Tarzan: Lord of the Movies
2017 · Movie
as Host / Tarzan (Archived Footage)
Gordon Scott
1926-08-03
•
Portland, Oregon, USA
Gordon Scott was an American film and television actor known for his portrayal of the fictional character Tarzan in five films (and one compilation of three made-as-a-pilot television episodes) of the Tarzan film series from 1955 to 1960. Gordon Scott was the eleventh Tarzan, starting with Tarzan’s Hidden Jungle. He was "discovered" poolside, and offered "a seven-year contract, a loin cloth, and a new last name." "Due in part to his muscular frame and 6-foot-3-inch [1.91-metre] height, he was quickly signed to replace Lex Barker as Tarzan" by producer Sol Lesser. Lesser had Gordon change his name because "Werschkul" sounded too much like "Weismueller". Scott's Tarzan movies ranged from rather cheap re-edited television pilots to large-scale action films with high-production values shot on location in Africa. In his early Tarzan films, he played the character as unworldly and inarticulate, in the mold of Johnny Weissmuller, an earlier Tarzan portrayer. In Scott's later films, after a change in producers, he played a Tarzan who was educated and spoke perfect English, as in the original Edgar Rice Burroughs novels. Scott was the only actor to play Tarzan in both styles. Fearing he would become typecast as Tarzan, Scott moved to Italy and became a popular star in epics of the péplum genre (known in the United States as sword-and-sandal), featuring handsome bodybuilders as various characters from Greek and Roman myth. Scott was a friend of Steve Reeves, and collaborated with him as Remus to Reeves's Romulus in Duel of the Titans. Scott also played Hercules in a couple of international co-productions during the mid-1960s. As the péplum genre faded, Scott starred in spaghetti westerns and Eurospy films. His final film appearance was in The Tramplers (filmed in 1966; released in the United States in 1968).
Filmography
In Search of Tarzan with Jonathan Ross
1998 · Movie
as Self
Investigating Tarzan
1997 · Movie
as Self
Tarzan at the Movies, Part 2: The Many Faces of Tarzan
1996 · Movie
as Tarzan (archive footage)
Kolossal - The Magnificent Macisti
1977 · Movie
Women in Cell Block 7
1973 · Movie
as (Archive Footage)
The Movie Orgy
1968 · Movie
as Self (archive footage)
Danger!! Death Ray
1967 · Movie
as Bart Fargo
Top Secret
1967 · Movie
as John Sutton
L'Attaque de Fort Adams (Une aventure de Buffalo Bill)
1965 · Movie
as Buffalo Bill
The Tramplers
1965 · Movie
as Lon Cordeen
Hercules and the Princess of Troy
1965 · Movie
as Hercules
Hero of Rome
1964 · Movie
as Mucius
Buffalo Bill, Hero of the Far West
1964 · Movie
as Buffalo Bill
Thunder of Battle
1964 · Movie
as Coriolanus
The Conquest of Mycenae
1963 · Movie
as Glauco / Hercules
The Lion of St. Mark
1963 · Movie
as Manrico Venier
Zorro and the Three Musketeers
1963 · Movie
as Zorro
Hero of Babylon
1963 · Movie
as Nippur
The Tyrant of Lydia Against the Son of Hercules
1963 · Movie
as Goliath / Gordian
The Shortest Day
1963 · Movie
as Soldato (uncredited)
Gladiator of Rome
1962 · Movie
as Marcus
Kerim, Son of the Sheik
1962 · Movie
as Kerim
A Queen for Caesar
1962 · Movie
as Julius Caesar
Romulus and Remus
1961 · Movie
as Remus
Goliath and the Vampires
1961 · Movie
as Maciste (Goliath)
Samson and the 7 Miracles of the World
1961 · Movie
as Maciste / Samson
Tarzan the Magnificent
1960 · Movie
as Tarzan
Tarzan's Greatest Adventure
1959 · Movie
as Tarzan
Tarzan and the Trappers
1958 · Movie
as Tarzan
Tarzan's Fight for Life
1958 · Movie
as Tarzan
Tarzan and the Lost Safari
1957 · Movie
as Tarzan
The Steve Allen Show
1956 · TV Show
as Self
Tarzan's Hidden Jungle
1955 · Movie
as Tarzan
