His First Command

William Boyd -- in the days before he donned the cowboy hat of Hopalong Cassidy -- joins the army in this lost pre-Code classic!

Terry Culver is a womanizing playboy who always gets what he wants. That is, until he meets Judy Gaylord, the daughter of a colonel in the U.S. cavalry. She only dates military men, and thinks Terry is a worthless idler. To impress the gorgeous girl, he enlists in her father's regiment, but quickly finds that the life of a soldier is harder than playing polo. Vowing to take his new vocation seriously, Terry sees a chance to win Judy's heart when the cavalry is called into action. But the pampered playboy may not be cut out for the battlefield...

His First Command is a notable non-Western role for William Boyd (1895-1972). Years before he became Hopalong Cassidy, the actor was a popular romantic leading man in features as diverse as Cecil B. DeMille's The Volga Boatman (1926) and D.W. Griffith's Lady of the Pavements (1929). His dramatic career was derailed when newspapers mistakenly ran a picture of him to report the arrest of another actor with the same name, William "Stage" Boyd in 1931. Released from his studio contract, he struggled to find work until he was cast as Clarence E. Mulford's cowboy character in Hop-Along Cassidy (1935). During the filming of His First Command, Boyd became involved with his leading lady, Dorothy Sebastian, despite still being married to Elinor Fair, his co-star in The Volga Boatman. Sebastian had just played Joan Crawford's best friend in the movie that made Crawford a household name, the racy Our Dancing Daughters (1928). After obtaining a divorce from Fair, Boyd married Sebastian in December of 1930. Director Gregory La Cava started as an animator, working with Walter Lantz on the WWI-era 'Katzenjammer Kids' cartoons. He switched to live action two-reel short comedies in the 1920s, and by the time talkies rolled around, he had become a skilled director of features. He was nominated for an Academy Award for My Man Godfrey (1936) and Stage Door (1937). Also appearing in His First Command is Gavin Gordon, remembered for playing Lord Byron in the prologue of The Bride of Frankenstein (1935). Decades later, he was the villain in another horror film, The Bat (1959).