Speaker 1: It's Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2: The final hour of night Side is here six minutes
Speaker 2: into itself. I am Morgan White Junior. The announcer just
Speaker 2: told you that my guest, we're having fun here. They've
Speaker 2: let the inmates run the asylum. Is this Arkham? I
Speaker 2: hear there are a lot of funny going on going
Speaker 2: on at Arkham. And my guest is mister Ed Robertson.
Speaker 2: I've had him on many a time. He is a
Speaker 2: very prolific gentleman. Has written a great number of books
Speaker 2: around television programs of the past five decades. And we
Speaker 2: are talking about this book Manufaction, focusing on these four
Speaker 2: TV series The Magician, HARRYO, The Untouchables and Run for
Speaker 2: Your Life, and within those shows because of well known
Speaker 2: producers and actors who've been in multiple series, other shows
Speaker 2: have been mentioned. So if there's something about one of
Speaker 2: the easily dozen of more shows you've heard us talk about,
Speaker 2: call in like this. Next lady has Allison welcome aboard,
Speaker 2: hope you Thanksgiving with well?
Speaker 3: Oh, then I dropped the phone. Hello, I know I
Speaker 3: just called it, but nobodys calling you, and you know
Speaker 3: I love this sort of thing. I have your I
Speaker 3: have your Terry Mason books, and that's really it's really amazing.
Speaker 4: Oh thank you.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I wish I we somebody to do a book
Speaker 3: about the Untouchables. I wanted to talk a bit about that.
Speaker 3: But I know this.
Speaker 2: Book, this book covers the Untouchables.
Speaker 3: Okay, is it like a comprehensive thing or just overviewer,
Speaker 3: because I wish I had an episode guys.
Speaker 2: But I mean I found an episode guy in here
Speaker 2: for the original series and this series that came back
Speaker 2: just for two years.
Speaker 3: I didn't even know there was a nineties one. Yeah, no,
Speaker 3: I mean I just actually, about three months ago I
Speaker 3: watched I watched the entire series of Untouchables. Again. This
Speaker 3: is what I do. I live in the past and
Speaker 3: then I'm only.
Speaker 4: You will you will love this book, Alison.
Speaker 3: Okay, I'm living in the past because I'm living in
Speaker 3: I'm watching a show from the nineteen fifty is about
Speaker 3: the nineteen thirty so that's like a double whammy or something.
Speaker 3: But no, but I mean some of the villains and
Speaker 3: things are on now. Of course mister Gordon was always
Speaker 3: good with Gordon, Yes, but they're just I just watched some,
Speaker 3: you know, some of them with kacky. Just show out
Speaker 3: a few and you'll probably know, right, because usually I
Speaker 3: geek out about this thing and Morgan catches a lot
Speaker 3: of it. But it's hardly a bit I can talk
Speaker 3: to you about these things. There are some amazing episodes.
Speaker 2: This is Bizarrow rather Allison, let me tell it something, Okay.
Speaker 2: Allison tries to get as many words in as she can.
Speaker 4: She does a very good job of it.
Speaker 2: And I just want you to know you have to
Speaker 2: learn to speak. Alison.
Speaker 3: You were forty five RPMs and everybody else is thirty three,
Speaker 3: and I think quite if you were sixteen, but let's
Speaker 3: not go into that.
Speaker 2: I would say you're going at seventy eight.
Speaker 3: But okay, it's just the way I am, especially when
Speaker 3: I get into things i'm really interested in. It's just
Speaker 3: well anyway.
Speaker 5: Blah blah blah.
Speaker 3: So I was thinking that, you know, like some stories
Speaker 3: episodes like the Lily Dallas story, I can't remember who
Speaker 3: the actress was now, but whoever was was so fierce
Speaker 3: in that. Do you remember who the actress was in
Speaker 3: the Lily Dallas story?
Speaker 4: For some reason, I want to say Barbara Stanwick, but
Speaker 4: I'm no, it wasn't.
Speaker 3: No, No, no, no, I was trying to look it
Speaker 3: up on the DVD, but I didn't have time. But anyway,
Speaker 3: it was she was in the last season where it
Speaker 3: got kind of whimpy. And it's so weird how they were,
Speaker 3: you know, how they were criticizing how violent it was,
Speaker 3: even though you almost never saw blood, you know, and it.
Speaker 4: Was all blacks, I know. And in fact, Walter Grahman,
Speaker 4: who was one of the great directors of the Golden Age,
Speaker 4: he he's by the way. June Benson, Norma Crane were
Speaker 4: the guest stars in the Little in the Lily Dallas story,
Speaker 4: as well as Barbara Parkins and Debt and the Great
Speaker 4: Dad's Greer and Larry Parks and Larry Parks who played
Speaker 4: al Jos and Joel You were.
Speaker 3: Kind of heartbreaking because he loved the Lily Dallas the character,
Speaker 3: and then he was really really cool.
