In spite of a few bright spots, such as Boyne Castle, Disney movies in the 1960s were overwhelmingly heterosexist. Disney Adventure Boys -- and there was a stable of them -- offered an aggressive conflation of muscles and heterosexual ravings. The stand out hetero star was Roger Mobley.
Born in Evansville, Indiana in 1949, Roger began performing with his siblings in carnivals and county fairs, and on Ted Mack's Original Amateur Hour, a sort of radio precursor of American Idol.
This led to many guest spots on the popular tv series of the day -- Hawaiian Eye, Donna Reed, Gunsmoke, The Detectives, The Virginian-- plus a starring role in Seasons 3 and 4 of Fury (1958-60), a "boy and his horse" Western. Peter Graves played a rancher in modern-day California, a single dad raising his adopted son Joey (Bobby Diamond). Fury was a "wild" stallion who won't be ridden, but doesn't mind saving the day. Roger played the son's friend, Packy.
He starred in Emil and the Detectives (1964), based on the novel by Erich Kastner: After his 400 marks are stolen, rich kid Emil (Bryan Russell) follows the thief to Berlin. He thwarts a bank robbery with the help of his gay-subtext buddy, the street urchin Gustav (Roger).
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For the Love of Willadean (1964) Rural
l boy Harley (Roger) tries to win the Girl of His Dreams, but his rivals trick him into stealing a prize watermelon, and then into braving a haunted house. Future Lost in Space kid Billy Mumy plays his buddy.
Next Roger started on his most famous character, Gallagher, a Gilded Age newsboy who first appeared in an 1891 story by Richard Harding Davis, then in two silents, Gallegher: A Newsboy Story (1917) and Let'Er Go, Gallegher (1928)
More after the break
The first installment, The Adventures of Gallagher (1965), stays close to the original Gilded Age Horatio Alger-style stories, granting Gallagher a homoromantic bond with Jimmy the Bootblack (Bryan Russell again). and no perceptible interest in girls.
But The Further Adventures of Gallagher (1965) eliminates the buddy-bonding and asks Gallagher to puppy-dog grin at liberated newspaperwoman Adeline Jones (Anne Francis). Adeline is eight years older than Gallagher, so nothing comes of the infatuation; Disney just wanted us to know the boy is heterosexual, that he has successfully acquired girl-craziness and abandoned “unhealthy” associations with other boys.
We might anticipate a few smoldering looks and some suggestive grabbing as Phinn shows the greenhorn Gallagher how to tame a wild stallion. But no: when Gallagher arrives at the Carlson ranch, Phinn has inexplicably vanished, and his teenage sister Laurie (Darlene Carr) offers to train and “tame” Gallagher. The two fall in love precisely on schedule.
Gallagher also excites the interest of the villainous Sundown Kid (Davis Weaver). As the episode begins, the two have just shared a lengthy stagecoach ride. As they say goodbye, the Kid gazes at Gallagher with lip-licking predatory lust and says“I like your style” in a hoarse voice that seems to imply rather an appreciation of physical attractiveness. Later, after kidnapping Gallagher, the Kid cups his face in his hands, draws him close, and threatens to shoot him, but looks as if he really plans a kiss instead.
Davis is queer-coded, but only to underscore his aura of menace. What better way to induce shudders than to display a desire for something beyond the limits of imagination? Same-sex relationships are presented as threatening, to be spurned or abandoned. The only true, valid, and safe relationships must be with girls.
The final installment, The Mystery of Edwin Sims (1968), is not available to stream, but according to the plot synopsis, Gallagher gets involved with land fraud: valueless land is sold to Cornish immigrants. It doesn't sound riveting.
Roger's final Disney Adventure Boy role was in The Treasure of San Bosco Reef (1968): Dave Jones (not Davey Jones of The Monkeys) travels to Italy to help his underwater-archaeologist uncle, and gets involved with artifact-theft and murder. Alan Alda's brother Antony plays a street urchin who he befriends.
After he finished his stint for Disney, Mobley went to Viet Nam as a Green Beret, then married his high school sweetheart and became a police officer in Beaumont, Texas. Later he became a pastor in the Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod (the homophobic one). According to Wikipedia, he and his wife have three children, twelve grandchildren, and a great-grandchild.
Ou sont les neiges d'antan? Where are the snows of yesteryear, when Packy and Joey adventured together, and Gustav and Emil fell in love?
