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The Cisco Kid
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The Cisco Kid was a popular film, radio, television and comic book series based on the fictional Western character created by O. Henry in his short story "The Caballero's Way," published in 1907 in the collection Heart of the West. Films and television depicted the Cisco Kid as a heroic Mexican caballero, although in O. Henry's original story, he was a non-Hispanic character and a cruel outlaw, probably modelled on Billy the Kid.
Numerous movies featured the character, beginning in the silent film era with William R. Dunn portraying the Cisco Kid in The Caballero's Way (1914), followed by The Border Terror (1919). Warner Baxter won an Oscar for his portrayal of the Cisco Kid in the early sound film In Old Arizona (1928), directed by Irving Cummings and Raoul Walsh, who was originally slated to play the lead until a jackrabbit jumping through a windshield cost him an eye while on location.
The movie series with
Cesar Romero in the title role began with
The Cisco Kid and the Lady (1939), and
Duncan Renaldo took over the reins in 1945 with
The Cisco Kid Returns. Beginning with
The Gay Cavalier (1946),
Gilbert Roland played the character in a half-dozen 1946-1947 movies.
Contents
- 1 Radio
- 2 Television
- 3 Fiction and comics
- 4 Music
- 5 Film
- 6 Listen to
- 7 External links
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Radio
The Cisco Kid came to radio October 2, 1942, with Jackson Beck in the title role and Louis Sorin as Pancho. With Vicki Vola and Bryna Raeburn in supporting roles and Michael Rye announcing, this series continued on Mutual until 1945. It was followed by another Mutual series in 1946, starring Jack Mather and Harry Lang, who continued to head the cast in the syndicated radio series of more than 600 episodes from 1947 to 1956.
Television
Renaldo returned to the role for the popular 156-episode Ziv Television series (1950-1956), notable as one of the first TV series filmed in color.
After a long absence, the character galloped back onto TV screens with The Cisco Kid, a 1994 TV movie starring Jimmy Smits.
The Cisco Kid's cinematic sidekick, Gordito ("Fatty"), was portrayed by
Chris-Pin Martin, followed by Pancho, played by
Martin Garralaga and later by
Leo Carrillo. For the 1994 TV film, Pancho was played by
Cheech Marin. The TV episodes and the 1994 movie ended with one or the other of them making a corny joke about the adventure they had just completed. They would laugh, saying, "Oh, Pancho!" "Oh, Cisco!", before galloping off into the sunset. Spanish-styled Western theme music was heard as the credits rolled.
The television series Hill Street Blues briefly featured a recurring character named Alan Bradford (portrayed by Martin Ferrero). In Bradford's first appearance, episode #58, "Here's Adventure, Here's Romance" (title drawn from a lyric in the theme of the Cisco Kid television series), he was arrested while wearing western garb and disrupting traffic. In an unusual twist, his delusion was not that he was the fictional Cisco Kid, but that he was the real-life actor Duncan Renaldo playing the Cisco Kid. He misidentified Hill Street supporting character Ray Calletano (portrayed by René Enríquez) as Cisco Kid actor Leo Carrillo, who'd played Pancho.
Fiction and comics
- In Stephen King's short story "The Raft," Pancho and Cisco are used as the nicknames between the two ill-fated friends stranded on the raft.
- Baily Publishing's Cisco Kid Comics appeared on newsstands in 1944, followed by Dell Comics's 41-issue run of The Cisco Kid Comics, beginning in 1951.
- Jose Luis Salinas and Rod Reed drew the Cisco Kid comic strip, syndicated from 1951 to 1967.
- Moonstone Books has, as of 2006, published two miniseries about Cisco Kid.
Music
The group War has a song "The Cisco Kid" on the album The World Is a Ghetto (1972):
- Cisco Kid was a friend of mine
- He drank whiskey
- Pancho'd drink the wine
The song "Cisco Kid" by Cypress Hill, Method Man, and Redman also samples the song by War.
Sublime's song "Cisco Kid" includes sample sounds from the radio show.
Film
Listen to