Speaker 4: But one of the great things about the Untouchables is
Speaker 4: because they had to they had to do things within
Speaker 4: standards of nineteen sixty nineteen sixty one. They they would
Speaker 4: some of the gruesome violence that the that Bruce Gordon
Speaker 4: would do, they would do off camera and and and
Speaker 4: so you would play off the reaction of the actors
Speaker 4: witnessing the gruesome murder, and so as the viewer that
Speaker 4: left that left it to the viewer's imaginations to what
Speaker 4: they saw. It was far more effective than seeing all
Speaker 4: the blood and gore.
Speaker 3: Oh sometimes they would get counted the Tommy gun, so
Speaker 3: they really would, even though you were absolutely absolutely, like
Speaker 3: Philip pie in one of the early episodes, got really
Speaker 3: cut down that way. But I just I want to
Speaker 3: ask you of it. A couple more weird episodes of it.
Speaker 3: They were crazy. There's one called Strangleholds with Ricardo Montleban
Speaker 3: and two ubiquitous character acts from the time, Philip Pine
Speaker 3: and Kevin Hagen and the two skip man or they
Speaker 3: were calling forces. The two enforces in that are obviously
Speaker 3: in love. Do you know that episode? It's so bizarre. No,
Speaker 3: they're they're completely it's in clearly a gay episode of
Speaker 3: The Untouchables in about nineteen.
Speaker 4: Sixty, very near episode time.
Speaker 3: Very amazing episode. I mean, nothing's ever said latently, but
Speaker 3: it's amazing. And my favorite episode actually is because I
Speaker 3: always liked flooky stuff. So I'm going back a bit
Speaker 3: farther and my favorite episode was the The Underground Court
Speaker 3: with Joan Bondell, which was in Richard Devon. It was
Speaker 3: essentially oursonnicon o'lace meets meets the Untouchables.
Speaker 4: It was so sy.
Speaker 3: I just love that episode.
Speaker 4: Well. And as we said before being Touchables, there was
Speaker 4: another example of an anthology show with one or two
Speaker 4: regular characters. Robert Stack was Robert Stack and whoever was
Speaker 4: the whoever played the because they changed the actors who
Speaker 4: played the supporting on touching most from year to year.
Speaker 4: But Robert Stack, as this was the constant. But you
Speaker 4: would have all these great guest stars like Rip Torn
Speaker 4: and Neamyah purs Off and he was everywhere Montgomery and
Speaker 4: and and and and all of that, and Robert Stack
Speaker 4: was the constant. So there was It was a great
Speaker 4: anthology show you would love. We go into it and
Speaker 4: Men of Action, which you will like. Al I believe,
Speaker 4: so I.
Speaker 3: Said to another episode, Now, what's that one called on?
Speaker 3: It was? But Elizabeth Montgomery is involved with David White
Speaker 3: in that.
Speaker 4: Yes, I mean right, yes, I'm I'm I'm I'm going
Speaker 4: off memory. But she got she got an Emmy nomination
Speaker 4: for it. Okay, she got an Emmy nomination for it.
Speaker 4: And I will probably remember it when we go to
Speaker 4: break in two seconds, but I'm sorry.
Speaker 3: And then the two part early on about the you know,
Speaker 3: Zangara attempting to kill Roosevelt.
Speaker 4: The Rusty Heller story, the.
Speaker 3: Rusty Heller story, great episode, and that the one they
Speaker 3: called The Unheared Assassin, the two parter where it's Sangara.
Speaker 2: Because because who ever wound up Alison for tonight the
Speaker 2: moon spring is still unfurrowed.
Speaker 3: Okay, but no, but come on, the Unheared assass And
Speaker 3: it was a great two parter because it really in
Speaker 3: the early days they wove in more of the real history,
Speaker 3: and later on they had it, you know, they came
Speaker 3: up with original stories because they'd run out of a
Speaker 3: lot of it. But Joe Mantell and that is Don Gara,
Speaker 3: I thought was amazing and uh, another ubiquitous character actor,
Speaker 3: you know, two parter because he was gonna tried to
Speaker 3: kill Roosevelt and he ended up killing Anton Stermax, the
Speaker 3: mayor of Chicago instead. Right, so I just still don't
Speaker 3: know them anyway. But hey, no, but I could do
Speaker 3: this you're talking about You talked to him your guests
Speaker 3: all the time, and boy, I could do this all
Speaker 3: the time too. You know some weird calling line where
Speaker 3: you call in and just talk about all TV shows
Speaker 3: all the time.
Speaker 4: I guess you as a friend of mine and said, Allison,
Speaker 4: you have good knowledge. You have you have very good
Speaker 4: knowledge about the Untouchables. You will love manufaction.
Speaker 3: Okay, thanks so much, thank you. Good to talk to you.
Speaker 3: I do you like to get a more word in
Speaker 3: the wife Morgan.
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna say it's time for a break.
