Week of March 26: Remembering Robert Culp; Scarecrow and Mr. Jones; A Gift of "GE Theater"

The risk of doing a blog about classic television shows is that it will include a lot of obituaries.

Sadly, there's another one this week: Robert Culp, possibly one of the most unselfish men to ever star in a television series. He was the star of "I Spy," but didn't complain when his co-star won three Emmys and became a television icon. That co-star, of course, is Bill Cosby, who said this week that Culp was like a brother.

Culp was also featured in "The Greatest American Hero," which starred William Katt (son of Barbara Hale, who played Perry Mason's loyal secretary, Della Street) and Connie Sellecca, and ran on ABC from 1981-83. He also played the father of Debra Barone (Pamela Heaton) in "Everybody Loves Raymond" (CBS, 1996-2005).

Here's a link to an interview by Culp about "Greatest American Hero," which would make a superb film (And please, not a re-made TV series):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KRSEKj1cU8c

And to watch the treat of the Culp-Cosby partnership and chemistry, the final episode of "I Spy":

http://tvseriesfinale.com/tv-show/i-spy-last-episode-pinwheel-13751



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A couple of great DVD releases in recent weeks:

*Season 1 of "Barnaby Jones," which ran on CBS 1973-80. The title character, played so well by Buddy Ebsen, spun off into his own series from "Cannon," which starred William Conrad.

Also starring was Lee Merriwether, Miss America 1955, as Jones daughter-in-law, Betty. In later seasons, Mark Shera would play a cousin, J.R. (or Jedidiah, as Barnaby called him).

The show was, as the announcer intoned each week, "A Quinn Martin Production.":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ATUILf51B3c

*Also newly released is Season 1 of "Scarecrow and Mrs. King," which ran on CBS from 1983-87.

Kate Jackson underwent quite an image transformation from the cool agent Sabrina Duncan of "Charlie's Angels" to domestic divorcee Amanda King in this series. She discovered the dangers of taking a package from a stranger in the first episode - especially when the stranger turned out to be handsome agent Lee Stetson, played by Bruce Boxleitner. Amanda kept her life secret from mother Dotty (Beverly Garland, who had been in "My Three Sons") and her two sons. Lee and Amanda were overseen by Billy Melrose (Mel Stuart, who had played Henry Jefferson in "All in the Family") and aided by agent Francine Desmond (Martha Smith).

The show was fun, if increasingly implausible as time passed (While fans cheered Lee and Amanda's eventual romance and marriage, they did not cheer the pair keeping it a secret from Amanda's family.).

Eventually, real life intervened: Kate Jackson contracted breast cancer, and struggled to complete the last season of the show.

Today, she continues to work in television, and has survived both cancer and a hole in her heart, which was repaired by surgery. Boxleitner has continued in various TV roles as well.

Here's the beginning of that first episode:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sJBucQp-fws&feature=PlayList&p=2BEF207731FC5F9D&index=0&playnext=1

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NBC's present doesn't look very good, but it recently had a great find from its past: All of the episodes of General Electric Theater that were hosted by an actor named Ronald Reagan.

The 208 episodes have been sent to the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library as part of the library's celebration of Reagan's 100th birthday:

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jRNYUmlrFBmq-_NOS_dfgR2aWwSAD9EGP6IO0

Reagan began his hosting duties for the program, which ran on CBS on Sunday nights after "The Ed Sullivan Show," during the third season.

http://www.museum.tv/eotvsection.php?entrycode=generalelect

Most of the productions were drama; Reagan himself starred with his wife and future First Lady Nancy Reagan in one production. Occasionally, the program would draw a different kind of entertainment, like the legendary Judy Garland:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jYCFtWzz3gw

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Rabbit Ears will return in two weeks.

Until then, Happy Passover, Happy Easter, Happy Spring and Happy Viewing!

Week of March 19: How Peter Graves Became Mr. Phelps; Fess Parker Tribute

Until the DVD of the first season of "Mission Impossible" came out a few years ago, a lot of people had forgotten that Peter Graves did not play the iconic role of Jim Phelps throughout the entire series.

Steven Hill, who would later play the district attorney modeled after real-life New York DA Henry Morgenthau on "Law & Order," played Dan Briggs, the man who received those strange missions via reel-to-reel tape recorder, during "MI's" first season.

