The Movies of DeForest Kelley

[Komack]

After spending the summer watching all original TOS episodes, my children have fallen in love with DeForest Kelley. They would like to rent some of the movies in which De Kelley performed. Any suggestions?

 

[Orac]

Besides the Star Trek movies the only other film I've seen him in is Night of the Lepu's.

Apparently he was in a few other films and TV shows too though, here's a link to his filmography on imdb.com: link

 

[Melakon]

Gunfight at the OK Corral (1957)
Burt Lancaster is Wyatt Earp, Kirk Douglas as Doc Holliday. Earl Holliman as a Deputy, Dennis Hopper as Billy Clanton, and DeForest Kelley as Morgan Earp. Also, Whit Bissell (from Trouble With Tribbles) as the newspaper editor, Martin Milner (of Route 66 & Adam 12), Lee Van Cleef as Ed Bailey, and ugly one-eyed Jack Elam as Tom McClowery.

Kelley's part isn't that large I believe, but he's in the big showdown.

And then you could show the kids Spectre of the Gun.

 

[bbailey861]

^ Great idea and a wonderful segue.

 

[J.T.B.]

"Gunfight" is a great one to start with.

As you can see from IMDb, Kelley was mostly a TV actor, and predominantly in Westerns. One of his films I am familiar with is Warlock, an excellent movie and a very good example of the '50s "psychological Western" directed by Edward Dmytryk. Henry Fonda plays a mercenary gunman who's hired to protect the town of Warlock from a gang, Anthony Quinn is his partner in sort of a Wyatt Earp-Doc Holiday dynamic, and Richard Widmark is a good guy caught in the middle of everything. Kelley is a member of the bad guy gang, not a very big role but fairly important at one point. TOS guests Frank Gorshin and (big surprise!) Whit Bissell also appear, and if you pay attention you will see Gary Lockwood in the gang as well.

 

[Kinokima]

After spending the summer watching all original TOS episodes, my children have fallen in love with DeForest Kelley. They would like to rent some of the movies in which De Kelley performed. Any suggestions?

Oh wonderful more Deforest Kelley fans

I have been watching a lot of his stuff too.

Just a note not sure how your children will take this but De Kelley primarily played the heavy (especially in Westerns) before he became Doctor McCoy. In fact he was so well known as a villain that originally producers didn't think he could play one of the good guys.

Anyways for a great Deforest movie I highly recommend Warlock. It also stars Henry Fonda and Richard Widmark. What is nice about it is De actually has a real character arc and development which is kind of rare.

He was also in a lot of Tv series. One of my favorites is the Virginian episode Man of Violence which also has Leonard Nimoy in a small role. Again De's character gets some really nice character development. '

Oh and then there is hist first film Fear in the Night. It's a low budget noir, but he is the lead here and only 27.

But really he is in tons of stuff, especially Westerns. Just search for Deforest Kelley on youtube, lots of his stuff is on there. Although keep in mind he was a character actor, not a leading one.

It always amazed me that De was so good at playing villains. Heck even Dr. McCoy was somewhat opposite his nature. From all accounts he was just the sweetest, most down to earth guy. So when I watch De in these roles I am struck by the irony of it.