Speaker 3: Allison, call be seeing you, okay, And that's from the prisoner.
Speaker 4: Be Seen Patrick. We're going see.
Speaker 2: We could do this forever. You're lucky. I don't live
Speaker 2: out there. I'd be knocking on your front door all
Speaker 2: the time. Six four ten thirty or eight eight eight
Speaker 2: nine two nine ten thirty. You can do what Glenn did,
Speaker 2: what Allison has done, and many others all night long.
Speaker 2: Give us a call. We have touched upon so many performers,
Speaker 2: actors whose names you know may not remember, and at
Speaker 2: least a dozen different classic TV series. The main four
Speaker 2: of The Magician, HARRYO, The Untouchables, and Run for Your
Speaker 2: Life are in this book Minivac, written by Ed Robertson.
Speaker 2: And go buy the book, buy it for a friend
Speaker 2: or a relative that way, give it to him for
Speaker 2: a gift and borrow it back after Christmas is over. Absolutely,
Speaker 2: time and temperature eleven fifteen forty two degrees.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Ray live from the Window World
Speaker 1: night Side Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: It's Morgan. I'm here tomorrow night as well. I will
Speaker 2: have Bob and Donna Jenks will be speaking with them
Speaker 2: about catering and maybe after today. With all the relative
Speaker 2: relatives coming to your house and dishes and footmarks on
Speaker 2: the rug, you might want to have someone someone do
Speaker 2: it for you so you don't have to lift the finger.
Speaker 2: Bill and Bo Winnaker they will be here, and Bill
Speaker 2: called in earlier tonight, and my buddy Cleo Campbell will
Speaker 2: be here right now. I've got Ed Robertson and we've
Speaker 2: got Brian and Dennis as our next caller. Brian, Happy Thanksgiving,
Speaker 2: Welcome aboard.
Speaker 5: Hey, how you guys doing.
Speaker 2: We're just crazy?
Speaker 5: Hey, I got a tri your questions for you? I
Speaker 5: guess there does he know the great act of Brian McKenzie.
Speaker 4: Name rings Bell, Well that's my name.
Speaker 5: I'm just joking with.
Speaker 2: You, guys.
Speaker 4: Oh there you go.
Speaker 5: Okay, I'm having a great time, Morgan, You've got a
Speaker 5: great guest, and I'm going to continue listening. I just
Speaker 5: thought I hit around and pull that out there.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you for that. Okay, by wait wait Brian,
Speaker 2: before you go, Glen, do you remember any of these
Speaker 2: four TV series Harry O, the Magician, Run for Your Life,
Speaker 2: or The Untouchables, The Untouchables? What about the Untouchables comes
Speaker 2: to mind?
Speaker 5: Well, I'm sixty seven on my mind not as good
Speaker 5: as it used to be, but I just remember the
Speaker 5: name of the program, you know, and me and my
Speaker 5: family probably watched it a many times. But now you
Speaker 5: got me.
Speaker 2: Do you know who the executive producer of that show was?
Speaker 5: Don't tell me, Brian McKenzie, no.
Speaker 2: No, no, but I am going to tell you a
Speaker 2: name you should know, Dissey earn Is.
Speaker 5: Oh wow, I love Lucy Sho.
Speaker 2: So tell you what. You keep listening because I'm going
Speaker 2: to have Ed go into a story that a lot
Speaker 2: of people know of but necessarily don't know the correct story.
Speaker 2: So thank you for your call.
Speaker 5: And Morgan, yes, real quick, if I may say, you
Speaker 5: know how you know sometimes I'll go to a bar
Speaker 5: and the kids would be talking about college, you know. Okay,
Speaker 5: so I said to them. There were three of them,
Speaker 5: two guys and a girl. I said, I went to
Speaker 5: abbed And five minutes later the girl weaned over and said, too,
Speaker 5: what you made you in? And I said, well, I
Speaker 5: didn't makee I did go to hobbit. I walked in
Speaker 5: the front, towing off the back.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, let's all play rim shop, all right.
Speaker 4: Try to be all tip you wators on the way out.
Speaker 2: How about that? Could you get into the story about
Speaker 2: how the real life dieern Is Junior and the real
Speaker 2: life son of al Capone Or at the same bastion
Speaker 2: of learning and one was talking to the other. They
Speaker 2: knew each other, and al Capone Junior made a request
Speaker 2: of his friend don Is Jor.
Speaker 4: Yes, he told Desi not to not to do the
Speaker 4: show because she He said, if you do the show,
Speaker 4: it will come back to bite you, and uh, some
Speaker 4: unsavory people may do you harm and I won't be
Speaker 4: able to do anything to help you. And DESI thought
Speaker 4: about it, but he figured. But but he you know,
Speaker 4: he he had he had a very viable property. And
Speaker 4: this was around the time that Elliott Nessa's book with
Speaker 4: Oscar Frehley had hit the market and did very very well,
Speaker 4: was the best seller, and that led to CBS developing
Speaker 4: it for the Desilu Playhouse. And Desi figured, Desi was
Speaker 4: a very very shrewd man, as you will know, Morgan,
Speaker 4: and Desi figured, if I don't do this, somebody else will.
