Wed 18 Apr 2018
OTR and TV Reviews by Michael Shonk: FOUR FAILED PILOTS.
Posted by Steve under Old Time Radio , Reviews , TV mysteries , TV Science Fiction & Fantasy[9] Comments
by Michael Shonk
It’s pilot season at the major TV networks as the networks look for new shows for the 2018-19 season. Here is a link to Deadline’s “Primetime pilot panic†where you can read what each network is looking at for next season:
http://deadline.com/category/primetime-pilot-panic/
The creation of the pilot dates back to radio days when audition shows were used to find a sponsor or stations to support the show as a regularly appearing series. While radio used the word “audition†for the first example of the possible series, TV uses pilot from “pilot project.â€
In the summer of 1940 CBS aired FORECAST, a series of radio episodes with the hope the audience would help them become a network series. Of these auditions two would become hits and continue to be remembered today, SUSPENSE and DUFFY’S TAVERN.
Below is DEDUCTION DELUXE, an episode from FORECAST second and final season. Despite its pleas to the radio audience DEDUCTION DELUXE did not survive for a second episode.
DEDUCTION DELUXE “Problem of the Painted Poodle.†CBS Radio, July 28, 1941, Monday at 9pm (Eastern). Cast: Adolphe Menjou as Roger Boone, Verree Teasdale as Twyla Boone. Other Voices include: Arthur Q. Bryan, Verna Telton, and Gerald Mohr. Written by Keith Fowler and Frank Galen.
The episode sounded like a vaudeville sketch with its simple character types and non-stop patter of gags, many still funny. The mystery of who painted a rich lady’s poodle green was better than average as the writers for the most part played fair with the clues.
Real life married couple Adolphe Menjou and Verree Teasdale certainly had the right chemistry as PI Roger Boone and his wife Twyla Boone. The fatal flaw for the show was in the character of husband Roger Boone, a man who handled “clues, blondes and horses with equal enthusiasm.†Twyla seemed resigned to her husband sleeping with other women but I doubt the 1941 radio audience was as forgiving.
RUSSELL. Paramount Television – CBS Films Production; date unknown. Fess Parker as Charles Russell, Beverly Garland as Bonnie, Jay C. Flippen as Windy, and Paul Carr as Tracey. Created and written by Borden Chase. Directed by Arthur Hiller. Executive Producer: Gordon Kay. Produced by Frank O’Connor.
I can find nothing about this pilot beyond the on screen credits and the copyright is unreadable. The pilot was done by Paramount. Fess Parker worked for Paramount between 1958 and 1962. The credit for CBS Films and the sales pitch epilogue probably makes this a pilot for a possible syndicated series. Since Fess Parker was starring in MR SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON in 1962 we can narrow the time for this show even further to 1958-61.
While the story and characters were overly simple the show had a certain charm helped by a talented cast and a script that kept things moving.
Fess Parker played Charles Russell one of the greatest artists of the Old West, and a man of many talents and experiences. He was a good man who was as good with the gun as he was with a brush. Russell wrote about his times and travels through the Old West in books such as TRAILS PLOWED UNDER. Link from Project Gutenberg Australia: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks07/0700941h.html.
In an interesting twist, the premise of the series was not to be just a loosely based biography but instead the stories were to be based on Charlie Russell’s artwork. The pilot episode featured the famous painting “Innocent Allies.â€
The story had Charlie partnering with a man called Windy to run a cattle drive. When Charlie and a young hothead cowboy witness a stage robbery, the young cowboy overreacts and runs off to stop the robbery. His gunfire starts a stampede. Charlie warns others of the approaching stampede and rescues the beautiful and feisty Bonnie, the new owner of the saloon. Charlie tries to help the young man grow up while he paints for Bonnie “Innocent Allies†– his eyewitness account of the stage holdup.
RUSSELL had the makings for a successful series but Westerns were fading during the years 1958-1961 as the PI and modern detective was growing in its popularity.
GLOBAL FREQUENCY . WB, 2005 Cast: Michelle Forbes as Miranda Zero, Aimee Garcia as Aleph, Josh Hopkins as Sean Flynn and Jenni Baird as Dr. Katrina Finch. * The on-air credits were clipped from this YouTube copy of the 45-minute pilot. The series was created by Warren Ellis based on the popular award winning graphic novel series. John Rogers wrote the script, or at least he was the main writer for the pilot that was directed by Nelson McCormick. (Sources: IMdb and Wikipedia.)
Before WB had made its decision about the fate of GLOBAL FREQUENCY the episode was leaked to the Internet. According to an email by creator Warren Ellis sent out to fans he claimed WB was so unhappy over the leak they rejected the pilot (CBR.com, July 29, 2005). It would not be the first time or the last Hollywood egos destroyed a quality program.
