''Stars In My Crown'' is a 1950

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

film directed by

Jacques Tourneur Jacques Tourneur (; November 12, 1904 – December 19, 1977) was a French film director known for the classic film noir ''Out of the Past'' and a series of low-budget horror films he made for RKO Studios, including ''Cat People (1942 film), Cat ...

and starring

Joel McCrea Joel Albert McCrea (November 5, 1905 – October 20, 1990) was an American actor whose career spanned a wide variety of genres over almost five decades, including comedy, drama, romance, thrillers, adventures, and Westerns, for which he bec ...

as a preacher whose faith tames an unruly town by inspiring the townspeople to change. It was based on the 1947 novel of the same name by Joe David Brown.

Plot

Shortly after the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

, preacher Josiah Gray (Joel McCrea) arrives in the town of Walesburg. He heads straight for the saloon to give his first sermon. When the patrons laugh at him, he pulls out two guns, cowing the men into listening. Amanda Blake in Stars in My Crown trailer

Amanda Blake in Stars in My Crown trailer

Josiah settles in and becomes a well-respected member of the community. The people build a church. He marries Harriet (

Ellen Drew Ellen Drew (born Esther Loretta Ray; November 23, 1914 – December 3, 2003) was an American film actress. Early life Drew, born in Kansas City, Missouri in 1914, was the daughter of an Irish-born barber. She had a younger brother, Arden. Her ...

) and raises her orphan nephew John (

Dean Stockwell Robert Dean Stockwell (March 5, 1936 – November 7, 2021) was an American actor with a career spanning seven decades. As a child actor under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, he first came to the public's attention in films including ''Anchors A ...

). (The story is narrated by

Marshall Thompson James Marshall Thompson (November 27, 1925 – May 18, 1992) was an American film and television actor. Early years Thompson was born in Peoria, Illinois. He and his parents, Dr. and Mrs. Laurence B. Thompson, moved to California when he was a ...

, as an adult John.) When the beloved Dr. Harris, Sr. (

Lewis Stone Lewis Shepard Stone (November 15, 1879 – September 12, 1953) was an American film actor. He spent 29 years as a contract player at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer and was best known for his portrayal of Judge James Hardy in the studio's popular ''Andy H ...

) dies, his place is taken by his son (James Mitchell), but the younger, unreligious man is not well-liked and wants to leave Walesburg. He falls in love with the schoolteacher, Faith Samuels (Amanda Blake). She is reluctant to marry him, as he insists on moving away. John comes down with

typhoid Typhoid fever, also known as typhoid, is a disease caused by '' Salmonella'' serotype Typhi bacteria. Symptoms vary from mild to severe, and usually begin six to 30 days after exposure. Often there is a gradual onset of a high fever over several ...

. Dr. Harris, Jr. warns Josiah to stay away from others, to avoid spreading the disease, but Josiah ignores him and soon, others are stricken, including Faith. When Harris blames Josiah, his faith is shaken; he closes the church and withdraws from the community. John recovers and discovers the cause was tainted well water. Harris's work on behalf of his patients forges a bond between him and Walesburg. When it seems Faith is dying, Harris summons the preacher. Josiah's prayers are answered; Faith recovers, and the man of science and the man of faith are reconciled. Josiah is tested again. Leading businessman Lon Backett (

Ed Begley Edward James Begley Sr. (March 25, 1901 – April 28, 1970) was an American actor of theatre, radio, film, and television. He won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in the film ''Sweet Bird of Youth'' (1962) and ...

) wants to buy the land of

freed slave A freedman or freedwoman is a formerly enslaved person who has been released from slavery, usually by legal means. Historically, enslaved people were freed by manumission (granted freedom by their captor-owners), emancipation (granted freedom a ...

Uncle Famous Prill (

Juano Hernandez Juano G. "Juano" Hernández (July 19, 1896 – July 17, 1970) was a Puerto Rican stage and film actor who was a pioneer in the African American film industry. He made his silent picture debut in ''The Life of General Villa'', and talking pi ...

). He needs the

mica Micas ( ) are a group of silicate minerals whose outstanding physical characteristic is that individual mica crystals can easily be split into extremely thin elastic plates. This characteristic is described as perfect basal cleavage. Mica is ...

deposit to keep his mine in operation, but Uncle Famous refuses to sell. The out-of-work miners trample the old man's crops and scatter his livestock, yet he stubbornly holds out, and is given an ultimatum: get out or else. Josiah declines the armed assistance of his old war buddy, Jed Isbell ( Alan Hale), and his sons (including an uncredited

James Arness James Arness (born James King Aurness; May 26, 1923 – June 3, 2011) was an American actor, best known for portraying Marshal Matt Dillon for 20 years in the CBS television series '' Gunsmoke''. Arness has the distinction of having played the ...

), and waits with Uncle Famous for the

lynch Lynch may refer to: Places Australia * Lynch Island, South Orkney Islands, Antarctica * Lynch Point, Marie Byrd Land, Antarctica * Lynch's Crater, Queensland, Australia England * River Lynch, Hertfordshire * The Lynch, an island in the River ...

mob to show up in their

Ku Klux Klan The Ku Klux Klan (), commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan, is an American white supremacist, right-wing terrorist, and hate group whose primary targets are African Americans, Jews, Latinos, Asian Americans, Native Americans, and ...

costumes. Josiah offers no resistance, but asks the mob to first listen to him read Uncle Famous's will. With each item, he reminds the beneficiary of the old man's past kindness to that individual. Shamed, the mob disperses, with Lon Backett leading the way. Afterwards, John picks up the pages Josiah had read and, seeing nothing written on them, says it's not a will. Josiah replies, "It's the will of God."