Speaker 4: And uh, it's thought that he didn't take the threat seriously,
Speaker 4: but he said, let's let's let's worry about what's in
Speaker 4: front of me and make the best show that I can.
Speaker 4: And he did. And Desi lived a good twenty years
Speaker 4: after after the a good twenty five years after he
Speaker 4: did The Untouchable.
Speaker 2: So some people may remember Desi looking old and frail
Speaker 2: when he was doing the publicity tour for my book,
Speaker 2: had Piography.
Speaker 4: A book, a book, a book, which I think is
Speaker 4: one of the coolest titles ever. It's just a book,
Speaker 4: a book, a book, but it is.
Speaker 2: But he looks so.
Speaker 4: Frail, yeah, yeah, well, you know, he he he was
Speaker 4: one of those you know, two or three pack that
Speaker 4: pack of day smokers, right, and that makes its toll,
Speaker 4: you know. And but he he we may have mentioned
Speaker 4: this before on the air, but he was the one.
Speaker 4: He was the one who he did not originate the
Speaker 4: idea of filming three cameras, but he made it into
Speaker 4: an art form and he made and basically by filming
Speaker 4: I Love Lucy with three cameras on film. He he
Speaker 4: had the foresight to know that if you if you
Speaker 4: do it on film versus videotaper kinescope, doing it on film,
Speaker 4: you have a permanent record. And it made possible for
Speaker 4: rebroadcasts at the time when nobody thought nobody even thought
Speaker 4: of rebroadcasting anything, because television was considered disposable, right, But
Speaker 4: but he not only made the idea of the repeat,
Speaker 4: the summer repeat and the syndicated you know, a repeat
Speaker 4: UH possible, But because he owned the films along with
Speaker 4: CPS Lucy you know, set themselves up pretty good.
Speaker 2: And you don't think of this as in the irony.
Speaker 2: But one of the last Desilu filmed shows, of which
Speaker 2: there were so many was Star.
Speaker 4: Trek, was Star Trek and Mannix and A Mission Impossible,
Speaker 4: all of which premiered within a year of each other.
Speaker 4: And uh and at the time uh Desi had stepped down,
Speaker 4: but Lucy was running the studio in addition to starring
Speaker 4: on The Lucy Show at the time, and I think
Speaker 4: she was also doing her radio show for CBS Radio
Speaker 4: at the time. So and uh, I believe she was
Speaker 4: talking about Star Uh this is this pertains the Star
Speaker 4: Trek in particular, but uh, it was she was the
Speaker 4: one who basically gave the green light to Star Trek okay,
Speaker 4: and and she saw something in that show that nobody
Speaker 4: else did. And without her stamp of approval, there would
Speaker 4: be no Captain Kirk, there would be no Mistress Bock,
Speaker 4: there would be no franchise, there would be no Star
Speaker 4: Trek franchise in all the various you know, Star Trek
Speaker 4: movies and Star Trek spin offs and you know, sixty
Speaker 4: years of Star Trek merchandise that all began with Lucille
Speaker 4: Ball and Desilu Productions before they sold it to Mara Mountain.
Speaker 2: The funny thing about Gene Roddenberry, he was trying to
Speaker 2: who get the concept that a Western TV series that
Speaker 2: was the number one show in those years late fifties
Speaker 2: was doing and doing quite well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, he pitched it up wagon Trained to the Stars.
Speaker 4: That's right, that's right. And uh and so but so
Speaker 4: so it like Lucy, you know, Lucy was not as Lucy,
Speaker 4: by her own admission, was not as visionary as DESI was.
Speaker 4: But if you if you sat down and you explain
Speaker 4: how something would I mean like for example, I mean,
Speaker 4: uh what, she was smart enough to surround herself with
Speaker 4: you great writers like Madeline Pugh and Bob Carroll who
Speaker 4: you know, they say, Okay, Lucy's going to Lucy's gonna
Speaker 4: stomp greats with with with the woman in this, ain't that?
Speaker 4: And Lucy would say, why is that funny? And then
Speaker 4: Carol and Davis would sit would would explain it to
Speaker 4: her so to speak, and they would they would fill
Speaker 4: in all that, They would give her a picture of
Speaker 4: what they wanted her to do and want and then
Speaker 4: lose and then got it. And then she you know,
Speaker 4: from there she took all her skills as a comedian
Speaker 4: and made it the magic you know, film moment that
Speaker 4: we all know. So she was visionary in that in
Speaker 4: that respect. But with regard to Star Trek and Mission
Speaker 4: Impossible and Mannix, you know, she saw the potential on
Speaker 4: all three of those shows and they went on to
Speaker 4: be three of the biggest Well, Mission Impossible and Mandis
Speaker 4: were two of the biggest hits in the nineteen sixties.
