Wallace MacDonald on AllMovie

After starting his acting career in Canadian summer stock, Nova Scotian Wallace MacDonald enlisted in the British Army during World War I. After the Armistice, MacDonald emigrated to America, where he continued his theatrical career. Making his first film in 1919, MacDonald became a moderately popular leading man, specializing in westerns after 1925. Talkies interrupted his career momentum, but MacDonald made a successful comeback in character roles in the early 1930s. In 1934, MacDonald forsook acting for writing, becoming script supervisor at the newly formed Republic Studios in 1935. One year later, he accepted a writer/producer post at Columbia Pictures. Wallace MacDonald remained a guiding force of Columbia's program westerns until the 1950s, also dabbling in early television work for Columbia's TV subsidiary Screen Gems.