Tarzan and the Lion Man

Rating:
Summary: Edgar Rice Burroughs and Tarzan take on Hollywood
Review: Hollywood had its own take on Tarzan of the Apes beginning with Elmo Lincoln and then going off in its own direction during the Johnny Weismuller years. In "Tarzan and the Foreign Legion" a soldier notes that Tarzan does not look at all like Weismuller. That was a good crack, but Edgar Rice Burroughs got even more digs at Hollywood in the seventeenth novel of the series, "Tarzan and the Lion Man." The Lion Man in question is the movie character played by Stanley Obroski, an actor who actually looks like Tarzan. Of course this element will come into play over the course of the novel and poor Stanley will prove himself to be pretty far removed from being a hero when the cameras are not rolling.

Milton Smith, the Executive Vice-President of B.O. Studios (hmmm, I wonder what that is supposed to mean) leads a safari into the heart of Africa to make a movie (remember, this is years before John Huston went on location to film "The African Queen"). Even with Major White, the big game hunter hired as a studio consultant, the safari is almost wipe out by the Bansuto tribe led by Chief Rungula. The survivors flee farther into the jungle and find a hidden valley of diamonds ruled an old Englishman who calls himself "God" and who has created gorillas named King Henry the Eighth, Buckingham, Suffolk, Cranmer, Howard and Thomas Wolsey. There are also gorilla wives named Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr. Fortunately, Tarzan and his friend the great Golden Lion are tracking down the lost party.

On the one hand "Tarzan and the Lion Man" is an example of the formula that ERB was using for Tarzan novels at this point: Tarzan has to rescue people from dying in a lost land. This scenario describes over half of the twenty-four Tarzan novels that Burroughs wrote. So even with the crazy guy with the apes named for Tudor nobility, the lost land bit is nothing special. But Tarzan's encounter with Hollywood, both in Los Angeles and in Africa, gives Burroughs an opportunity to comment on what tinsel town did to Tarzan. I would not hazard a guess as to who people like Ben Goldeen, producer for Prominent Pictures, are "really" supposed to be, but my bet would be that ERB is taking shots at some specific targets. Clearly the movie character of the "Lion Man" is a fair representation of the watered down Lord of the Jungle ERB saw on the big screen. It is this aspect of "Tarzan and the Lion Man" that gives this particular novel a bit of an edge and an above-average ranking.

Rating:
Summary: Edgar Rice Burroughs and Tarzan take on Hollywood
Review: Hollywood had its own take on Tarzan of the Apes beginning with Elmo Lincoln and then going off in its own direction during the Johnny Weismuller years. In "Tarzan and the Foreign Legion" a soldier notes that Tarzan does not look at all like Weismuller. That was a good crack, but Edgar Rice Burroughs got even more digs at Hollywood in the seventeenth novel of the series, "Tarzan and the Lion Man." The Lion Man in question is the movie character played by Stanley Obroski, an actor who actually looks like Tarzan. Of course this element will come into play over the course of the novel and poor Stanley will prove himself to be pretty far removed from being a hero when the cameras are not rolling.

Milton Smith, the Executive Vice-President of B.O. Studios (hmmm, I wonder what that is supposed to mean) leads a safari into the heart of Africa to make a movie (remember, this is years before John Huston went on location to film "The African Queen"). Even with Major White, the big game hunter hired as a studio consultant, the safari is almost wipe out by the Bansuto tribe led by Chief Rungula. The survivors flee farther into the jungle and find a hidden valley of diamonds ruled an old Englishman who calls himself "God" and who has created gorillas named King Henry the Eighth, Buckingham, Suffolk, Cranmer, Howard and Thomas Wolsey. There are also gorilla wives named Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr. Fortunately, Tarzan and his friend the great Golden Lion are tracking down the lost party.

On the one hand "Tarzan and the Lion Man" is an example of the formula that ERB was using for Tarzan novels at this point: Tarzan has to rescue people from dying in a lost land. This scenario describes over half of the twenty-four Tarzan novels that Burroughs wrote. So even with the crazy guy with the apes named for Tudor nobility, the lost land bit is nothing special. But Tarzan's encounter with Hollywood, both in Los Angeles and in Africa, gives Burroughs an opportunity to comment on what tinsel town did to Tarzan. I would not hazard a guess as to who people like Ben Goldeen, producer for Prominent Pictures, are "really" supposed to be, but my bet would be that ERB is taking shots at some specific targets. Clearly the movie character of the "Lion Man" is a fair representation of the watered down Lord of the Jungle ERB saw on the big screen. It is this aspect of "Tarzan and the Lion Man" that gives this particular novel a bit of an edge and an above-average ranking.