the Foreign Office Joseph in the Land of Egypt .... JosephWhy Reginald Reformed The Woman Pays The Adventures of a Diplomatic Freelance Frou Frou .... Comte Paul de ValreasThe Legend of Provence .... Sir HenryThe Silver-Tongued Orator The Plot Against the Governor A Daughter Worth While Moths .... Undetermined Name, villainRobin Hood The Message to Headquarters The Ward of the King An Unromantic Maiden Tannhäuser The Lost Combination The Snare of Fate Marble Heart .... RaphaelHer Sister's Secret Rosie's Revenge The Woman Who Did Not Care Cymbeline .... LeonatusFor Her Boy's Sake Her Gallant Knights The Idol of the Hour Good Morning, Judge The Dove in the Eagle's Nest .... The EagleThe Tiniest of Stars .... The MusicianA Poor Relation When Ghost Meets Ghost A Militant Suffragette .... John Strong, Mary's FiancéThe Star of Bethlehem .... Micah, JosephThe Other Half .... The FatherThe Forest Rose .... Albert as an Older Man, Rose's LoverThe Thunderbolt .... The Dishonest BrokerCross Your Heart .... The Little Boy Grown UpThe Ladder of Life Put Yourself in His Place .... Edith's HusbandIn a Garden .... Jack, as an AdultThe [Woman in White (1912 film)|The Woman in White] .... Sir PercivalWhen Mercy Tempers Justice .... The Impoverished FatherMiss Robinson Crusoe .... Miss Crusoe's Rescuer and LoverLetters of a Lifetime .... A Dying BachelorBut the Greatest of These Is Charity .... The Rich FatherUndine .... Huldbrand, the KnightLucile .... Lord AlfredBaby Hands .... The HusbandThe Finger of Scorn .... The MinisterNursie and the Knight .... The FatherPa's Medicine .... The DoctorUnder Two Flags Called Back .... Gilbert VaughnWhom God Hath Joined .... The HusbandThe Ring of a Spanish Grandee Jess .... Captain John NeilLove's Miracle .... The Convict/LoverMiss Arabella Snaith .... Harry Hargreaves, NovelistThe Cry of the Children .... The working fatherRejuvenation .... The MillionaireInto the Desert .... The ArabA Love of Long Ago The Girl of the Grove For Sale—A Life .... The Wealthy Young Clubmanhe Golf Caddie's Dog .... The LoverFlying to Fortune .... The Daughter's SweetheartThe Arab's Bride .... The Wealthy MoorOn Probation East Lynne .... Archibald CarlyleDr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde .... Dr. Jekyll / Mr. HydeShe .... Leo Vincey / KallikratesBrother Bob's Baby .... Bob's BrotherBeneath the Veil .... The ArtistA Mother's Faith .... The Errant SonThe Last of the Mohicans .... UncasThe Higher Law A Boy of the Revolution Back to Nature