Armstrong Circle Theatre is an
AmericanThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
anthology drama television series which ran from 1950 to 1957 on
NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices near Los Angeles and in Chicago...
, and then until 1963 on
CBSCBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...
. It alternated weekly with
The U.S. Steel Hour.
Synopsis
The series featured original dramas by noted writers, although sometimes comedies were shown. Its guidelines specifically called for the avoidance of violence. Originally a half-hour production, in 1955 the show expanded to an hour and began to emphasize dramatized versions of real-life contemporary events (including the sinking of the
SS Andrea DoriaSS Andrea Doria[p] was an ocean liner for the Italian Line home ported in Genoa, Italy, most famous for its sinking in 1956, when 46 people died. Named after the 16th-century Genoese admiral Andrea Doria, the ship had a gross register tonnage of 29,100 and a capacity of about 1,200 passengers and...
and a documentary on the history of
CommunismCommunism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
in the
Soviet UnionThe Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
. Upon moving to CBS, the show emphasized several
Cold WarThe Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
topics, including
espionageEspionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
,
Radio Free EuropeRadio Free Europe/Radio Liberty is a broadcaster funded by the U.S. Congress that provides news, information, and analysis to countries in Eastern Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East "where the free flow of information is either banned by government authorities or not fully developed"...
and escapes from East Germany.
Rod SerlingRodman Edward "Rod" Serling was an American screenwriter, novelist, television producer, and narrator best known for his live television dramas of the 1950s and his science fiction anthology TV series, The Twilight Zone. Serling was active in politics, both on and off the screen and helped form...
wrote two episodes of the program.
George LowtherGeorge F. Lowther was a writer, producer, director in the earliest days of radio and television. During the 1940s, he was a scriptwriter for the Superman radio programs on the Mutual Radio Network and the author of The Adventures of Superman .Born in New York City, Lowther broke into radio at 13...
was the producer for 62 episodes and wrote one.
Hosts and narrators
- Nelson Case (1950-1951)
- Joe Ripley (1952-1953)
- Bob Sherry (1953-1954)
- Sandy Becker
George Sanford Becker , who was known professionally as Sandy Becker, was a television announcer, actor, and comedian who hosted several popular children's programs in New York City...
(1954-1955)
- John Cameron Swayze
John Cameron Swayze was a popular news commentator and game show panelist in the United States during the 1950s.- Early life :...
(1955-1957)
- Douglas Edwards
Douglas Edwards was America's first network news television anchor, anchoring CBS's first nightly news broadcast from 1948–1962, which was later to be titled CBS Evening News.-Early life and career:...
(1957-1961)
- Ron Cochran
Ron Cochran was a television news journalist for ABC and CBS. He served as the anchor of the ABC Evening News from 1962 to 1965. In November 1963, he served as the network's principal anchor for the around-the-clock coverage of the Kennedy assassination...
(1961-1962)
- Henry Hamilton
Henry Hamilton was an Irish-born soldier and official of the British Empire. He was captured during the American War of Independence while serving as the Lieutenant Governor at the British post of Fort Detroit.-Early career :...
(1962-1963)
Guest stars
The series featured numerous guest stars including:
- Tige Andrews
Tige Andrews was an American character actor. His work includes the role of Captain Adam Greer on the late 1960s-to-early 1970s television series The Mod Squad and Detective Lt...
- Ed Begley
Edward James Begley, Sr. was an Academy Award-winning American actor.-Biography:Born in Hartford, Connecticut, Begley began his career as a Broadway and radio actor while in his teens. He appeared in the hit musical Going Up on Broadway in 1917 and in London the next year. He later acted in...
- James Broderick
James Joseph Broderick III was an American actor.-Life and career:Broderick was born in Charlestown, New Hampshire, the son of Mary Elizabeth and James Joseph Broderick, Jr....
- John Cassavetes
John Nicholas Cassavetes was an American actor, screenwriter and filmmaker. He acted in many Hollywood films, notably Rosemary's Baby and The Dirty Dozen...
- Dabney Coleman
Dabney Wharton Coleman is an American actor, best known for his roles in 9 to 5, WarGames, You've Got Mail, Sworn to Silence, The Beverly Hillbillies and as the voice of Principal Peter Prickly in Recess and Recess: School's Out.-Early life:Coleman was born in Austin, Texas, the son of Mary...
- Jackie Cooper
Jackie Cooper was an American actor, television director, producer and executive. He was a child actor who managed to make the transition to an adult career. Cooper was the first child actor to receive an Academy Award nomination...
- Patty Duke
Anna Marie "Patty" Duke is an American actress of stage, film, and television. First becoming famous as a child star, winning an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress at age 16, and later starring in her eponymous sitcom for three years, she progressed to more mature roles upon playing Neely...
- Robert Duvall
Robert Selden Duvall is an American actor and director. He has won an Academy Award, two Emmy Awards, four Golden Globe Awards and a BAFTA over the course of his career....
