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A.C. LYLES produced many second feature Westerns at Paramount during the 1960s and "Johnny Reno" was just one of them. However, they were all worth seeing mainly due to the fine actors that A.C. always used in his films (even in the smallest roles). Take a look at the credits of this film for example: Dana Andrews, Jane Russell, Lon Chaney Jr, Tom Drake, Lyle Bettger, John Agar, Richard Arlen, Robert Lowery, and (in an uncredited role) De Forrest Kelley. Quite an impressive cast for a second feature I would say. Apart from producing the film A.C. also had a hand in the story. Now in his late eighties, A.C. Lyles still has an office on the Paramount lot which he visits most days. A.C. can often be seen on TV currently being interviewed for the excellent "Biography" series with his recollections of the "Golden Years of Hollywood" and the many stars he knew from that era. One of A.C.s closest friends was James Cagney who only directed one film in his entire career and that was "Short Cut to Hell" (1957) a gangster melodrama which he undertook out of personal friendship for A.C. Lyles just to get him started as a producer. (The film was an efficient remake of the Alan Ladd classic "This Gun for Hire"). Cagney also did the narration for another A.C. Lyles production "Arizona Bushwhackers" - again as a personal favour for A.C. In honour of his long association with Paramount and his outstanding contribution to the motion picture industry, Lyles was given a "star" on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1988. At the same time Paramount named a building on the lot after him with a brass plaque reading "The A.C. Lyles Building". I have known A.C. Lyles since 1989 and been in his company many times. I never tire of hearing his anecdotes and fascinating stories about his years in the film industry and the famous people he knew as friends. The last time I saw A.C. was on a holiday to Hollywood in 2006. Lyles and his wife, Martha, were married in 1955 at the Little Brown Church in the Valley, with their longtime friends, the James Cagneys and the Ronald Reagans, in attendance. It is the same place where the Reagans had been married three years earlier. A.C. and Martha live in an early American home on a Bel Air hilltop overlooking Los Angeles.
