Lambert Hillyer

Lambert Hillyer (July 8, 1893 – July 5, 1969) was an American film director and screenwriter. He is best known today for his many western features, his horror films The Invisible Ray and Dracula's Daughter, and the first Batman serial.

Biography Lambert Harwood Hillyer was born July 8, 1893, in Tyner, Indiana (his 1946 résumé amended this to South Bend, Indiana). His mother was character actress Lydia Knott. A graduate of Drake College, he worked as a newspaper reporter and short-story writer, then as an actor in vaudeville and stock theater. During World War I he began working in motion pictures with the Mutual company. He began his career as a director with Paramount-Artcraft, then First National, Goldwyn, and Fox. He became a specialist in westerns, working on many silent features starring William S. Hart, Buck Jones, Tom Mix, and others.

Hillyer expanded into romantic melodramas and crime films in the 1920s. In 1936 he directed two chillers for Universal, the science-fiction film The Invisible Ray and the cult horror film Dracula's Daughter.

He directed many features for Columbia Pictures in the 1930s and early 1940s. Some were major productions like The Defense Rests (1935) with Jack Holt and Jean Arthur, but most were low-budget action features. In 1940 he was assigned to Columbia's Charles Starrett westerns, including The Durango Kid (1940), which later inspired a popular series. When Starrett left the studio temporarily, Hillyer was reassigned to the Bill Elliott series, which he directed through 1942. One of Hillyer's most famous credits is the Batman serial (1943), which was memorable enough to be re-released in 1954, 1962, and 1965. The 1965 revival inspired the very successful Batman TV series.

After his tenure with Columbia ended in 1943, Hillyer moved to RKO Radio Pictures briefly, where he directed a Tim Holt western and a pair of two-reel comedies with Leon Errol. Hillyer then began a six-year association with Monogram Pictures, first with the Sam Katzman crime story Smart Guy and then a series with the studio's newest cowboy star Johnny Mack Brown. Hillyer also directed Monogram's other western leads Jimmy Wakely and Whip Wilson.

Television Like many directors who were accustomed to low budgets and speedy schedules, Lambert Hillyer made a smooth transition to the new field of television. He directed 40 episodes of the syndicated Western The Cisco Kid. Hillyer also directed seven episodes of Highway Patrol, which starred Broderick Crawford. His last assignment came in 1957, a single episode of the secret-agent show The Man Called X, under the pseudonym Lambert Hill.

Hillyer died July 5, 1969, in Los Angeles, California.

Filmography Director

Year Title Notes 1917 Also screenwriter 1917 Strife 1941 The Pinto Kid 1941 Second-unit director 1941 North from the Lone Star 1941 Hands Across the Rockies 1941 1941 Also screenwriter 1941 Thunder Over the Prairie 1941 King of Dodge City 1941 Prairie Stranger 1941 Roaring Frontiers 1941 The Royal Mounted Patrol} 1942 The Devil's Trail 1942 North of the Rockies 1942 Prairie Gunsmoke 1942 Vengeance of the West 1943 Fighting Frontier 1943 Bombardier Aerial action sequences (uncredited) 1943 The Stranger from Pecos 1943 Six Gun Gospel 1943 Smart Guy 1943 ''The Texas Kid 1943 Batman 15-part serial 1944 Partners of the Trail 1944 Law Men 1944 Range Law 1944 West of the Rio Grande 1944 Land of the Outlaws 1944 Ghost Guns 1945 Beyond the Pecos 1945 Flame of the West 1945 Stranger from Santa Fe 1945 South of the Rio Grande 1945 The Lost Trail 1945 Frontier Feud 1946 Border Bandits 1946 Under Arizona Skies 1946 The Gentleman from Texas 1946 Silver Range 1946 Trigger Fingers 1946 Shadows on the Range 1947 Raiders of the South 1947 Valley of Fear 1947 Land of the Lawless 1947 The Law Comes to Gunsight 1947 Trailing Danger 1947 The Hat Box Mystery 1947 The Case of the Baby Sitter 1947 Flashing Guns 1947 Gun Talk 1948 Overland Trails 1948 Song of the Drifter 1948 Oklahoma Blues 1948 Crossed Trails 1948 Partners of the Sunset 1948 Frontier Agent 1948 Range Renegades 1948 The Fighting Ranger 1948 The Sheriff of Medicine Bow 1948 Outlaw Brand 1948 Sundown Riders 1949 Gun Runner 1949 Gun Law Justice 1949 Trails End 1949 Haunted Trails 1949 Riders of the Dusk 1949 Range Land

Screenwriter

In addition to writing screenplays for many of the films he directed, as noted above, Hillyer wrote or contributed to the screenplays for these motion pictures. Year Title Notes 1917 They're Off 1917 1917 1917 1917 Love or Justice 1917 The Snarl 1917 One Shot Ross 1917 1921 1930 Hide-Out 1933 Straightaway 1933 State Trooper 1935 Law Beyond the Range 1937 1938 Highway Patrol 1939 Parents on Trial 1939