- Geraldine Fitzgerald
Geraldine Fitzgerald, Lady Lindsay-Hogg was an Irish-American actress and a member of the American Theatre Hall of Fame.-Early life:...
- Nina Foch
Nina Foch was a Dutch-born American actress and leading lady in many 1940s and 1950s films.- Personal life :...
- Wallace Ford
Wallace Ford was an English film and television actor who, with his friendly appearance and stocky build later in life, appeared in a number of film westerns and B-movies....
- Alan Furlan
-Biography:Born Aleardo Furlan in Farla, in the North Friuli region of Italy, Furlan acted in films in Europe and the United States, on Broadway and in commercials....
- Jonathan Harris
Jonathan Harris was an American stage and film character actor. Two of his best-known roles were as the timid accountant Bradford Webster in the TV version of The Third Man, and the comic villain Dr. Zachary Smith, in the 1960s sci-fi television series, Lost in Space...
- Hurd Hatfield
William Rukard Hurd Hatfield was an American actor.-Biography:The son of William Henry Hatfield , an attorney who served as deputy attorney general for New York, and his wife, the former Adele Steele, Hatfield was born in New York City, and was educated at Columbia University before travelling to...
- Grace Kelly
Grace Patricia Kelly was an American actress who, in April 1956, married Rainier III, Prince of Monaco, to become Princess consort of Monaco, styled as Her Serene Highness The Princess of Monaco, and commonly referred to as Princess Grace.After embarking on an acting career in 1950, at the age of...
- Jack Klugman
Jacob Joachim "Jack" Klugman is an American stage, film and television actor known for his roles in sitcoms, movies, and television and on Broadway...
- Otto Kruger
Otto Kruger was an American actor who began his career in 1915. His career was most prolific during the 1930s and 1940s.-Career:...
- Jack Lemmon
John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III was an American actor and musician. He starred in more than 60 films including Some Like It Hot, The Apartment, Mister Roberts , Days of Wine and Roses, The Great Race, Irma la Douce, The Odd Couple, Save the Tiger John Uhler "Jack" Lemmon III (February 8, 1925June...
- Audra Lindley
Audra Marie Lindley was an American actress, most famous for her role as landlady Helen Roper on the sitcom Three's Company and its spin-off, The Ropers.-Career:...
- Gene Lockhart
Eugene "Gene" Lockhart was a Canadian character actor, singer, and playwright. He also wrote the lyrics to a number of popular songs.-Early life:...
- Walter Matthau
Walter Matthau was an American actor best known for his role as Oscar Madison in The Odd Couple and his frequent collaborations with Odd Couple star Jack Lemmon, as well as his role as Coach Buttermaker in the 1976 comedy The Bad News Bears...
- Darren McGavin
Darren McGavin was an American actor best known for playing the title role in the television horror series Kolchak: The Night Stalker and his portrayal in the film A Christmas Story of the grumpy father given to bursts of profanity that he never realizes his son overhears...
- Patrick McVey
Patrick McVey was an American actor who starred in three television series between 1950 and 1961, Big Town, Boots and Saddles, and Manhunt.-Early life and career:...
- Elizabeth Montgomery
Elizabeth Victoria Montgomery was an American film and television actress whose career spanned five decades. She is perhaps best remembered for her roles as Samantha Stephens in Bewitched, as Ellen Harrod in A Case of Rape and as Lizzie Borden in The Legend of Lizzie Borden.-Early life:Born in Los...
- Lois Nettleton
Lois June Nettleton was an American actress of film, stage, and television. She was Miss Chicago of 1948 as well as a semifinalist at that year's Miss America Pageant.-Early years:...
- Leslie Nielsen
Leslie William Nielsen, OC was a Canadian and naturalized American actor and comedian. Nielsen appeared in more than one hundred films and 1,500 television programs over the span of his career, portraying more than 220 characters...
- Carroll O'Connor
John Carroll O'Connor best known as Carroll O'Connor, was an American actor, producer and director whose television career spanned four decades...
- Telly Savalas
Aristotelis "Telly" Savalas was an American film and television actor and singer, whose career spanned four decades. Best known for playing the title role in the 1970s crime drama Kojak, Savalas was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his performance in Birdman of Alcatraz...
- Maureen Stapleton
Maureen Stapleton was an American actress in film, theater and television.-Early life:Stapleton was born Lois Maureen Stapleton in Troy, New York, the daughter of Irene and John P. Stapleton, and grew up in a strict Irish American Catholic family...
- Harold J. Stone
Harold J. Stone was an American film and television character actor.Born Harold Hochstein to a Jewish acting family, he began his career on Broadway in 1939 and appeared in five plays in the next six years, including One Touch of Venus and Stalag 17, following which he made his motion picture...
- Suzanne Storrs
Suzanne Storrs was a former Miss Utah and an American television actress who appeared in sixteen different television series between 1954 and 1961, usually as the beautiful leading lady, including Maverick with James Garner , Wanted Dead or Alive with Steve McQueen , Sugarfoot Suzanne Storrs...