GREAT DETECTIVES & PEOPLE OF MYSTERY #50

THE FALCON

Who is the Falcon and who created him?  That's a mystery that hasn't truly been solved in 80 years.  The man who gets the most credit for the creation is Michael Arlen who wrote a 1940 short story "Gay Falcon".  In the story, Gay Stanhope Falcon is a hardboiled character, tall with a long, slim, dark face and deep-set penetrating eyes.  He earns his living by keeping his mouth shut and handling dangerous assignments.  In that short story of 1940 he breaks into the bedroom of beautiful Diana Temple and burglarizes her safe, confident that she will not call the police.  He takes his haul to an insurance company, the officials of which are happy to see the stolen jewelry on which claims of a quarter million dollars have been paid during the past few years.

The other Falcon was created by Drexel Drake (pseudonym of Charles H. Huff) in a 1936 novel "The Falcon's Prey".  His Falcon was Malcolm J. Wingate, a freelance investigator and troubleshooter who took on the underworld.  He avoided the police because the cops tended to blame him for their unsolved crimes.  In Drake's novels Wingate becomes the shadowy Falcon to fight crime.  He's got a long, square-cut face, accentuated by a tall forehead and a long, square chin.  His partner is Steve "Sarge" Hardy, an ex-cop.  Although American, Wingate was educated at Cambridge and left an inheritance when his parents died.  The books are set in NYC even though Sarge and the Falcon meet in London.  Drexel's Falcon consisted of three novels and one short story that all preceded Arlen's version.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The only information I can find about Charles H. Huff (aka Drexel Drake) is that he was born in 1887 and died in 1959.  Michael Arlen (1895-1956) was born in Bulgaria as Dikran Kuyumjian to Armenian parents.  He moved to England as a boy and changed his name, becoming an English citizen.  He became a successful writer, but hated writing.  He spent two years in Hollywood as a screenwriter, producing nothing, and was content in his lack of endeavor.  He wrote nothing for the last ten years of his life and died of cancer in 1956.

The Falcon by Drexel Drake:

1936 novel "The Falcon's Prey"/  1937 novel "The Falcon Cuts In"/  1938 novel "The Falcon Meets a Lady"/  short story "The Falcon Strikes" (American Magazine Nov. 1938)

The Falcon by Michael Arlen:

short story "Gay Falcon" (The Strand Jan. 1940)

FILMS

The screen version of The Falcon is based, reportedly, upon the single Michael Arlen story, even though the portrayal by George Sanders bears no resemblance to the hardboiled character of Gay Stanhope Falcon.  George Sanders had just finished playing The Saint in a series of films for RKO and was now playing The Falcon at RKO, and playing him as a sophisticated adventurer which is how he played The Saint.  This resemblance was not wasted on Leslie Charteris, creator of The Saint, and he sued.  Charteris received an undisclosed settlement.  In the Falcon movies the character's name is changed from Gay Falcon to Gay Lawrence, and was the only American series detective to die on screen - in order to advance the film career of Sanders.  Sanders felt he was limited by the continuing role of the debonair semi-scoundrel.  Gay's brother Tom takes over as the Falcon after Gay's death.  Coincidentally, Sanders' role was assumed by his real-life brother, actor Tom Conway.

"The Gay Falcon" RKO, 1941.  Sanders, Wendy Barrie, Allen Jenkins, Gladys Cooper.  Director: Irving Reis.  The Falcon promises his fiancee not to aid anymore damsels in distress but instead to enter the safe family brokerage firm.  Soon, however, at the behest of a pretty girl, he is in pursuit of jewel thieves who are crashing society balls.  At the end of the film he decides that sleuthing, not marriage, is to his taste.

"A Date with the Falcon" RKO, 1941.  Sanders, Barrie, Jenkins, James Gleason, Mona Maris.  Director: Reis.  The Falcon is about to leave town with another fiancee to meet her family, when he learns that the inventor of an artificial diamond, which cannot be distinguished from the "real thing", has been kidnapped by a gang of criminals.

"The Falcon Takes Over" RKO, 1942.  Sanders, Gleason, Lynn Bari, Helen Gilbert, Ward Bond.  Director: Reis.  Based on Raymond Chandler's 1940 novel "Farewell, My Lovely".  A hulking hood who has just killed a nightclub owner forces the Falcon to find an old girlfriend, named Velma, who has disappeared.

"The Falcon's Brother" RKO, 1942.  Sanders, Tom Conway, Jane Randolph, Don Barclay, George Lewis.  Director: Stanley Logan.  Photographs printed in a magazine are a coded message instructing Nazi agents to assassinate a South American diplomat.  Gay's brother Tom joins him in exposing the spy ring, and when Gay dies heroically at the end of the film, Tom swears that he will carry on his work.

