Long before Fast & Furious and Fury Road, there was Fury! This wild black stallion not only taught morality to a generation of Saturday morning television viewers, he went on to be the highest grossing animal star after Lassie!
“This is the range country where the pounding hooves of untamed horses still thunder in mountains, meadows and canyons. Every herd has its own leader, but there is only one Fury – Fury, King of the Wild Stallions. And here in the wild west of today, hard-riding men still battle the open range for a living – men like Jim Newton, owner of the Broken Wheel Ranch and Pete, his top hand, who says he cut his teeth on a branding iron.”
A very colourful introduction to a black and white TV series.
Every Saturday morning Fury (1955-1960, NBC) was watched by tens of thousands of eager young viewers. These were “wholesome” 30-minute westerns with simple storylines promoting moral and ethical values (the total antithesis to Inglourious Basterds!).
The wife and son of widower (Jim Newton) had been killed by a drunk driver. Newton, who owned a ranch, adopted an orphan boy (Joey) who had been wrongly accused of a minor crime. At the ranch, Joey developed a close relationship with Fury. The horse felt the same about the boy and wouldn’t let anyone else ride him unless Joey said it was okay. Each episode involved a person getting into trouble for doing something bad who would then be saved by Fury. There was a definite attempt to teach the kids what was and was not acceptable behaviour.
It is not documented whether all Fury fans grew up to be squeaky-clean citizens; what we do know is that they were glued to their televisions every week because each episode featured a beautiful black American Saddlebred.
The horse was the star, the humans merely secondary players. He was discovered by Hollywood animal trainer, Ralph McCutcheon, on a farm in Missouri when he was 18 months old. His real name was Highland Dale, by Liberty Dale out of Marian Highland.
McCutcheon, who nicknamed him ‘Beaut’, used “positive reinforcement” to train the stallion, teaching him such things as playing dead, walking lame, untying knots, hitting a mark and whinnying on command.
SCENE STEALER
In 1946, Beaut was cast as the title lead in Twentieth Century Fox’s Black Beauty, where he was required to open doors with his mouth, poke his head into windows and be chased by motorcyclists. (Very unfairly, McCutcheon’s name never appeared in the movie’s credits). The stallion was, undoubtedly, the best performer in this very ordinary picture bristling with cringeworthy acting and sickly background music.
He played a number of bit parts in movies requiring scenes with a black horse, and then had a big break starring in Giant opposite Elizabeth Taylor, Rock Hudson and James Dean. His final heartbreaking appearance in this Oscar-winning epic consisted of limping up to Taylor’s farmhouse on three legs and whinnying softly – he stole the scene. The role cemented him as the biggest horse star of the decade with studios insuring him for over a quarter of a million dollars.
Now known to moviegoers around the country, his fame grew even larger after he was cast as the lead in NBC’s TV series. From then on the world knew him as Fury. Two episodes a week were produced, budgeted at $25,000 per show with $1,500 going to the horse plus 5% of the show’s profits.
Regularly playing opposite him were Peter Graves, as ranch owner Jim Newton, and Bobby Diamond as orphan Joey. It was reported that Graves found Fury “an excellent series for kids and families”, although he was “disappointed” when he found out the show, originally planned for prime-time screening, was being scheduled for Saturday mornings. “But looking back I realise what an important little production it was. We taught kids about animals, life, parental authority, growing up – basic values we sometimes lose sight of,” Graves recalls.
AUSSIE CONNECTION
After finishing Fury, Graves came to Australia to make Whiplash, a series to be screened in the evenings by Network Seven, loosely based on Cobb & Co, the famous Australian stagecoach company. Most episodes were written by Americans – and that was a problem. (It was rumoured that one script called for “a herd of stampeding sheep”!)
“It could have been so much better,” the actor would later declare. “It was kept in the mould of an American show because there was no time for proper research and production planning. Those writers should have gone down to Australia and really studied the Cobb & Co era. Not enough was made of the country itself; we were too often confined to the backlot.”
(Trivia: The series’ horsemaster was Lionel Ware, grandfather of Grahame Ware Jr, who was featured in EQL’s ‘The Saddle Club’ story, November 2020).
Bobby Diamond, Fury’s juvenile lead Joey, was 11 when he landed the job. His ambitious stage mother, Pearl, was thrilled. When he was eight she had pushed him and his younger brother into performing a tap-dancing act so they could enter talent contests at supermarket openings. Working for NBC was certainly a step up. Diamond earned $350 an episode, which gradually increased to $750, half the amount paid to Fury.
“I loved it – filming all day at a movie ranch in LA was nothing but play all summer; I got to be with horses and have fun. I fell off a few times but I never got hurt.” Diamond could ride before beginning the series, no doubt encouraged by his assertive mother, “but I improved a lot during the show as I’d ride every day whether we were shooting or not”.
TALK TO ANIMALS
Graves credits all the stallion’s talent to trainer Ralph McCutcheon. “He was one of those few people who could talk to animals. “He’d be off camera and say, ‘Beaut, go grab the boy by his shirt, pull him backwards’ and he’d do just that.”
Like all movie stars, Fury had doubles. Four black ones did long shots, and a stand-in was used when there were lengthy passages of dialogue requiring the horse to stand very still. During these takes the star would be led from the set, have a roll in the sand or a bite to eat. For most of his life he suffered from “the heaves”, and because this asthmatic condition was triggered by dusty hay his feed was always dampened down.
After the series finished he went on to other jobs, but 16-year-old Diamond found it difficult to get work. He landed a variety of small parts in Wagon Train, Twilight Zone and Mr Ed, and came close to playing Robin in the Batman TV series, but the producer told him he was too old at 21 and gave the role to Burt Ward.
Diamond went on to study law and became an attorney in California. He is quoted as saying: “The Vietnam draft was staring me in the face. I wasn’t sure if I really wanted to be a lawyer, but it was a good way to stay in the US and remain alive.”
‘Beaut’ worked well into his 20s with guest roles in Rin Tin Tin, Bonanza and The Monkees before retiring at McCutcheon’s Sand Canyon Ranch in Santa Clarita, California. He died in 1973 aged 29.
By the time he retired he ranked second only to Lassie in net earnings by an animal actor (The Lassie character had a 30-year run in Hollywood, played by seven generations of male collies trained by a man with the brilliant name of Rudd Weatherwax. Male collies were always used because they were considered to have more stamina and more luxurious coats than bitches).
Fury was syndicated from 1959 under the title Brave Stallion and to this day episodes are being screened on classic TV networks and streaming services such as Stirr.
When it comes to feel-good horse pictures, there will always be an audience.
Next month in Equestrian Life’s Horses & Movies: ‘Dream Horse’ starring Toni Collette, presently screening in Australia. EQ
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