Zane Grey was an American author best known for his popular western adventure novels and stories that presented an glorified image of the American frontier. In addition to the success of his printed works, they later had second lives with much influence when adapted as films and television productions.

Zane Grey started his association with Hollywood when William Fox bought the rights to Riders of the Purple Sage. The mount of Zane Grey’s westerns career matched that of the motion picture industry. It eagerly adapted Western stories to the screen practically from its inception, with Bronco Billy Anderson becoming the first major western star. After his first two books were adapted to the screen, Zane Grey formed his own motion picture company. This allowed him to control production values and faithfulness to his books. After seven films he sold his company to Jesse Lasky, who was a partner of the founder of Paramount Pictures. Paramount made a number of movies based on Zane Grey's western writings and hired him as advisor. Many of his films were shot at locations described in his books.

In 1936 Zane Grey appeared as himself in a feature film shot in Australia, White Death. Zane Grey became disappointed by the commercial exploitation and pirating of his works. Zane Grey felt his western stories and characters were diluted by being adapted to film. Nearly fifty of his novels were converted into over one hundred Western movies, the most by any Western author.