"The Falcon Strikes Back" RKO, 1943.  Conway, Randolph, Harriett Hilliard, Edgar Kennedy, Rita Corday.  Director: Edward Dmytryk.  The Falcon has been knocked unconscious in a cocktail bar - which vanishes, as do some war bonds.  The trail leads to a large country hotel where, while an elaborate puppet performance of "Scheherazade" is staged, several murders occur.

"The Falcon in Danger" RKO, 1943.  Conway, Jean Brooks, Elaine Shepard, Amelita Ward, Ed Gargan.  Director: William Clemens.  A large airliner crash-lands at an airport, but no one is found on board.  The Falcon discovers that a fortune in securities is also missing.

"The Falcon and the Co-eds" RKO, 1943.  Conway, Brooks, Corday, Isabel Jewel.  Director: Clemens.  A complicated case of jealousy and murder unfolds for the Falcon at an exclusive girl's school.

"The Falcon Out West" RKO, 1944.  Conway, Barbara Hale, Carole Gallagher, Joan Barclay, Lyle Talbot.  Director: Clemens.  A wealthy Texan dies of snake poisoning while celebrating in a New York nightclub.  The Falcon follows the man's fiancee, a model, back to the old Panhandle homestead.

"The Falcon in Mexico" RKO, 1944.  Conway, Mona Maris, Martha Vickers, Nestor Paiva.  Director: William Berke.  A Mexican girl pleads with the Falcon to recover a recent portrait of herself, but the owner of the gallery in which it hangs is murdered, and the artist has supposedly been dead for 15 years.

"The Falcon in Hollywood" RKO, 1944.  Conway, Barbara Hale, Veda Ann Borg, John Abbott, Sheldon Leonard.  Director: Gordon Douglas.  A movie studio is the background for nearly all the action as the Falcon, on a visit to Hollywood, probes why the eight investors in a motion picture are being killed off one-by-one.

"The Falcon in San Francisco" RKO, 1945. Conway, Mara Corday, Sharyn Moffett, Faye Helm, Robert Armstrong.  Director: Joseph H. Lewis.  Heading west by train, the Falcon takes charge of a seven-year-old girl when her nurse is murdered.  At the climax of the film, the sleuth is on board a ship that is about to explode.

"The Falcon's Alibi" RKO, 1946.  Conway, Corday, Vince Barnett, Jane Greer, Elisha Cook, Jr.  Director: Ray McCarey.  Stolen jewels and several murders implicate the Falcon, but he suspects the announcer of an all-night radio show.

"The Falcon's Adventure" RKO, 1946.  Conway, Madge Meredith, Robert Warwick, Myrna Dell.  Director: William Berke.  The Falcon must take a formula for synthetic diamonds to Florida when the inventor is killed.  This was the last of the RKO Falcon series.  A new series began two years later by Film Classics with John Calvert as the Falcon, whose real name was changed to Michael Waring, the same name used in the radio series.

"The Devil's Cargo" Film Classics, 1948.  Calvert, Rochelle Hudson, Roscoe Karns, Lyle Talbot.  Director: John F. Link.  A man in prison, accused of murder, asks the Falcon's help just before he dies of poisoning.

"Appointment with Murder" Film Classics, 1948.  Calvert, Catherine Craig, Jack Reitzen, Talbot.  Director: Jack Bernhard.  The Falcon, an insurance investigator, tracks down stolen paintings and finds murder.

"Search for Danger" Film Classics, 1949.  Calvert, Myrna Dell, Albert Dekker, Douglas Fowley.  Director: Don Martin.  A gambler who disappears with a large betting sum leads the Falcon to two deaths.

RADIO

The producers of "The Falcon" radio series informed their listeners that this Falcon was based on Drexel Drake's character, though the name was changed from Malcolm Wingate to Michael Waring.  The half-hour weekly drama, with Barry Kroeger as Waring, debuted on NBC Blue and ran from April 10 to December 29, 1943.  The show took a short hiatus then popped up on Mutual from July 3, 1945 to April 30, 1950, where it was sponsored by Gem razor blades.  It moved back to NBC, May 7, 1950, to September 14, 1952 with Kraft foods as the sponsor.  The show made its final move back to Mutual with General Mills as a sponsor January 5, 1953 to November 27, 1954.

TELEVISION

"The Adventures of the Falcon" was a syndicated series with gravel-voiced Charles McGraw as a tough Michael Waring in 39 episodes that aired June 24, 1954 until March 1955.