The Sheriff of Fractured Jaw hours of Westerns per week, and Walsh felt that a spoof of the genre would be a good choice for the studio, especially with the new CinemaScope process to properly display the desolate background of a lawless town in the American West. Fox decided to make the film and decided to give Walsh majority of the control over the movie's production. The studio still wanted Clifton Webb to play Jonathan Tibbs, the lead character, but Walsh preferred British actor Kenneth More. Moore had become popular in films such as "Genevieve" (1953) and "The Admirable Crichton" (1957), and Walsh felt he
Michael Crichton subjects. The film was a popular success. Crichton then wrote and directed an adaptation of his own book, "The First Great Train Robbery" (1978). In 1979 it was Crichton would direct a movie version of his novel "Eaters of the Dead" for the newly formed Orion Pictures. This did not occur. Crichton pitched the idea of a modern day "King Solomon's Mines" to 20th Century Fox who paid him $1.5 million for the film rights to the novel, a screenplay and directorial fee for the movie, before a word had been written. Crichton wrote the novel, then did the screenplay