Speaker 4: Star Trek, you know, was not a gratings hit at
Speaker 4: the time, but it blew up in in syndication.
Speaker 2: More money than every other Desilu production port side by
Speaker 2: side by, side by side times Tan, absolutely times Tan.
Speaker 2: And like you mentioned the spin offs, I mean Voyager,
Speaker 2: the separate shows of the new one below Decks. I
Speaker 2: mean I could go on.
Speaker 4: Deep Space nine with Avery Brooks also known as Hawk
Speaker 4: from Spencer of Higher Spencer for Hire, and you almost were.
Speaker 2: Hawked, you know, I told you that story you did.
Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, all right, let me let me look
Speaker 2: at the clock. I can tell this in thirty five
Speaker 2: minutes seconds. I mean I worked for an agency that
Speaker 2: was situated in the Saltensas building right next to the
Speaker 2: Massachusetts Film Borough Bureau, and I knew several people. I
Speaker 2: had left the agency for another job for the city
Speaker 2: as a matter of fact, and they were looking for
Speaker 2: a black actor who had a decent voice and was
Speaker 2: rather large personally. I think I'm diminutive, but I They
Speaker 2: tried to get me over the weekend. By the time
Speaker 2: the producers get in touch with me, they had already
Speaker 2: found Avery brook Brooks. They had hired an actor, but
Speaker 2: another role came up and he took that other role,
Speaker 2: and they were going to begin shooting later on that week,
Speaker 2: so it's kind of imperative to get somebody quick. Had
Speaker 2: I gotten the message on that Friday, since there was
Speaker 2: time ticking away, I think I would have gotten.
Speaker 4: The role, and you you would have been the one
Speaker 4: who said Spencer.
Speaker 2: No, No, no, Spence. See the difference.
Speaker 4: See the difference.
Speaker 2: Let me take my break the time. If you're one,
Speaker 2: look all in six, one, seven, two, five, four, ten
Speaker 2: thirty or eight eight, eight, nine, two, nine, ten thirty
Speaker 2: to call. We have about thirty minutes a show to
Speaker 2: go here on night Side, eleven thirty at night. Temperature
Speaker 2: is still forty two degrees.
Speaker 1: Night Side with Dan Ray on WBZ, Boston's news radio.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna tell you right now. Yeah, yeah, Morgan right
Speaker 2: Junior filling in for Dan Ray Nightside. Yes, I'm going
Speaker 2: to have Ed Robertson back with me in January. You know,
Speaker 2: I usually skip a month when I have a guest,
Speaker 2: and we'll promote men of Action again, just so I
Speaker 2: can talk to Ed and have fun. That's all I
Speaker 2: care about is having fun on radio, and he is
Speaker 2: a fun guest. See what you've done to me? Ed.
Speaker 4: I appreciate that very much, Morgan.
Speaker 2: And we've spoken about all the shows. I don't think
Speaker 2: we've spoken enough about the magician. So I'm going to
Speaker 2: kind of point a finger at the magician.
Speaker 4: All magic you're about to see is perform without trick photography.
Speaker 2: And that that was important because he Bill Bixby learned
Speaker 2: from the great Mark Wilson how to seemingly make cards appear.
Speaker 2: You hold your hands straight out and you kind of
Speaker 2: curl your fingers and puff an ason and king appear.
Speaker 2: How did that happen? Ooh, it is magic. No, it's
Speaker 2: pressed the digitation, doing something manipulation with your hands that
Speaker 2: if you could see behind the magician's hand, you would
Speaker 2: know what two cards were coming up. But you told
Speaker 2: me a story, and I'm just gonna set you up
Speaker 2: so you can take a golf club and hit the
Speaker 2: ball three hundred yards. That had the Magician stayed on
Speaker 2: it did one season. Had it stayed through a second season,
Speaker 2: what was in store for Bill Bixby with the magician?
Speaker 4: Mark Wilson, who was the he was the technical consultant
Speaker 4: on the show, and he worked with the showrunner and
Speaker 4: he was very close to Bixby. During the time The
Speaker 4: Magician was in production, there were plans for a big
Speaker 4: multi city tour where Bill Bixby would perform magic in
Speaker 4: various venues including Las Vegas. I believe in promotion for
Speaker 4: what was anticipated to be the second season of The Magician. Now,
Speaker 4: The Magician had a very it had a very interesting
Speaker 4: broadcast history that it.
Speaker 6: Was.
