towncaller
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Post by towncaller on Nov 29, 2021 19:27:06 GMT
What are your favorite classic TV Westerns that had 1 or 2 season runs? Some of mine are:
Black Saddle, ran about 1 1/2 seasons, 44 episodes, Jan 1959 through 1960. After his brothers are killed in a shootout, a gunfighter decides to hang up his guns and uphold the law by becoming a lawyer. Nice characterizations of the antagonism, friendly and sometimes not so friendly, between the two lead characters, played by Peter Breck as gunman lawyer Clay Culhane and Russell Johnson as Marshall Gib Scott.
Stagecoach West, one season, 38 episodes, 1960-61. Luke Perry and Simon Kane run a stagecoach line in the Old West, where they come across a wide variety of killers, robbers, and ladies in distress. They are accompanied by Simon's young son David. Wayne Rogers does a great job as Luke, and Robert Bray is fine as Simon, before he became quite the alcoholic. Child actor Richard Eyer, often seen on many other TV westerns, is good as his son.
Yancy Derringer, one season, 34 episodes, 1958-59. An adventurer, gambler, and widely respected southern gentleman is recruited to work as a secret agent, at no pay, in post-Civil War New Orleans, helped by his companion, a silent Pawnee Native American. Jock Mahoney is great as Yancy, but often X-Brands steals the show as Pahoo Katawa, his Pawnee companion who is intentionally silent and communicates using common Native American sign language. This series ended with Yancy considering a move to Virginia City, NV, to operate a silver mine he won. The last episode involved the joining of the transcontinental railroad in Promentory, Utah.
Others?
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Post by gspdude on Nov 30, 2021 15:17:03 GMT
Broken Arrow (1956–1958) Ran 2 seasons. John Lupton is an Indian Agent and Michael Ansara is Indian Chief Cochise. Together they fight bad guys, both white and red, to keep the peace. I was very young when I watched and enjoyed this but haven't seen it since.
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towncaller
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@lostcauses
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Post by towncaller on Nov 30, 2021 16:46:34 GMT
Broken Arrow (1956–1958) Ran 2 seasons. John Lupton is an Indian Agent and Michael Ansara is Indian Chief Cochise. Together they fight bad guys, both white and red, to keep the peace. I was very young when I watched and enjoyed this but haven't seen it since. That reminded me of another favorite of mine also starring Ansara.
Law of the Plainsman, 1 season, 1959-60, 30 episodes, About a Native American Deputy Marshall who was introduced on "The Rifleman", and had the same quality production values.
IMDB description: Sam Buckhart was an Apache Indian who had saved the life of a U.S. Cavalry officer after an Indian ambush. When the officer died, he left Sam money that was used for an education at private schools and Harvard University. After school, he returned to New Mexico where he became a Deputy Marshal working for Marshal Andy Morrison and living in a boarding house run by Martha Commager. The only other continuing cast member was 8-year old Tess Logan, an orphan who had been rescued by Buckhart.
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Nov 30, 2021 23:07:59 GMT
The Rebel - 2 seasons 1959-61 starring Nick Adams
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Post by mikef6 on Dec 1, 2021 15:37:48 GMT
“Whispering Smith” Whispering Co. and National Broadcasting Company (NBC). May 8, 1961 to October 30, 1961. This western series starring Audie Murphy lasted for just one 26 episode season. The season was shot in 1959 but didn’t reach TV screens (via NBC) until 1961. This was Audie's only foray into series television. It is the only western series I own on home video.  |
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towncaller
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@lostcauses
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Post by towncaller on Dec 3, 2021 21:37:45 GMT
The Whispering Smith series was a good one. It reminded me of another Movie "cowboy" who made a successful move into TV but only for two seasons as that was his choice.
Hopalong Cassidy as a TV series ran from 1952-54 and had 52 episodes, 12 actual full length features from the late 1940s that were edited to run 1/2 hour, and 40 new episodes with Edgar Buchanan as Red Conners, Hoppy's sidekick, whereas Andy Clyde was the edited feature film's sidekick.