Here is a YouTube clip explaining the premise.
Global Frequency is a secret independent organization created to do the dirty jobs that threaten the world. Run by Miranda Zero, a former top spy, with the aid of Aleph, a young female computer expert who from a high tech base assists and contacts field agents.
Global Frequency’s agents are a group of people with various talents and connections from all over the world waiting for that call that they are needed to save the world, or at least part of it. This is one of my favorite plot devices and the way it is handled would have hooked me on the series.
The story began when disgraced ex-cop Sean finds the dead body of a Global Frequency agent. It seems San Francisco will be destroyed in 55 minutes. Sean joins in to help find the man who killed the agent and now is a threat to destroy San Francisco.
Everything works here. The writing based on an award winning graphic novel series, the cast, the direction, the production, all are excellent. The characters are likable and developed. This even has the most elusive of all qualities, excellent chemistry between the actors.
Every time I watch a TV thriller like GLOBAL FREQUENCY that blends technology and the human hero so entertainingly, I remember the objections that Hugh O’Brian had during SEARCH (NBC 1972) that the technology not upstage him and again I realize how better SEARCH could have been.
CALLAHAN. ABC – Carsey/Werner Company Production in association with Finnegan Associates, September 9, 1982. Cast: Jamie Lee Curtis as Rachel Bartlett, Hart Bocher as Callahan, John Harkins as Marcus Vox, and Peter Maloney as Mustaf. Created by Ken Finkleman. Developed and Written by David Misch and Ken Finkleman. Directed by Harry Winer
This funny pilot spoof of the Indiana Jones movie unfairly faced some challenges that had nothing to do with the quality of the episode entitled “Appointment In Rangoon.â€
Plucky innocent Rachel Bartlett applies for the job of assistant to the Director of Research (Callahan) at the Regis Foundation. The job interview quickly expands from Callahan’s academic office into a dangerous thrill-filled chase across the world.
Overly focused on his work, Callahan is clueless to how unaccustomed Miss Bartlett (as Callahan calls her) is to the action. But Rachel does not let the constant dangers to her life or her torn and increasingly disappearing dress stop her from helping Callahan to recover the object, stop the villain and save the world.
However quality writing and acting does not always lead a pilot to series. CALLAHAN wanted to become an ABC series for the 1982-83 season. But TV cop spoof POLICE SQUAD had just bombed on ABC during the 1981-82 season. ABC’s pilots for the 1982-83 season had contained more than one Indiana Jones inspired pilot. ABC chose the action drama TALES OF THE GOLDEN MONKEY.
YouTube continues to be a great place to find failed pilots, so coming soon I will look at four more failed pilots from the past.
April 18th, 2018 at 9:00 pm
An interesting collection. CALLAHAN reminds me of an earlier series CLIFFHANGER that tried to recreate the look and feel of the serials.
You have to wonder about Curtis career arc of this had been picked up rather than TAKES OF THE BRASS MONKEY or CBS BRING ‘EM BACK ALIVE.I
RUSSEL is a real curiosity. I wonder if this would have resulted in other art based series like REMINGTON, LATREC, VAN GOGH, or DALI? Incidentally Robert Taylor also played Russell in an episode of DEATH VALLEY DAYS, and I seem to remember his showing up on another series, might have been THE WESTERNER.
April 18th, 2018 at 11:35 pm
Robert Taylor did THE DETECTIVES (ABC 59-62) and he did four episodes of THE ROBERT TAYLOR SHOW that was cancelled before it aired (it was to feature the Dept of Health, Education and Welfare but NBC discovered the producers didn’t get HEW permission to use the official files so cancelled it.
David, he did a character for two episodes on HONDO.
Jamie Lee Curtis has had a nice career. It is nice she is cool with the horror queen title. If CALLAHAN had been a success she would not have the time to do A FISH CALLED WANDA (1988)so it all worked out for the best.
April 19th, 2018 at 11:31 am
Russell:
Actually, this pilot was made at Paramount, not by Paramount.
You see, Paramount Pictures was among the last holdouts against having their own filmed TV productions.
They were more than willing to rent out their facilities and technical talent to outside producers like CBS Films, who also made shows at MGM (Twilight Zone, Rawhide), Twentieth-Fox (the first few years of Perry Mason, among others), Revue (when they were using the old Republic lot), and an indie outfit called Filmaster.
Ultimately, of course, CBS and Paramount came to own the whole kit and caboodle – but that’s another story …
By the way, that’s Dr. Frank Baxter who’s doing the sales pitch in the Russell epilogue.
If you’re my age (or older), you may remember Dr. Baxter from the Bell Science Specials, which we all saw in our high school science classes (and sometimes even on TV).
