Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater
Encyclopedia
Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theatre, sometimes simply called Zane Grey Theatre, is an American Western
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...

 anthology series which ran on CBS
CBS
CBS 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...

 from 1956 to 1961.

Overview

Zane Grey Theatre was created by Luke Short
Luke Short (writer)
Luke Short was a popular Western writer.Born in Kewanee, Illinois Glidden attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for two and a half years and then transferred to the University of Missouri at Columbia to study journalism.Following graduation in 1930 he worked for a number of...

 and Charles A. Wallace. The series was originally based on the short stories
Short story
A short story is a work of fiction that is usually written in prose, often in narrative format. This format tends to be more pointed than longer works of fiction, such as novellas and novels. Short story definitions based on length differ somewhat, even among professional writers, in part because...

 and novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....

s of Western author Zane Grey
Zane Grey
Zane Grey was an American author best known for his popular adventure novels and stories that presented an idealized image of the Old West. Riders of the Purple Sage was his bestselling book. In addition to the success of his printed works, they later had second lives and continuing influence...

, but as the episodes continued, new material was included. Aaron Spelling
Aaron Spelling
Aaron Spelling was an American film and television producer. As of 2009, Spelling's eponymous production company Spelling Television holds the record as the most prolific television writer, with 218 producer and executive producer credits...

, who later became a legend in Hollywood, wrote twenty Zane Grey episodes. The program opened with a prelude of the episode followed by the introduction, the firing of a gun, with the proclamation: "From out of the West, Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater." Much of the musical score was handled by Four Star's Herschel Burke Gilbert
Herschel Burke Gilbert
Herschel Burke Gilbert was a prolific orchestrator, musical supervisor and composer of film scores as well as television scores and theme songs, including the themes for The Rifleman , Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater and The Detectives Starring Robert Taylor...

.

Powell appeared as various characters in 15 of the 149 episodes of the program and hosted the entire run. Zane Grey, a half-hour program, debuted at 8:30 Eastern on Friday, October 5, 1956, and ran until the end of the 1960-1961 season, when Powell switched to NBC for a new hour-long anthology of drama
Drama
Drama is the specific mode of fiction represented in performance. The term comes from a Greek word meaning "action" , which is derived from "to do","to act" . The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a...

 and comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...

 called The Dick Powell Show
The Dick Powell Show
The Dick Powell Show is an American anthology series that ran on NBC from 1961- 1963, primarily sponsored by the Reynolds Metals Company. It was hosted by longtime film star Dick Powell until his death from lymphatic cancer on January 2, 1963, then by a series of guest hosts until the series ended...

, which continued until shortly after Powell's death from cancer
Cancer
Cancer , known medically as a malignant neoplasm, is a large group of different diseases, all involving unregulated cell growth. In cancer, cells divide and grow uncontrollably, forming malignant tumors, and invade nearby parts of the body. The cancer may also spread to more distant parts of the...

.

Spin-offs

Zane Grey Theatre was ground-breaking in that six episodes were developed into subsequent series: Trackdown
Trackdown
Trackdown is an American Western television series starring Robert Culp that aired on CBS between 1957 and 1959. The series offered more than seventy episodes and was produced by Dick Powell's Four Star Television and filmed at the Desilu-Culver Studio...

 (from "Badge of Honor") starring Robert Culp
Robert Culp
Robert Martin Culp was an American actor, scriptwriter, voice actor and director, widely known for his work in television. Culp first earned an international reputation for his role as Kelly Robinson on I Spy , the espionage series in which he and co-star Bill Cosby played a pair of secret agents...

 as Texas Ranger
Texas Ranger Division
The Texas Ranger Division, commonly called the Texas Rangers, is a law enforcement agency with statewide jurisdiction in Texas, and is based in Austin, Texas...

 Hoby Gilman, Johnny Ringo
Johnny Ringo (TV series)
Johnny Ringo is a Western television series starring Don Durant that aired on CBS from October 1, 1959, until June 30, 1960. It was loosely based on the life of the notorious gunfighter Johnny Ringo, who tangled with Wyatt Earp, John "Doc" Holliday, and "Buckskin" Franklin Leslie.This fictional...

 (from "Man Alone"), starring Don Durant
Don Durant
Don Durant was an American actor and singer, best known for his role as the gunslinger-turned- sheriff in the CBS Western series Johnny Ringo, which ran on Thursdays from October 1, 1959 - June 30, 1960....

, both on CBS, The Rifleman
The Rifleman
The Rifleman is an American Western television program that starred Chuck Connors as homesteader Lucas McCain and Johnny Crawford as his son, Mark McCain. It was set in the 1880s in the town of North Fork, New Mexico Territory. The show, filmed in black-and-white with a half hour running time, ran...