Speaker 4: It went to series in the spring of seventy three,
Speaker 4: around the time a writers guild strike that shut down
Speaker 4: production and curtailed production of a lot of news series
Speaker 4: at the time, including The Magician. And so by the
Speaker 4: time the strike was settled, the show was sort of
Speaker 4: in a chaotic behind the eight ball a situation. But
Speaker 4: and they changed formats, and they changed producers at least
Speaker 4: three times in the course of that one season. But
Speaker 4: and they moved it to from Tuesday nights to Monday nights,
Speaker 4: where it still faced It's still faced strong opposition against
Speaker 4: Gunsmoke and the Rookies, but apparently it did well enough
Speaker 4: to be it was considered a bubble show, which was
Speaker 4: its numbers are well enough that depending on how the
Speaker 4: pendulum swings, it may see a second season, and so
Speaker 4: by when it finished original twenty two episode season run,
Speaker 4: it looked like it was in the running for a
Speaker 4: second season, and so Wilson and Bixby and the people
Speaker 4: behind the scenes they put together this grand tour, and
Speaker 4: just before Bixby hit the road, NBC announced that they
Speaker 4: decided not to renew the show. And they were never
Speaker 4: clear why they didn't renew the show. They told Wilson
Speaker 4: and had to do with you weren't reaching the right demographics,
Speaker 4: you weren't reaching the right audience. And Wilson said, well,
Speaker 4: what exactly are you talking about? And the network was
Speaker 4: kind of vague and never gave them a straight answer,
Speaker 4: and that happens sometimes. It's just Harry OH is not
Speaker 4: renewed for a third because the people who were behind
Speaker 4: the show left the network and Fred Silverman took over.
Speaker 4: And Fred Silverman had an ax to grind I understand
Speaker 4: against David Jansen because Jansen did a show for CBS
Speaker 4: when Silverman was in charge of CBS and seventy one
Speaker 4: called O'Hara Us Treasury, which did not do well, and
Speaker 4: Silverman remembered that. And so when Silverman took over ABC
Speaker 4: and HARRYO was on the bubble. I have been told
Speaker 4: on very good authority that Silverman canceled Harry O out of.
Speaker 2: Spite because my memories of Harry oh two words, it worked. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Henry Darrow leaving. I think he left like the first
Speaker 2: half of the first year.
Speaker 4: He left around the time they moved production from San
Speaker 4: Diego to to Los Angeles. And it would not have
Speaker 4: it would not have been in the world television. It
Speaker 4: would have made as much sense as than anything else
Speaker 4: to have Henry to have Manny Quillen transferred to UH
Speaker 4: Los Angeles around the same time that Harry O moved
Speaker 4: to Los Angeles. But when they we tooled the show,
Speaker 4: Jerry Thorpe, the show runner, felt that they needed a
Speaker 4: little They needed an actor who provided more of a
Speaker 4: contrast to David Jansen. You know, Darrow was a good actor,
Speaker 4: but Darrow was kind of low key. David Jameson was
Speaker 4: low key. They felt they needed someone who would be
Speaker 4: a counterpuncher, counterpuncher, who would was who would be a
Speaker 4: cool contrast David Jansen. And that was Anthony Zerby And
Speaker 4: and the show really took off and found its footing.
Speaker 4: And even though it went even though a lot of
Speaker 4: the interesting trappings of the first season went by the
Speaker 4: wayside when it moved to Los Angeles. The fact that
Speaker 4: this marvelous, you know, relationship between Harry and Lieutenant Trench,
Speaker 4: this symbiotic relationship between two characters who were from different
Speaker 4: worlds and yet they had a lot in common. They
Speaker 4: respected each other. And the verbal the verbal sword play,
Speaker 4: the verbal wordplay, if I, if I may be redundant
Speaker 4: between Jensen and and and Anthony Zerby. That was the
Speaker 4: fun part of the.
Speaker 2: Show and that's why I watched it. Yeah, it's funny
Speaker 2: because the private eye detective character on TV always need
Speaker 2: like Stu Bailey needed Detective Quinlan, like Magnum needed Tanaka.
Speaker 2: You had to have that rather caustic police person who
Speaker 2: had to follow the book, who couldn't take the liberties
Speaker 2: of a detective. Meanwhile, detectives are breaking all kinds of
Speaker 2: rules left, right and center. But that detective really loved
Speaker 2: the police detective, loved the detective like a brother.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I mean a colleague of mine described the relationship
Speaker 4: between Harry and Lieutenant Trench as frenemies.
Speaker 2: You know, that's a twenty first century title, that's.
Speaker 4: Very much a twenty first century word. But but you know,
Speaker 4: the Trench respected Harry's independence. He respected Harry's style, even
Speaker 4: though harry style drove him up the walls, you know,
Speaker 4: nine times out of ten. Because Trench was, you know,
Speaker 4: by the book, because he had to be he had
Speaker 4: a department to run, he had rules to follow, and
Speaker 4: and and so forth. He envied Harry's independence. There's a
Speaker 4: great scene in the episode Anatomy of a Frame, which
Speaker 4: is the first episode of the second season, where Harry
Speaker 4: helps f frame is Uh. Trench is framed for a
Speaker 4: for a murder which he didn't commit. He comes to
Speaker 4: Harry for help and we get to learn a little
Speaker 4: bit about Trench's backstory in that in that episode and
Speaker 4: Uh and and he basically and Trench says, you know,
Speaker 4: I I admire you. I admire your independence, even though
Speaker 4: I can't be you. I can't I can't live like you,
Speaker 4: you know, I can't do it like you. But it's
Speaker 4: it's a wonderful episode. And there are many moments like
Speaker 4: that in the Anthony's there are so many.
