Robust-looking character actress Alice Fleming, a Broadway veteran, enjoyed much success as the Duchess, William Elliott's aunt in Republic Pictures' popular "Red Ryder" Westerns. Incredibly popular at the time, especially with children, the "Red Ryder" films arguably constituted the studio's best-produced non-singing cowboy series, in no small measure due to a charming supporting cast that also included Bobby Blake (later Robert Blake) as Elliott's Indian sidekick Little Beaver. Alice Fleming left the series after three seasons in 1946 and was replaced by Martha Wentworth (who in turn was replaced by Marin Sais in a final series of films for low-budget Eagle-Lion). Decades earlier, Fleming appeared in several silent films, usually playing young society matrons. Most notable, perhaps, was His Greatest Sacrifice (1921), in which she played William Farnum's coldhearted and ambitious wife.
by Hans J. Wollstein
biography