William Boyd, as Hopalong, made the character a real winner, though nothing like the book character. He lasted from 1935 until the TCV series, and then afterwards in public appearances until his death in 1972. He was often considered America's favorite cowboy due to great popularity among kids and parents who saw him as a positive role model. His "Hoppy" films were usually had top production values, and hold up well for their age. He was smart enough to retain rights to much of his work and became wealthy from that.
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Post by mikef6 on Dec 4, 2021 6:09:00 GMT
The Whispering Smith series was a good one. It reminded me of another Movie "cowboy" who made a successful move into TV but only for two seasons as that was his choice. Hopalong Cassidy as a TV series ran from 1952-54 and had 52 episodes, 12 actual full length features from the late 1940s that were edited to run 1/2 hour, and 40 new episodes with Edgar Buchanan as Red Conners, Hoppy's sidekick, whereas Andy Clyde was the edited feature film's sidekick. William Boyd, as Hopalong, made the character a real winner, though nothing like the book character. He lasted from 1935 until the TCV series, and then afterwards in public appearances until his death in 1972. He was often considered America's favorite cowboy due to great popularity among kids and parents who saw him as a positive role model. His "Hoppy" films were usually had top production values, and hold up well for their age. He was smart enough to retain rights to much of his work and became wealthy from that. William Boyd had played Hopalong Cassidy and nothing else in movies for 13 years before the “B” western theater market dried up. He was aging, typecast, and out of work. At that point, he pulled one of the shrewdest moves in just about any actor’s career. He bought the “Hopalong” trademark and the rights to all his old movies then took them to that new-fangled contraption, television. It made him rich and more popular than ever because TV in its infancy badly needed programming to fill its available broadcast time.
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Post by Penn Guinn on Dec 4, 2021 6:50:12 GMT
His cameo in The Greatest Show on Earth as Hopalong Cassidy would be the final feature film appearance of William Boyd. William Boyd, who had become enormously popular playing the character Hopalong Cassidy in a series of films and on television, contributed his cameo in this film -- as Hoppy -- as a favor to director Cecil B. DeMille. This was to repay DeMille for having cast him in the showcase role of Simon of Cyrene in DeMille's production of The King of Kings (1927) nearly a quarter of a century earlier. The Simon of Cyrene role in the earlier DeMille production had contributed enormously to Boyd's film career. |
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towncaller
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Post by towncaller on Dec 6, 2021 17:02:35 GMT
One of my favorite one-season westerns was Cimmaron City, 1958-59, 26 episodes, starring George Montgomery as the mayor & John Smith as Sheriff (before he became popular in Laramie). Cimmaron City in the Oklahoma panhandle is booming due to oil and gold and hopes to become capital of the future state of Oklahoma. Matthew Rockford is the son of the city's founder; he's now mayor and a major cattle rancher.
Another one based on a similar idea was Cimmaron Strip, 1967-68, 23 episodes at 90 mins each. This one had Stewart Whitman as the tough, but fair, Marshal Jim Crown. Whitman really went all out in his portrayal and makes the series enjoyable.
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Dec 6, 2021 18:04:24 GMT
Lancer 2 seasons 1968-70 51 episodes. The show was recently prominently featured in Quentin Tarantino's Once Upon a Time in Hollywood
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Post by Penn Guinn on Dec 6, 2021 19:35:32 GMT
The Deputy (1959-61)Nominally starring HENRY FONDA but .... "That was the Arizona territory in 1880, and I was its chief marshal." So began this western series starring Henry Fonda as Simon Fry. Unfortunately, Fonda's character was fully integrated into the plot in only six of the episodes of the first season and thirteen in season two. In all other episodes he appeared only briefly, generally at the start of the episode and again at the close. Fonda did narrate most episodes. Fonda worked for ten weeks on season one, for example, shooting all of his scenes during that time, which left the rest of the year free for film and theater work. While Allen Case tried hard as the title character, Clay McCord, the series is well- known for the substantial differences in quality between what the series producers (and Fonda himself) came to call the "Fonda" and "Non- Fonda" episodes.