Speaker 2: For an example, Dan Tanner and Dave Nelson played by.
Speaker 4: Greg Morris, Greg Morris and.
Speaker 2: Spencer Spencer Hire and Lieutenant Quirk Richard.
Speaker 4: Uh play Great Richard Yes all of.
Speaker 2: Those characterizations are pretty much the same. The cop is
Speaker 2: locked into rules and laws that he cannot step around,
Speaker 2: while the private detectives steps all over those rules and laws.
Speaker 4: And the key to making a successful show is to
Speaker 4: fin to is to find enough, you know, uh, enough
Speaker 4: enough angles, enough quirks to each character to make them
Speaker 4: different enough. And sometimes it has to do with the casting,
Speaker 4: you know, the casting of the actor. What the actor
Speaker 4: brings the character they you know, they'll they'll flesh it
Speaker 4: out and they'll bring enough with their own personality. And
Speaker 4: if you have an actor like Robert Urich or Richard
Speaker 4: Jacole who worked well with each other, or David Janssen
Speaker 4: and Henry Daro or James Gardner and James Louisi and
Speaker 4: Rockford Files, you know, that's where the real magic of
Speaker 4: that relationship comes.
Speaker 2: Let me take my last break. I have a caller,
Speaker 2: and John in North Carolina will get to you after
Speaker 2: a few commercials. I promise time and temperature eleven forty
Speaker 2: five forty two degrees.
Speaker 1: Now back to Dan Way live from the Window World,
Speaker 1: Nice Sight Studios on WBZ News Radio.
Speaker 2: Roughly ten minutes of show to go, John in North Carolina,
Speaker 2: You've waited long enough. Here's your chance to speak with
Speaker 2: Ed Robertson. Hi.
Speaker 6: Ed, I'm Morgan.
Speaker 2: Hello.
Speaker 4: Hi.
Speaker 6: I thought it was interesting when I heard you speaking
Speaker 6: about Roy Huggins, because I just recently read a detective
Speaker 6: novel by him. It was it was called The Double Take.
Speaker 6: It was from nineteen forty six, if.
Speaker 4: I remember correctly, that was that was the That was
Speaker 4: the novella that he introduced Stu Bailey exactly.
Speaker 6: That's that was something I was going to mention that.
Speaker 6: And it's from nineteen forty six, so I guess about
Speaker 6: ten years before seventy seven Sunset Strip. But I thought
Speaker 6: it was very good. It was kind of a Raymond
Speaker 6: Chandler esque type mystery.
Speaker 4: Well, Roy, that's that's That's how Roy started his career.
Speaker 4: He started his career as a novelist into Chandler vein
Speaker 4: and he his publisher at the time was a man
Speaker 4: named Howard Brown. He published several of his novellas, and
Speaker 4: then one thing led to another and Roy saw the
Speaker 4: future in a storytelling in television and when about fast
Speaker 4: forward about ten years in the early nineteen fifties, when
Speaker 4: Roy established himself as a various as one of the
Speaker 4: top producers in television with Warner Brothers. He remembered his
Speaker 4: friend Howard Brown when Howard Brown decided to break into television,
Speaker 4: and Howard wrote for Roy not only a Warner Brothers
Speaker 4: but also a Universal. So it's all I mean, it's
Speaker 4: all kind of circular.
Speaker 6: Well, did Roy then leave Warner Brothers and become an
Speaker 6: independent producer?
Speaker 4: No, he left Warner Brothers in fifty nine sixty. He
Speaker 4: was a little burned out because and for reasons that
Speaker 4: I explained in detail in Maverick Legend of the West,
Speaker 4: my book on the Map show. He was feeling he
Speaker 4: was responsible for like seventy percent of Warner Brothers prime
Speaker 4: time shows on ABC. But because of the way Warner
Speaker 4: Brothers ran his television apartment in the early going, they
Speaker 4: refuse to give an independent writer created by a credit
Speaker 4: which gave him or her a share of the pie,
Speaker 4: you know, because Warner Brothers was very strident. You know,
Speaker 4: we will only develop movies or properties we own. We
Speaker 4: will only develop those for television. We will not pay
Speaker 4: an independent writer, We will not pay a producer or
Speaker 4: created by credit. And you know, Roy was working very
Speaker 4: hard and he was you know, you know, cult forty
Speaker 4: five seventy seven sunset strip. You know, most all those
Speaker 4: successful Warner Brothers shows at the time, he wasn't. I
Speaker 4: mean they all, they all tied back to him, you know,
Speaker 4: at one point. And so he decided to leave the studio.