 (from "The Sharpshooter") with Chuck Connors
Chuck Connors
Chuck Connors was an American actor, writer, and professional basketball and baseball player. His best known role from his forty-year film career was Lucas McCain in the 1960s ABC hit Western series The Rifleman....

 as Lucas McCain
Lucas McCain
Lucas McCain is the rancher and widowed father with a penchant for using his Winchester firearm -- as a last resort -- in the Western television series, The Rifleman, which ran on ABC from 1958-1963. The part was portrayed by the former athlete-turned-actor Chuck Connors...

, and Stagecoach West
Stagecoach West (TV series)
Stagecoach West is a highly-acclaimed Western drama television series which ran for thirty-eight episodes on the ABC network from October 4, 1960, until June 27, 1961. Characters Luke Perry and Simon Kane operate the Timberland Stage Line from Missouri to San Francisco...

 starring Wayne Rogers
Wayne Rogers
William Wayne McMillan Rogers III is an American film and television actor, best known for playing the role of 'Trapper John' McIntyre in the U.S...

 and Robert Bray
Robert Bray
Robert E. Bray was an American film and television actor probably best remembered for his role as the forest ranger Corey Stuart in the long-running CBS series Lassie.-Life and career:...

, both on ABC
American Broadcasting Company
The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

, and The Westerner
The Westerner (TV series)
The Westerner is a 1960 Four Star Television Western series on NBC created by Sam Peckinpah. The series stars Brian Keith as Dave Blassingame and features John Dehner as semi-regular Burgundy Smith...

 (from "Trouble at Tres Cruces"), starring Brian Keith
Brian Keith
Brian Keith was an American film, television, and stage actor who in his four decade-long career gained recognition for his work in movies such as the 1961 Disney family film The Parent Trap, the 1966 comedy The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming, and the 1975 adventure saga The Wind and...

 as Dave Blassingame, and Black Saddle
Black Saddle
Black Saddle is an American Western series that ran for forty-four episodes on ABC from January 10, 1959 to May 6, 1960. The series was produced by Dick Powell's Four Star Television, and the original pilot was an episode of Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, with Chris Alcaide playing Culhane.For...

 (from "Threat of Violence" with Chris Alcaide
Chris Alcaide
Christopher "Chris" Alcaide was an American actor particularly known for his role in television westerns. He surfaced to national attention as Deputy Joshua Tate in the 1956 film Gunslinger, co-starring Beverly Garland as a woman marshal.In 2003, Alcaide was among recipients, including the Sons of...

 instead of series star Peter Breck
Peter Breck
Joseph Peter Breck is an American prolific character actor of stage, who has played roles on television and in film...

 as Clay Culhane), both on NBC
NBC
The 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...

.

In addition, Wanted: Dead or Alive, with Steve McQueen
Steve McQueen
Terrence Steven "Steve" McQueen was an American movie actor. He was nicknamed "The King of Cool." His "anti-hero" persona, which he developed at the height of the Vietnam counterculture, made him one of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination...

 playing the bounty hunter
Bounty hunter
A bounty hunter captures fugitives for a monetary reward . Other names, mainly used in the United States, include bail enforcement agent and fugitive recovery agent.-Laws in the U.S.:...

 Josh Randall, was a CBS spinoff of Trackdown, and Law of the Plainsman
Law of the Plainsman
Law of The Plainsman is a Western television series starring Michael Ansara that aired on the NBC television network from October 1, 1959, until May 5, 1960. The character of Native American U.S...

, starring Michael Ansara
Michael Ansara
Michael Ansara is a Syrian-born American stage, screen, and voice actor best known for his portrayal of Cochise in the American television series Broken Arrow, Kane in the 1979-81 series Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, and Commander Kang on three different Star Trek TV series.- Early life and...

 as a Harvard-educated, Native American U.S. Marshal was an NBC spin-off of The Rifleman.

Guest stars

Actor Denver Pyle
Denver Pyle
Denver Dell Pyle was an American film and television actor. He is best remembered for playing Uncle Jesse in The Dukes of Hazzard .-Early life:...

 became well-known for his appearances as a sheriff
Sheriff
A sheriff is in principle a legal official with responsibility for a county. In practice, the specific combination of legal, political, and ceremonial duties of a sheriff varies greatly from country to country....

 on Zane Grey as well as in numerous other Western and comedy
Comedy
Comedy , as a popular meaning, is any humorous discourse or work generally intended to amuse by creating laughter, especially in television, film, and stand-up comedy. This must be carefully distinguished from its academic definition, namely the comic theatre, whose Western origins are found in...

 series. Stars who were frequently featured on Zane Grey included Chris Alcaide (five times) David Niven
David Niven
James David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was a British actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Lytton, a.k.a. "the Phantom", in The Pink Panther...

