
Acting
James P. Burtis
Born 1893-05-11 · Emporia, Kansas, USA
Acting credits
6.4Lee is a fresh young kid from the South when he gets a job with The Press. His first assignment on gangsters gets his name in the paper, the police on a raid and Lee in the hospital.
The Finger Points
1931
5.5In the 1840s, Ramsey MacKay, the driver for the struggling Wells Fargo mail and freight company, will secure an important contract if he delivers fresh oysters to Buffalo from New York City. When he rescues Justine Pryor and her mother, who are stranded in a broken wagon on his route, he doesn't let them slow him down and gives the ladies an exhilirating ride into Buffalo. He arrives in time to obtain the contract and is then sent by company president Henry Wells to St. Louis to establish a branch office.
Wells Fargo
1937
6.5An elderly business tycoon, believed to be dying, decides to give a million dollars each to eight strangers chosen at random from the phone directory.
If I Had a Million
1932
6.3Down-on-his-luck John Ellman is framed for a judge's murder. After he's convicted and sentenced to death, witnesses come forth and prove his innocence. But it was too late for a stay to be granted and Ellman is executed. A doctor uses an experimental procedure to restore him to life, though the full outcome is other than expected.
The Walking Dead
1936
6.9An ex-con uses his street smarts to become a successful photojournalist.
Picture Snatcher
1933
4.8A Professor has an invention that will bring down planes causing them to crash and Dawson is forcing him to use it on those carrying money. When Tim arrives to investigate he is mistaken for a noted outlaw. So he assumes that identity to force Dawson to make him a partner. But just as a plane bringing Tim help is arriving, his true identity is revealed and while he is a prisoner, Dawson forces the Professor to start his machine.
Ghost Patrol
1936
5.7A popular jockey is disbarred from racing after he's accused of throwing a race.
Sweepstakes
1931
6.8When a confused eyewitness identifies New York City cabbie Brick Tennant as a killer, he is sentenced to death for a murder that he wasn't involved in. Though no one is willing to listen to the innocent prisoner's pleas for freedom, Brick's faithful fiancée, Mary, knows that her lover is innocent because she was with him when the crime was committed. As the scheduled execution draws ever nearer, Mary begins to investigate the murder herself.
Let Us Live
1939
4.9A decoding expert tangles with enemy spies.
Rendezvous
1935
6.6Searching for headlines at any cost, an unscrupulous newspaper owner forces his editor to print a serial based on a past murder, tormenting a woman involved.
Five Star Final
1931
6.7Despite her mother's objections, the naive young daughter of a show boat captain is thrust into the limelight as the company's new leading lady.
Show Boat
1936
6.8A temperamental Broadway producer trains an untutored actress, but when she becomes a star, she proves a match for him.
Twentieth Century
1934
5.3The wealthy Van Dyke family are constantly in the media for outrageous behavior, much to the frustration of the patriarch, Dan Van Dyke. His self-centered wife has a fondness for foreign imports, including "pet projects" like dancers and such and his spoiled children Tony and Carol have constant run-ins with the law. When Dan himself ends up in the clink for five years for tax evasion, he becomes bunk-mates with ex-bootlegger Joe "Spots" Ricardi. Ricardi lectures him on being such a push-over for an out-of-control family, so a dying Dan makes Ricardi his estate trustee once he is released from prison. Ricardi is then thrust into high society and must do everything he once nagged Dan to do.
She Couldn't Take It
1935
5.8In the second screen version of The Maltese Falcon, a detective is caught between a lying seductress and a lady jewel thief.
Satan Met a Lady
1936
A fancy masquerade party is the scene of a jewel robbery, and later several suspects in the robbery are discovered to be aboard the same train.
Western Limited
1932
6.5Harriet, Walter Craig's wife, is an upper-class woman obsessed with control, material possessions and social status whose behavior makes difficult her relationship with domestic service and family members.
Craig's Wife
1936
4.8An heiress abandons an out-of-work husband, two sons and a lovesick daughter.
The Merry Frinks
1934
7.3A well-cloistered and protected-against-reality group of college students get their diplomas in the heart of the Great Depression, and quickly learn that the piece of paper the diploma is written on is worth about eighteen-dollars-a-week in the job-market...for the lucky ones. Some of them fare even worse.
Gentlemen Are Born
1934
5.6During a séance at an elderly millionaire's house, the millionaire is murdered. The detectives investigating the crime discover that everyone who was at the séance had a motive for killing the man.
Sinister Hands
1932
6.6A traitor is lurking somewhere aboard the USS Carolina, and Lt. Tom Randolph is determined to find the offender. First a revolutionary new piece of technology -- an electric firing device -- is sabotaged. Then one of the cruiser's crew is murdered. In order to catch the killer, the captain locks down the ship. With foreign dignitaries, corporate goons and even Tom's girlfriend, Betty, trapped on the vessel, there is no shortage of suspects.
Murder in the Fleet
1935
6.0The operators of a bankrupt carnival sideshow hope to restore their fallen fortunes by staging a fake 'public wedding' in the mouth of their unprofitable giant whale. But the intended 'bridegroom' absconds with the proceeds, arranging a substitute. The bride, Flip Lane (Jane Wyman), much to her surprise, finds herself really married to a handsome stranger, whose career as an artist she decides to manage, much to his dismay.
Public Wedding
1937
5.8A proud, pro-capital punishment district attorney with a 90% execution rate, finds himself wrongly convicted of murdering his estranged wife and sentenced to die. The woman he loves and his investigator rival for her affections rally to find the real killer, while he is confronted by the misery of life on death row.
The Accusing Finger
1936
10.0A race-car driver whose career is on the skids because of his drinking falls for a rich society girl. That motivates him to clean up his act and resume his career, but it may be too late for that.
The Racing Strain
1932
5.4Reporter Nicholas Ranson is jubilant when, on 17 Dec 1903, in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Orville and Wilbur Wright take their first airplane flight. Back home in Underwood, Maryland, however, his uncle Hiram F. Jenkins, owner and editor of the local newspaper, refuses to print the story. Nicholas quits and continues to work on his own airplane, with the devoted help of his little daughter Peggy. Peggy is actually the first in her family to fly when her friends, Patrick Falconer and Scott Barnes, induce her to get inside a large kite they have made, and run with it in a field until she is airborne. The kite is caught in a tree, however, and Peggy gets a black eye. Later, Nicholas dies when his experimental airplane crashes, leaving his wife and children alone. By Peggy's adulthood, planes are capable of flying at an altitude of 11,000 feet, and speeds of nearly 100 m.p.h. Peggy continues her father's obsession with flight by helping Scott and Pat to build a plane.
Men with Wings
1938