Hill is an Orthodox Jew, and thus could not film from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, or on major holidays. Under today's standards, accomodations might be made, but Hill had struggles with the show's producers over that and other issues. He was then replaced by Graves.

The show did not achieve high ratings during that first season, despite Lalo Schifrin's memorable opening theme song, possibly the best in television history. But it did win an Emmy for best dramatic series. That and Graves' entry opened the door to "Mission's" glory years.

Here's a link to America Online for "Mission's" 3 most memorable moments:

http://insidetv.aol.com/2010/03/16/peter-graves-on-mission-impossible-3-most-memorable-moments/

Good night, Mr. Phelps.

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Late word, sorry to say, of the death of Fess Parker, who was great at playing two 19th century men: Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone. Appropriately, Parker had a history degree.

Parker had a second life, as a successful developer and vintner. He was most successful in family life, being married for 50 years. Sadly, he died on his wife's birthday.

The legacies of all his lives remain, including an inn in California. Here's a link to the best-known one:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2Tu8NskR-E

Hail to the King of the Wild Frontier.

See you next week.

Week of March 12: So Long, Father Murphy

Yesterday came the sad news of the death of Merlin Olsen, a Hall of Fame football player during the 1960s, a stellar football announcer and actor afterwards, and a class act always.

Olsen teamed up first with the legendary Curt Gowdy, then with Dick Enberg, on NBC's Sunday National Football League telecasts. In 1988, when Enberg was headed to Seoul to co-host the network's coverage of the Summer Olympics with Bryant Gumbel, Olsen and Gowdy reunited in the broadcast booth:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X91l6IuTJLs

And Gowdy was sure right about Olsen: "He's never missed at any effort in his life."

Those efforts included television drama. Olsen was a Mormon, and that influenced his choice of roles. Michael Landon tapped him to play Jonathan Garvey, Charles Ingells' friend, on NBC's "Little House On the Prairie" in 1977:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CzB8rVCNrjA&NR=1

This scene also included a young Patrick Labyorteaux (later Lt. Bud Roberts on the CBS program "JAG") as Jonathan's son, Andy.

In 1981, Landon would produce, and Olsen would star in "Father Murphy," in which he played a prospector who pretended to be a priest in order to protect a group of orphans. The show lasted two seasons:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf2LTOlaKc4

Moses Gunn and Katherine Cannon were also part of the cast.

So long to Merlin Olsen, gentle giant.

Week of March 5: Oscar Nominees On the Small Screen

Sunday night will be the Academy Awards, Hollywood's shiniest night of the year.

Before all the glitter, it's fun to take a look back at the experience of some of the nominees on some classic (and not-so-classic) television shows.

Best Actor

*Who's that Easy Reader? Why it's nominee Morgan Freeman. Long before he was playing Nelson Mandela, Freeman was playing a number of characters on the first version of the PBS children's program "The Electric Company":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkwCynNm18c

*George Clooney's television contributions have been well-noted: Two versions of ER (one not-so-good on CBS as well as the classic NBC series), and, of course, "The Facts of Life":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FIZ7ACvfwds

Not-so-classic mullets, either. :)


*Colin Firth is another actor with a classic television background, including everyone's favorite TV interpretation of the classic "Pride and Prejudice":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHNwtGBbODg&feature=PlayList&p=QP_6Bmwu4-8

I'll take you, Mr. Darcy; I'll take you.


Best Actress

*Helen Mirren's contribution to television is unquestioned. She set standards as Jane Tennison in "Prime Suspect," all of which was shown on PBS and is available on DVD (and begs yet another question: Like "The Rockford Files" and "Hawaii Five-O," why remake this when the original was so good?).

*"Working Girl," of course, is a classic Academy Award winning (for Carly Simon's song "Let the River Run") movie. It later became a series, with one of this year's nominees, Sandra Bullock:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crW8CVZ8f1M


*Meryl Streep has been a movie star almost since the beginning. But a year before she would win her first Oscar for "Kramer vs. Kramer," she starred in the groundbreaking NBC miniseries "Holocaust":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4ECsTESTxA



Best Supporting Actor

We conclude with Woody Harrelson, who joined the cast of "Cheers" in its third season, after the death of Nicholas Colasanto and the character he played, Coach. Look for Harrelson about five minutes in (and the added bonus of one of the greatest theme songs in television history):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpcWtujp9PE

Enjoy the Oscars. Until next week, Happy Viewing!