Cast

as Josiah Doziah Gray *

as Harriet Gray *

as John Kenyon *

as Uncle Famous Prill *

Alan Hale, Sr. Alan Hale Sr. (born Rufus Edward Mackahan; February 10, 1892 – January 22, 1950) was an American actor and director. He is best remembered for his many character roles, in particular as a frequent sidekick of Errol Flynn, as well as f ...

as Jed Isbell *

as Dr. Daniel Kalbert Harris, Sr. * James Mitchell as Dr. Daniel Kalbert Harris, Jr. * Amanda Blake as Faith Radmore Samuels. (Blake and

were reunited five years later as the stars of the long-running television western ''

Gunsmoke ''Gunsmoke'' is an American radio and television Western drama series created by director Norman Macdonnell and writer John Meston. It centers on Dodge City, Kansas, in the 1870s, during the settlement of the American West. The central character ...

''.) *

Charles Kemper Charles Kemper (September 6, 1900 – May 12, 1950) was an American character actor born in Oklahoma. The heavy-set actor was for decades a successful stage actor. Movie career Like many actors in New York, Kemper worked in short comedies fil ...

as Professor Sam Houston Jones, a good-natured

medicine show Medicine shows were touring acts (traveling by truck, horse, or wagon teams) that peddled "miracle cure" patent medicines and other products between various entertainments. They developed from European mountebank shows and were common in the Unit ...

huckster *

Connie Gilchrist Rose Constance Gilchrist (July 17, 1895 – March 3, 1985) was an American stage, film, and television actress. Among her screen credits are her roles in the Hollywood productions '' Cry 'Havoc (1943), ''A Letter to Three Wives'' (1949), ...

as Sarah Isbell *

as Lon Backett * Jack Lambert as Perry Lokey *

Arthur Hunnicutt Arthur Lee Hunnicutt (February 17, 1910 – September 26, 1979) was an American actor known for his portrayal of wise, grizzled, and old rural characters. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in ...

as Chloroform Wiggins *

Philo McCullough Philo McCullough (June 16, 1893 – June 5, 1981) was an American actor. He appeared in more than 250 films between 1914 and 1969. He was born in San Bernardino, California, and died in Burbank, California. McCullough's film debut came in 1 ...

as Townsman (uncredited)

Reception

Critical response

According to MGM records the film earned $1,962,000 in the US and Canada and $184,000 overseas, resulting in a profit of $225,000. In 1998,

Jonathan Rosenbaum Jonathan Rosenbaum (born February 27, 1943) is an American film critic and author. Rosenbaum was the head film critic for ''The Chicago Reader'' from 1987 to 2008, when he retired. He has published and edited numerous books about cinema and has ...

of the ''

Chicago Reader The ''Chicago Reader'', or ''Reader'' (stylized as ЯEADER), is an American alternative weekly newspaper in Chicago, Illinois, noted for its literary style of journalism and coverage of the arts, particularly film and theater. It was founded by a ...

'' included the film in his unranked list of the best American films not included on the AFI Top 100. ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' in its review wrote: "Mr. McCrea gives the picture an impeccable performance whether praying at the bedside of a dying person or brandishing his two guns in a saloon to command attention while he reads from the Bible. Ellen Drew is fine as his wife; Juano Hernandez is excellent as the aged Negro, and Dean Stockwell, the late Alan Hale, James Mitchell and Amanda Blake head a supporting cast that is uniformly very good. With the help of a screenplay by Margaret Fitts and the direction of Jacques Tourneur ''Stars In My Crown'' has become a real cinematic treasure."

Release

Home media

''Stars In My Crown'' was released on VHS on April 25, 1994, by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment for

MGM Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc., also known as Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures and abbreviated as MGM, is an American film, television production, distribution and media company owned by Amazon through MGM Holdings, founded on April 17, 1924 a ...

under their contract agreement. The film was released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

on April 18, 2011, by

MGM Home Entertainment Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Home Entertainment LLC ( d/b/a MGM Home Entertainment and formerly known as MGM Home Video, MGM/CBS Home Video and MGM/UA Home Video) is the home video division of the American media company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. History ...

. ''Stars In My Crown'' was

remaster Remaster refers to changing the quality of the sound or of the image, or both, of previously created recordings, either audiophonic, cinematic, or videographic. The terms digital remastering and digitally remastered are also used. Mastering A ...

ed on DVD on September 18, 2018, by

Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures Entertainment Studios, Inc., also known as Allen Media Group, is an American media and entertainment company based in Los Angeles. Owned and founded in 1993 by businessman Byron Allen, the company was initially involved in the production and d ...

References

External links

* * * * {{Jacques Tourneur 1950 films 1950 Western (genre) films American Western (genre) films American black-and-white films 1950s English-language films Films scored by Adolph Deutsch Films about religion Films based on American novels Films based on Western (genre) novels Films directed by Jacques Tourneur Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films 1950s American films