Inaugurating his film career around 1918, actor Alphonse Ethier sometimes spelled his first name "Alphonz." In the late 1920s, Ethier became a favorite of young director Frank Capra, who displayed the actor to good advantage in several of his Columbia silent productions, as well as the early-talkie The Donovan Affair (1929). After essaying such sizeable roles as the Marshal in Raoul Walsh's The Big Trail, Ethier settled into minor parts, usually as executives and government officials. Alphonse Ethier retired in 1938, and passed away five years later.