LITTLE BIG SCREEN - THE "MAVERICK" MYSTERY MAN

Is there anybody out there who can help me identify who this actor is?

Is it pozz'ble, just pozz'ble, that this mystery poker player could be a legendary TV cowboy who was also mysterious?  So much so that we never even learned what his real name was?

In the cast list for the movie "Maverick" at the "always reliable" IMDb, there are four actors listed as poker players on board the Lauren Belle riverboat whom I was not originally familiar with:

• Cal Bartlett
• Donal Gibson
• Richard Blum
• Chuck Hart

Thanks to Caeric ArcLight, I know now that the actor I had pegged as being Leo Gordon was actually Cal Bartlett:

And there's a photo attached to Donal Gibson's IMDb page so I know I can at least eliminate him for consideration as to the identity of this poker player.

Based on an obituary I found for "Chuck Hart", stuntman, he also would have been too young to have played this poker player in 1994.  (Although there might be a slight resemblance to Bill Hart, Chuck's father, who was also a stuntman.)

And that leaves Richard Blum.  Delving into a Google search (admittedly for only about five pages) showed only that Richard Blum - the husband of Senator Dianne Feinstein - dominates that topic.  I would think an actor would try to get his image out there for the public to see......

So here's my question: Could this mystery poker player have been James Drury, the eponymous star of 'The Virginian'?  Drury is not listed in the movie's official credits, but the IMDb said he was there but uncredited.  And it looks like other sites from around the world have run with this information... information... information.  (Sorry about that, Chief.)

As mentioned in the post about Doug McClure's appearance in the movie, 'The Virginian' began in 1898 and on the Toobworld timeline it took up about ten years.  I've placed "Maverick" as a movie to be around 1913.  

Here are a couple of pictures of James Drury as characters from around that time frame window:

As Ethan Emerson in two episodes of 'The Adventures Of Brisco County, Jr.'.  

This series was set 100 years into the past, marking it on the Toobworld timeline as taking place in 1891.

As Jim in "The Gambler Returns: The Luck Of The Draw".  

That TV movie was definitely set in the days leading up to the April, 1906 earthquake which leveled San Francisco.

(Although he was credited as Jim, there is nothing to dissuade me from believing that he was playing 'The Virginian'.)

If this mystery poker player is indeed James Drury, then there's no way he could have been 'The Virginian'.  He has aged too bleeping fast from the way he looked just seven years earlier in 1906.  

But I could see him being Ethan Emerson, a dozen years after the events of 'The Adventures Of Brisco County Jr.'.  Emerson was a banking tycoon living in San Francisco and a member of the Westerfield Club.  I could see him playing in the Big Game and even after losing it all still just consider it to be a loss of pocket change.  Even so, it looks like he didn't take too kindly to losing even if he did retire from the table gracefully.

However, that all depends on whether or not that poker player shown up top is James Drury.....

BCnU!