The alkoxybenzophenanthridine alkaloids (coralyne acetosulfate, fagaronine chloride, and nitidine chloride) have been reported to possess antileukemic activity in mice. These compounds were tested for inhibition of reverse transcriptase activity of an RNA tumor virus and DNA polymerase, RNA polymerase, and polyadenylic acid polymerase activities of NIH-Swiss mouse embryos. Reverse transcriptase and DNA polymerase activities were strongly inhibited by these antileukemic alkaloids, whereas RNA polymerase and polyadenylic acid polymerase activities were only moderately affected. Viral and cellular DNA polymerase activities were potently diminished by the alkaloids when poly[d(A-T)], poly(dA)-oligo(dT), and poly(rA)-oligo(dT) template primers were used in the reaction mixture; however, no inhibition of enzyme activity was obtained with poly(rC)-oligo(dG) as template primer. These results suggest that alkoxybenzophenanthridine alkaloids inhibit DNA polymerase activity by interaction with A:T base pairs of the template primer.