, Ben Cooper
Ben Cooper
Ben Cooper is a retired American actor of film and television, who won a Golden Boot award in 2005 for his work in westerns.-Early films:...

 (five times), Russ Conway
Russ Conway (actor)
Russ Conway was a Canadian-American character actor who appeared on film and television between 1947 and 1975.-Early years:...

, Walter Coy
Walter Coy
Walter Darwin Coy was an American stage, radio, film, and, principally, television actor, originally from Great Falls, Montana. He was best known for narrating the NBC western anthology series, Frontier, which aired early Sunday evenings in the 1955-1956 season.-Career:Coy performed on Broadway...

 (three times), Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford
Joan Crawford , born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre....

, Edward G. Robinson
Edward G. Robinson
Edward G. Robinson was a Romanian-born American actor. A popular star during Hollywood's Golden Age, he is best remembered for his roles as gangsters, such as Rico in his star-making film Little Caesar and as Rocco in Key Largo...

, Claudette Colbert
Claudette Colbert
Claudette Colbert was a French-born American-based actress of stage and film.Born in Paris, France and raised in New York City, Colbert began her career in Broadway productions during the 1920s, progressing to film with the advent of talking pictures...

, Sammy Davis, Jr.
Sammy Davis, Jr.
Samuel George "Sammy" Davis Jr. was an American entertainer and was also known for his impersonations of actors and other celebrities....

, Robert Harland
Robert Harland
Robert "Bob" Harland is a retired American actor whose principal work was done on television in the late 1950s and 1960s...

, Hedy Lamarr
Hedy Lamarr
Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-American actress celebrated for her great beauty who was a major contract star of MGM's "Golden Age".Lamarr also co-invented – with composer George Antheil – an early technique for spread spectrum communications and frequency hopping, necessary to wireless...

, Patrick McVey
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:...

, Tyler McVey
Tyler McVey
Tyler McVey was an American character actor.-Early life and career:McVey was born in Bay City on Saginaw Bay in the Lower Peninsula of Michigan. His first screen role, uncredited, came at the age of 39 in 1951, when he portrayed Brady in the The Day the Earth Stood Still...

, John M. Pickard
John Pickard (American actor)
John M. Pickard was an American actor who appeared primarily in television Westerns.-Early life and career:...

 (four times), Paul Stader
Paul Stader
Paul B. Stader, sometimes known as Manny Stader , was an American actor best known for having performed stunts for Johnny Weismuller, Lex Barker, Gregory Peck, and John Wayne. He was also the underwater director of the 1978 film The Return of Captain Nemo.-Working with Weismuller and Barker:Stader...

 (twice), Danny Thomas
Danny Thomas
Danny Thomas was an American nightclub comedian and television and film actor, best known for starring in the television sitcom Make Room for Daddy . He was also the founder of St. Jude Children's Research Hospital...

, Esther Williams
Esther Williams
Esther Jane Williams is a retired American competitive swimmer and MGM movie star.Williams set multiple national and regional swimming records in her late teens as part of the Los Angeles Athletic Club swim team...

, Jack Lemmon
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...

, Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck
Barbara Stanwyck was an American actress. She was a film and television star, known during her 60-year career as a consummate and versatile professional with a strong screen presence, and a favorite of directors including Cecil B. DeMille, Fritz Lang and Frank Capra...

, Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers
Ginger Rogers was an American actress, dancer, and singer who appeared in film, and on stage, radio, and television throughout much of the 20th century....

, Scott Marlowe
Scott Marlowe
Scott Gregory Marlowe was a versatile American actor of film, television, and stage, who was born and died in Los Angeles, California.-Early film career:...

, Robert F. Simon
Robert F. Simon
Robert F. Simon was an American character actor, often portraying military or authority figure roles. Though his face was recognized by audiences, he was mostly unknown by name...

, and in one episode, Ronald
Ronald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....

 and Nancy Reagan.

Lesser-known actors also appeared, including Brad Johnson
Brad Johnson (television actor)
Elmer Bradley "Brad" Johnson , was an American film and television actor, best remembered for his role as the deputy Lofty Craig on the 1950s Western series, Annie Oakley...

, Harry Lauter
Harry Lauter
Herman Arthur "Harry" Lauter was an American character actor originally from White Plains, New York....

, Adam Kennedy
Adam Kennedy (actor)
Adam Kennedy was an American actor, screenwriter, novelist, and painter, who starred as the Irish-American newspaper editor Dion Patrick in thirty-seven episodes during the first season, 1957–1958, of NBC's western television series, The Californians...

, Read Morgan
Read Morgan
Read Morgan is a former American actor whose longest-running role was as a United States Army cavalry officer in the 1960-1961 season of The Deputy, a western television series on NBC created by Norman Lear. Morgan appeared in thirty episodes as the one-eyed Sergeant Hapgood Tasker, recognized by...

