AllMovie

It is only a slight exaggeration to suggest that American screenwriter Houston Branch was responsible for nearly half the medium-budget pictures produced at Warner Bros. It was Branch who wrote the story "Tuna," which was adapted for the screen as Tiger Shark (1932). The plot concerned a menage a trois involving two working men--one older and crippled, one younger--and a beautiful woman. Throughout the 1930s and 1940s, whenever inspiration ran dry in the Warners scenario department (which was often), Tiger Shark would be trotted out and reshaped into a "new" film: Slim (1937) and Manpower (1941) were among the many Warners films that owed their existence to the Tiger Shark formula. After his tenure at Warners, Branch wrote for RKO, Universal and Monogram, remaining with the latter studio through its metamorphosis into Allied Artists. Houston Branch also wrote several novels, one of which, River Lady, served as the basis for a 1947 Yvonne de Carlo vehicle.