Speaker 4: And and and as we mentioned in our first hour,
Speaker 4: he was a little down on television to begin with.
Speaker 4: He left the industry and was going to get his
Speaker 4: h He was going to get his doctorate and teach
Speaker 4: when in sixty three, sixty two, sixty three Universal called him. Uh,
Speaker 4: they need they had they had the Virginian, which they bought,
Speaker 4: but they needed They felt they needed a new producer,
Speaker 4: and so they made Roy an offer he couldn't refuse.
Speaker 4: And so he went back into television and stayed with
Speaker 4: the Universal for almost twenty years.
Speaker 6: Wow, well you mentioned warners. Now I think what I
Speaker 6: read when Jack Warner set up that TV division, did
Speaker 6: he not expect it to be very much? He just
Speaker 6: did it. What did he put his son in charge
Speaker 6: of it?
Speaker 4: He did his son in law, if I remember correctly,
Speaker 4: William Peatwoor, and.
Speaker 3: He did it.
Speaker 4: Jack Warner did it reluctantly. He did it because all
Speaker 4: the other studios were leaving their mark were entering television.
Speaker 4: Warners was at the time, Warners was still very famous.
Speaker 4: You know when he made movies, when Warner Brothers made movies,
Speaker 4: you know, we're not going to portray a living room
Speaker 4: scene with the television in it. Because he saw television
Speaker 4: as the enemy. And so when they finally did enter television,
Speaker 4: as we said, they took a very narrow approach to it,
Speaker 4: and that ended up. I mean, it paid off initially
Speaker 4: in the short term because they made a deal with
Speaker 4: ABC and they provided a lot of programming for ABC,
Speaker 4: but it hurt them within ten years because they were
Speaker 4: losing a lot of talent.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 4: Then, not only did they treat their they worked there,
Speaker 4: they overworked their writers, and they didn't they they didn't
Speaker 4: let them share in the pie, so to speak. But
Speaker 4: they signed their actors to seven year contracts, they paid
Speaker 4: them next to nothing, and then they but they exploited
Speaker 4: them until James Garner famously stood up to them and said,
Speaker 4: I ain't going to do this anymore, and he took
Speaker 4: them to court and he beat them in court, and
Speaker 4: the Warner Brothers realized, Okay, we have to change the
Speaker 4: way we do this. Otherwise we're going to lose other
Speaker 4: James Garner's down the Road.
Speaker 2: It was, for an example, Hawaiian and I was surfside
Speaker 2: six not in not in Honolulu, but in.
Speaker 4: Miami, and both Hawaiian and I and serve side six
Speaker 4: for variations of seventy seven sunset strip, which was the
Speaker 4: which which originated with Roy Huggins. And so that that's
Speaker 4: why Roy felt a little That's why Roy felt a
Speaker 4: little put upon it, as he put it himself, because
Speaker 4: there were three shows that started with him, and yet
Speaker 4: the studio was making money off of off of those
Speaker 4: off of those shows, but they wouldn't recognize him.
Speaker 2: And John, I gotta let you go because I'm almost
Speaker 2: out of time and I want to say a proper
Speaker 2: goodbye to Ed. So John, thank you for your.
Speaker 4: Call, Thank you for calling.
Speaker 2: All right, and I got to do this again with you.
Speaker 2: I'll call you and set up something in January.
Speaker 4: Absolutely is always a pleasure to talk to you and
Speaker 4: your audience, Morgan, and I hope some of your listeners
Speaker 4: will pick up a copy of Minute Action available Amazon
Speaker 4: dot com. If you love classic television, if you love
Speaker 4: the history of television, it's it's a great gift idea.
Speaker 4: You really like this book.
Speaker 2: Riverboat Ring your Bell Taillywell Anna Belle Luck is a
Speaker 2: lady that he loves the best. And I'm going to
Speaker 2: tell you something I get a minute before I have
Speaker 2: to sign off. Nancy, who's sitting next to me. She
Speaker 2: got all the lyrics from Brett Maverick and framed them
Speaker 2: with a royal flesh hand in the middle. That's what
Speaker 2: a partner is supposed to do. Absolutely, And on that note,
Speaker 2: I thank you enjoying the rest of your holiday weekend
Speaker 2: and we'll talk again.
Speaker 4: Happy you take care.
Speaker 2: And by the way, Dan, you did a good job tonight.
Speaker 2: Thank you. And Nancy sitting next to me, and Gray
Speaker 2: on the floor on the rug. Thank you for all
Speaker 2: of you who listened, whether you called or not. I
Speaker 2: appreciate the fact that you made Nightside your choice for
Speaker 2: this Thanksgiving evening, and now that it has become time
Speaker 2: to say it. Eleven fifty eight by Boston, forty two
Speaker 2: degrees