, Richard Eastham
Richard Eastham
Richard Eastham, born as Dickinson Swift Eastham , was an American actor of stage, film, and television and a concert singer known for his deep baritone voice.-Tombstone Territory:...

, Quintin Sondergaard
Quintin Sondergaard
Quentin Charles Sondergaard, known primarily as Quintin Sondergaard , was an American actor principally active on television westerns from 1957-1970...

, Conlan Carter
Conlan Carter
Chester Conlan Carter is a former film and television actor best known for the role of "Doc", featured in sixty-six episodes of the Rick Jason and Vic Morrow ABC World War II television series Combat!...

, Dennis Cross
Dennis Cross
Dennis Cross was an American actor who was the lead star of the syndicated television series The Blue Angels, fictional stories of daredevil United States Navy pilots which aired from 1960-1961...

 (in episodes "Sundown at Bitter Creek" and "Trail Incident"), Ron Hagerthy
Ron Hagerthy
Ronald F. "Ron" Hagerthy is a former American actor known primarily for his guest-starring and supporting roles on television westerns. In 1952, he portrayed Clipper King in the modern western series, Sky King, with Kirby Grant in the title role of Clipper's uncle, Schuyler "Sky" King, pilot of...

 (as Jack Wilson in the 1960 episode "The Sunday Man"), Robert Karnes
Robert Karnes
Robert A. Karnes was a prolific television actor who also appeared in some films early in his career, including mostly uncredited parts in The Best Years of Our Lives , Miracle on 34th Street , Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye , and From Here to Eternity...

, and Judson Pratt
Judson Pratt
Judson Pratt was an American actor whose longest continuing work was in thirteen episodes of ABC's Walt Disney Presents and NBC's Walt Disney's Wonderful World of Color. A native of Hingham in Plymouth County, Massachusetts, Pratt appeared in numerous television westerns and drama series from...

. Phyllis Avery
Phyllis Avery
Phyllis Avery was an American television and film actress.-Early life and career:Avery was born in New York City to Evelyn and author Stephen Morehouse Avery. Her father hailed from Webster Groves, Missouri, near St. Louis. Her first role was as Marjorie in the 1951 film Queen for a Day based on...

 and Lew Ayres
Lew Ayres
Lew Ayres was an American actor, best known for starring as Paul in All Quiet on the Western Front and for playing Dr...

 appeared as Peg and Clint Howard in the 1956 episode "The Unrelenting Sky", later carried on Frontier Justice in a segment narrated by Ayres.

The Rifleman pilot appeared in 1958. Just a few months later, The Rifleman was on the ABC fall schedule for the beginning of its popular five-year run. That episode is part of the other series' rerun package, instead of Greys. This one was retitled The Westerners, utilizing the Black Saddle theme music, with Powell's hosting segments replaced with new ones featuring Keenan Wynn
Keenan Wynn
Keenan Wynn was an American character actor. His bristling mustache and expressive face were his stock in trade, and though he rarely had a lead role, he got prominent billing in most of his film and TV parts....

. That format was also used for a separate but connected rerun repackaging of four short-lived Western series from Four Star, Black Saddle, Johnny Ringo, The Westerner and Law of the Plainsman. An earlier rerun package was Frontier Justice
Frontier Justice (TV series)
For the NBC western anthology, see Frontier .Frontier Justice is a CBS television Western anthology series which had thirty-one telecasts over the summers of 1958, 1959, and 1961. It was a repackaging of episodes from CBS's Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, and was hosted by Lew Ayres, Melvyn...

, which CBS used as a summer replacement in 1958, 1959 and 1961, hosted by Lew Ayres
Lew Ayres
Lew Ayres was an American actor, best known for starring as Paul in All Quiet on the Western Front and for playing Dr...

, Melvyn Douglas
Melvyn Douglas
Melvyn Edouard Hesselberg , better known as Melvyn Douglas, was an American actor.Coming to prominence in the 1930s as a suave leading man , Douglas later transitioned into more mature and fatherly roles as in his Academy Award-winning performances in Hud...

 and Ralph Bellamy
Ralph Bellamy
Ralph Bellamy was an American actor whose career spanned sixty-two years.-Early life:He was born Ralph Rexford Bellamy in Chicago, Illinois, the son of Lilla Louise , a native of Canada, and Charles Rexford Bellamy. He ran away from home when he was fifteen and managed to get into a road show...

, one each summer.

Ratings

In 1958-1959, Zane Grey Theater ranked 13th of the top 25 programs. It dropped to 23rd place in 1959-1960 and disappeared from the ranking in its final season.

DVD release

In June 2009, VCI Entertainment released the complete first season of the series on Region 1 DVD in the United States.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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