"Stagecoach" (1939) Filming Locations

Above, the East and West Mittens and Merrick Butte in Monument Valley. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Stagecoach (1939), directed by John Ford, is one of those seminal movies that has become iconic in American movie history.

It was the movie that made John Wayne a star after he spent most of the 1930s in B movie purgatory. But, those years enabled him to hone his acting skills. 

Stagecoach, as most of us are aware, was the first movie to take advantage of the vistas of Monument Valley. Ford was going to film Stagecoach somewhere else until Harry Goulding of Goulding's Trading Post arrived in Hollywood with a binder of photographs of Monument Valley that convinced Ford to shoot the movie there. 

The Enlightened Mindset website has posted an article by Happy Sharer on filming locations for Stagecoach. I have some doubts over some of them, such as Sedona, Arizona, Durango, Colorado and Old Tucson studios. I have seen the movie many times and I've not seen anything in it that would identify those sites. Perhaps a more learned movie scholar can post a comment below pointing out where in the movie those and other locations appear. Unfortunately, the article does not elaborate where in the movie the sites cited appear.

All in all, the article is a bit of a disappointment, but is worth taking a look. There are few photos with the article and the ones in it are not helpful.

The article begins with:

Introduction

The 1939 classic Western movie Stagecoach is one of the most iconic films of all time. Directed by John Ford, the film features an ensemble cast including John Wayne, Claire Trevor, and Thomas Mitchell, and tells the story of nine strangers who find themselves on a stagecoach ride through dangerous Apache territory. The movie was a commercial and critical success, and it helped launch John Wayne’s career as an action star.

This article explores the historic setting of Stagecoach, taking a look at where the movie was filmed. It will revisit the iconic locations of Stagecoach and uncover the movie’s filming locations. Finally, it will trace the path of Stagecoach’s filming locations from Monument Valley to Durango, and revisit the filming locations of the movie.

To read more, go here.