Roy Barcroft was an American character actor famous for playing villains in B-Westerns and other genres. From 1937 to 1957, he appeared in more than 300 films for Republic Pictures. Film criticLeonard Maltin acclaimed Barcroft as "Republic Pictures' number one bad guy".
Background
Barcroft was born to a farming family in Crab Orchard, Nebraska, in 1902. In 1917, at the age of 15, he joined the United States Army during World War I to fight in France, where he was wounded in action. After leaving the military, he drifted through several jobs before reenlisting and being stationed in Hawaii. After leaving the Army for the second time, he played clarinet and saxophone for dance bands around Chicago until he and his family moved to Los Angeles in 1929.
Career
In 1929, he moved to California and worked as an extra and as a salesman. He was discovered while acting in an amateur theatre production, a hobby which he took up to improve his speaking voice as a salesman. He appeared in the film serialsFlash Gordon, The President's Mystery, and S.O.S. Coast Guard. He worked for many different studios in the years that followed until 1943, when he signed an exclusive 10-year contract with Republic. Under this contract, he starred in almost 150 films and film serials, becoming instantly recognized as the villain to the audiences of the day. His career slowed with the decline of B-Westerns, but he found work in television and B-movies during the 1950s and 1960s. From 1954 to 1956, Barcroft appeared in different roles in eight episodes of the syndicated western series Annie Oakley. He also played the bit role of the marshal in the 1955 film adaptation of Oklahoma!. That same year he appeared as the Marshal in the western movieThe Spoilers. Between 1955 and 1957 he played Col. Jim Logan, the kindly owner of the Triple-R Boys' Ranch, in the serial Spin and Marty, seen on television's Mickey Mouse Club. A DVD version of the 1955 season,, was released in 2005 as part of the Walt Disney Treasures series. On May 23, 1961, Barcroft played Doc Longley in the episode "Badge of the Outsider" on the television western series Laramie, playing a retired outlaw framed for the murder of the deputy sheriff in Laramie. Barcroft was cast in the 1967 episode "Halo for a Badman" of the syndicated western series, Death Valley Days, as the mayor of Las Animas, Colorado. The Internet Movie Data Base records 365 roles throughout his career, including the syndicated Sheriff of Cochise with John Bromfield, the CBS military sitcom/drama Hennesey, starring Jackie Cooper, and NBC's National Velvet, Riverboat, and Empire. In the film-focused newspaper Classic Images, Laura Wagner wrote that Barcroft's work as a voice actor is often overlooked. She commented, "Barcroft can be heard in movies and on TV as narrators, radio operators, announcers, and various stray voices." In marked contrast to his villainous movie persona, Barcroft off-screen "had a reputation as one of the nicest guys in Hollywood," said Leonard Maltin in 2005.
Personal life
Barcroft married Vera Thompson in 1932, and they had two children.