… or, you might recall his erudite introduction to Universal’s S-F ‘classic’ The Mole People (“It’s a fiction – it’s a fable – it’s a breath mint …”)(OK, that last one was a joke …).
No idea whether Dr. Baxter would have had some function in a Russell series (e.g., narrator).
Callahan! (Callahan!):
It was a true joy to hear that wonderfully inane theme music after all these years.
The age-old question arises: what were they gonna do for thirteen episodes? (or even six, comes to that?)
Making one guess: I’m figuring that fast-talker John Moschitta (who turns up here at about the 19:00 mark) would have appeared in most episodes for a minute or so, wearing different guises, to do some high-speed exposition (that’s what I’d have done, anyway).
Noting here that star Hart Bochner was Lloyd Bochner’s son, I’ll make the guess that Dad would have turned up somewhere along the line – with or without cookbook.
Oh well, that was 36 years ago (thirty-six friggin’ years!) – I guess we’re all more sophisticated nowadays (?) …
… And That Is Why They Call Him –
C A L L A H A N ! ! !
(CALLAHAN!!!)
(callahan!!!)
April 19th, 2018 at 2:05 pm
Good catch Mike about Paramount. I can’t read the copyright but RUSSELL looks like it came out of the late fifties, early sixties. You have any guess?
CALLAHAN would have had the same problem most spoofs had unless they follow the GET SMART formula of stupid characters and slapstick. I recently watched the first season of HOGAN’S HEROES and was impressed with the level of the humor, but by the second season it was all mock the Nazis and formula comedy full of catch phrases.
April 19th, 2018 at 4:32 pm
For what it’s worth — and Michael, I assume you found this as well — here are the complete credits for RUSSELL, as compiled by the people at this website:
https://westernstv.com/the-forsaken-westerns/the-forsaken-westerns-russell-tv-show/
Directed by
Arthur Hiller
Bob Terry … (segment director)
Writing Credits (in alphabetical order)
Borden Chase
Bob Terry … (creator)
Cast
Bob Terry … Himself – Host
Fess Parker … Charles Marion Russell
Jay C. Flippen … Windy
Beverly Garland … Bonnie
Paul Carr … Tracey Blue
George Wallace
James Anderson
Joseph Ruskin
Frank Chase
Joseph Breen
Produced by
Gordon Kay … executive producer
Frank O’Connor … producer
Bob Terry … executive producer
Johnie Terry … executive producer
Cinematography by
Jack MacKenzie … director of photography
Film Editing by
Tholen Gladden … (edited by)
Bob Terry … (addtional editing)
Art Direction by
Carl Anderson … (art direction)
Hal Pereira … (art direction)
Set Decoration by
Sam Comer … (decoration)
Frank R. McKelvy … (decoration)
Makeup Department
Nellie Manley … hair stylist
Wally Westmore … makeup artist
Production Management
Howard P. Alston … production manager (as Howard Alston)
William Mull … unit production manager
Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Arthur Jacobson … assistant director
Sound Department
Floyd Reynolds … sound recording
Special Effects by
John P. Fulton … special effects
Bob Terry … special effects
Camera and Electrical Department
Johnie Terry … camera
April 19th, 2018 at 7:01 pm
Michaels
Sorry I wasn’t clear, I meant Charles Russell, not Robert Taylor showed up as a character at least once beyond the DVD episide. I think it was on THE WESTERNER, but I’m not sure.
But thanks for the info anyway. THE DETECTIVES was an interesting series that attracted some good guest stars notably Edward G. Robinson as an aging gangster trying to return home to a quiet retirement after prison. Of course Adam West was famously one of the detectives under Taylor.
April 19th, 2018 at 7:10 pm
Steve, I did not find that website. IMdb does have information about their YouTube channel. I went there and was unable to find the episode there.
Forsaken Western was created by Bob Terry not this episode. Terry does an introduction so some of these credits are for the modern segment introducing it.
The copy I watched on YouTube did not have the intro but once something shows up at YT it can disappear and reappear often.
I need to go back and watch the intro (if its there) but the written description didn’t mention any date for when it was filmed. Looks like I need to do some more research.
April 19th, 2018 at 8:42 pm
Michael
I was confused as to where and how Bob Terry fit in. Thanks for unconfusig me!
April 19th, 2018 at 7:30 pm
6. David, what I love about researching is even when I am looking for the wrong things I find something interesting. I have an interest in series that were cancelled before they aired. Now I can add the ROBERT TAYLOR SHOW (four episodes filmed for NBC that never aired) to my growing list.
I am curious about Charles Russell TV appearance on TV. THE WESTERNER was one of the best TV Westerns I have seen and exactly what you expect from Sam Peckinpah while almost behaving himself for TV.