January 15, 2021

Around the dial




This week begins with Garroway at Large, where Jodie looks back at Today's 30th anniversary celebration in 1982, a gala celebration with most of the show's living former hosts, including the original three stars, Dave, Jack Lescoulie and Frank Blair (who wasn't actually an original but might as well have been), and the man who thought up Today, Pat Weaver. What a collection of talent; what a historic moment. It's a great read.

As is the latest in the Hitchcock Project at bare-bones e-zine, where Jack continues his survey of the Hitchcock career of William Fay with "The $2,000,000 Defense," a terrific and nasty little tale adapted from the short story by Harold Q. Masur, with Barry Sullivan and a very serious Leslie Nielsen.

Last night we watched the first season finale of the psychiatric drama The Eleventh Hour, which might as well be the last episode of all time, since the second and final season hasn't been issued on DVD, with no indication it ever will be. At Comfort TV, David gives his own review of the show. Purchase or pass? See what he thinks.

I have a shelf full of Ed McBain's famous 87th Precinct crime novels, so of course I also have the one and only season of the 87th Precinct TV series, and that series is the topic at Television's New Frontier: The 1960. One of the challenges that the review touches on is that McBain's cast of characters is so vast that it becomes difficult to narrow it down for the series. However, any series with Robert Lansing, even if he doesn't star in every episode, is bound to be a good one.

At A Shroud of Thoughts, Terence has a very interesting article on how Bewitched and Batman saved ABC (literally) in the 1960s. Despite the fact that the network had offered some very good series over the years, some of which were also quite creative for the time, it seemed destined to always be a distant third to CBS and NBC—if, that is, it survived at all. Things began to change with Bewitched and Batman, and they kept on changing.

Always nice to end on a light note, and here's one from Shadow & Substance: the seven times Rod Serling didn't say "In The Twilight Zone" at an episode’s end. You probably didn't know you needed to know that, but now that you've read it, you can't believe how you got along for so long without knowing it. TV  

1 comment:

Thanks for writing! Drive safely!