The Spoilers (1930 Film)

The Spoilers (1930 Film)

The Spoilers is a 1930 American Western film directed by Edwin Carewe and starring Gary Cooper, Kay Johnson, and Betty Compson. Set in Nome, Alaska during the 1898 Gold Rush, the film is about a gold prospector and a corrupt Alaska politician who fight for control over a gold mine. The film features a spectacular saloon fistfight between Cooper and William "Stage" Boyd.

The Spoilers was adapted to screen by Bartlett Cormack from the 1906 Rex Beach novel of the same name. Film versions also appeared in 1914, 1923 (with Noah Beery as McNamara), 1942 (with John Wayne in Gary Cooper's role of Glennister, Marlene Dietrich replacing Compson, whom she resembled, as Malotte, and Randolph Scott as McNamara), and 1955 (with Anne Baxter as Malotte, Jeff Chandler as Glennister, and Rory Calhoun as McNamara). The 1930 and 1942 versions were the only instance of Gary Cooper and John Wayne playing exactly the same role in the same story in two different films.