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Dec 6, 2021 21:34:28 GMT
Trackdown starring Robert Culp as a Texas Ranger. Two seasons 1957-59
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towncaller
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@lostcauses
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Post by towncaller on Dec 8, 2021 18:38:25 GMT
Trackdown starring Robert Culp as a Texas Ranger. Two seasons 1957-59 That was also a good series. Culp himself had parts in several TV westerns as a "character actor" in, eg, The Rifleman and Gunsmoke. He played a real bad character in a Gunsmoke episode where he sets up Marshall Dillon in a framed hanging. Of course he gets it in the end in a satisfying denouement.
His character in Trackdown is from an episode of Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, Badge of Honor, season 1, episode 27.
Culp also was story contributor or a writer of several TV western episodes
And certainly we can remember two of his best guest star episodes being from The Outer Limits, The Architects of Fear and Demon with a Glass Hand.
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Post by taylorfirst1 on Dec 8, 2021 19:51:59 GMT
Trackdown starring Robert Culp as a Texas Ranger. Two seasons 1957-59 That was also a good series. Culp himself had parts in several TV westerns as a "character actor" in, eg, The Rifleman and Gunsmoke. He played a real bad character in a Gunsmoke episode where he sets up Marshall Dillon in a framed hanging. Of course he gets it in the end in a satisfying denouement.
His character in Trackdown is from an episode of Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, Badge of Honor, season 1, episode 27.
Culp also was story contributor or a writer of several TV western episodes
And certainly we can remember two of his best guest star episodes being from The Outer Limits, The Architects of Fear and Demon with a Glass Hand.
I'm currently in the midst of a rewatch of the entire series of The Outer Limits. Culp also played a villain in a season 1 episode of The Man From UNCLE and another in Bonanza. Of course he also starred in I Spy.
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Post by Richard Kimble on Feb 12, 2022 22:20:30 GMT
The Rebel and Yancy Derringer are always my nominees for this category, along with Alias Smith and Jones -- my generation's Maverick.
Black Saddle is OK. The not-always amiable relationship between the two main characters is notable. Trivia tidbit: in the pilot Clay Culhane was played by Chris Alcaide, perennial western villain who must have been in a dozen Riflemans. I guess Dick Powell decided to go with the conventional male lead Breck rather than take a chance with Alcaide.
Law Of The Plainsman was a Rifleman spinoff that used the same format (the little girl is Sam Buckheart's Mark/surrogate child). I actually prefer LOTP -- the plots were at least more varied than the standard Rifleman Outlaw comes to town/Boom... Boom boom on the bass drum/Micah can't handle it/Boom... Boom boom/Lucas has to take his place and kills 20 people. LOTP also has a great theme song.
Restless Gun starred John Payne and was fairly popular but Payne had a falling out with Universal over profits from the series and threatened a lawsuit. He settled for a rumored payment of $1M but the show was ended.
I'm a Rory Calhoun fan so I like The Texan, although I've only seen a few episodes. The show's ratings were respectable but Calhoun quit b/c he wanted to lighten his workload. This would prove to be a career mistake.
Johnny Ringo was the first series produced by Aaron Spelling. It's not bad.
A Man Called Shenandoah, the western Fugitive, has Robert Horton as an amnesiac wandering the west trying to learn his identity. The amnesia angle gives the show an ambience of alienation not often found in westerns.
A little remembered nominee: The Adventures Of Jim Bowie was an attempt to repeat the success of Disney's Davy Crockett. I'm a sucker for old New Orleans stories so I probably rate it higher than it deserves. Certainly the production was modest -- I don't think it left the Desilu lot the entire first season. Yancy Derringer (also filmed at Desilu) was better, but TAOJB is entertaining. In one episode Jim meets John J. Audubon, while in another he has to stop a plot to assassinate Andrew Jackson.
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