Gunsmoke

[cspotrun]

i'm watching re-runs of Gunsmoke, and Doc Adams has to be The WORST doctor on TV, i've yet to see him SAVE one Person's life! and by the way i always hear a piano or banjo playing in the longbranch saloon,BUT i never see a Piano player or a guy playing a banjo... was there an episode where chester injured his leg that caused him to limp during the rest of his run on the show? weaver in an interview a few years before he died, said the producers wanted his charachter to have some kind of "weakness" as to not outshine matt dillon, and it was weaver's idea to have a limp.

 

[therealjm12]

was there an episode where chester injured his leg that caused him to limp during the rest of his run on the show?

No, I don't think his leg injury was ever explained, at least on TV, maybe radio. There is one episode where he falls off a wagon on to the bad leg. Probably everybody who saw it cringed. The best episodes of Gunsmoke are the hour long B & W ones. ME-TV and TV Land don't show them but Encore does. There is at least one B & W episode that has Chester, - Dennis Weaver, Quint, -Burt Reynolds, and Festus, -Ken Curtis in it. Until I saw it, I thought all three were in different time frames. There is an episode later on (color) where it's Matt says Chester had moved to California. That explained his disappearance from the series.

 

[FredLeonard]

Chester was limping from the start of the TV show, no explanation given. No limp for Chester was ever mentioned on the radio show. On radio, Chester was more like Festus. Reportedly, the TV producer decided Dennis Weaver seemed too strong and healthy to be just a helper, so they came up with limp.

Doctor's in the 19th Century didn't cure very many people. The fact that he is shown cleaning his hands before he tries to remove a bullet makes him ahead of his time. On TV, Doc is cranky. On radio he was greedy and ghoulish, which is why he was given the name Addams.

On radio, Kitty didn't own the saloon (until after this had been established on the TV show); it was clearly implied on radio she was engaged in a far older profession than saloon keeping. And Matt was more sinister; very close to the line between good guy and bad guy and it was clear he could have gone either way.

The dumbest part of Gunsmoke was Matt always walking up to bad guys with his gun holstered and giving them a chance to draw first. Second dumbest is Matt as US Marshall breaking up bar fights and Dodge City not having a town marshal or county sheriff to enforce local laws. After all, Kansas had been a state for some 20 years before the start of Gunsmoke and federal marshals (actually deputy marshals, only the chief marshal in a state was a full marshal) would only be concerned with federal fugitives.

 

[landtuna]

Mad Magazine's parody of Gunsmog was 1000 times better than any TV episode.

Festus always reminded me more of a pirate than a cowboy. And it always sounded like he was saying "Mr. Drill 'Em". ;D

 

[cspotrun]

it was never really explained exactly WHAT Chester's job was, unless it was being the guy who swept up the jailhouse and made coffee, Yet Matt Dillion took him along to round up every bad guy, even though he never carried a 6 shooter, only a rifle and had No Official capacity. chester's character has made me laugh several times. i saw an episode the other day where chester had just washed his face in the marshall's office opened the door and tossed it out into the street, after doing it chester says something like "Oh! Gee i'm sorry"... as if he drenched someone passing by... it seemed like an "Ad-Libbed" line when i watched it... ken curtis did a good job after chester but i like the episodes with dennis weaver better.

 

[FredLeonard]

Chester's job was to be Tonto. The radio show did not use a narrator. So, Matt needed somebody to talk to; Chester provided Matt an excuse to explain to the listeners what he was seeing. Chester was somebody to ask dumb questions so Matt could expound on what was happening. In Chester TV episodes (most of which were adapted from radio scripts), Chester always rode along when Matt went after somebody, bought somebody back or went out to somebody's ranch. He wasn't a deputy. There was no real world reason for him to go along.

Later when the show went to an hour, Matt usually rode alone and Festus or Newly would watch the town. Toward the end, Matt did not appear in most scenes and the show could shoot two episodes simultaneously.

Encore Westerns is currently running both the half hour and hour long episodes of Gunsmoke. They really don't hold up very well and he hour long episodes often seem like padded half hour scripts.

 

[MCarney]

I'll still take the hour black and white episodes over any episodes from the last 5 seasons or so. (My brother refers to these episodes as "The Festus Comedy Hour" because they insisted on inserting funny exchanges just to get Festus and Doc into episodes.) ME-TV is running season 20 right now. Between Miss Kitty leaving the show and very little of the other regulars it's really painful to watch.

 

[BD Sullivan]

I'll still take the hour black and white episodes over any episodes from the last 5 seasons or so. (My brother refers to these episodes as "The Festus Comedy Hour" because they insisted on inserting funny exchanges just to get Festus and Doc into episodes.) ME-TV is running season 20 right now. Between Miss Kitty leaving the show and very little of the other regulars it's really painful to watch.

Well, CBS came close to ending it after Season 12, but since William Paley's wife loved the show, Gilligan's Island (and the never-to-be-seen show "Doc") got the ax instead.

 

[onairb]

I'll still take the hour black and white episodes over any episodes from the last 5 seasons or so. (My brother refers to these episodes as "The Festus Comedy Hour" because they insisted on inserting funny exchanges just to get Festus and Doc into episodes.) ME-TV is running season 20 right now. Between Miss Kitty leaving the show and very little of the other regulars it's really painful to watch.

Well, CBS came close to ending it after Season 12, but since William Paley's wife loved the show, Gilligan's Island (and the never-to-be-seen show "Doc") got the ax instead.

What's the story behind 'Doc'? A Milburn Stone spinoff?

 

[rnigma1]

Hard to imagine a socialite and uber-fashionista like Babe Paley being enamored of "Gunsmoke." But her husband did have a hand in creating it, ordering Norman MacDonnell to come up with a Western in the manner of the "Philip Marlowe" series, which MacDonnell produced and directed.
The audition (pilot) episode had Rye Billsbury (aka Michael Rye) as Marshal Mark Dillon.
I think the best writer the show had was John Meston. The show started to decline a bit when he and MacDonnell left.

 

[LKellerIII]

Encore Westerns is currently running both the half hour and hour long episodes of Gunsmoke. They really don't hold up very well and he hour long episodes often seem like padded half hour scripts.

It was my observation both then (early 60s) and now in reruns, that most of the 30 minute shows that converted to 60 minutes seem like padded half-hour scripts.

IIRC, both Twilight Zone and Alfred Hitchock went to 60 minutes the same year. the Hitchcock shows seemed a bit padded, but the one hour Twilight Zones were atrocious - they moved at a glacial pace, and had none of the suspense of the half-hour shows.

 

[FredLeonard]

Well, CBS came close to ending it after Season 12, but since William Paley's wife loved the show, Gilligan's Island (and the never-to-be-seen show "Doc") got the ax instead.

It wasn't quite because Babe Paley liked it. The show's ratings had fallen off on Saturday night at 10pm. Re-runs, as "Marshall Dillion" had done well early in the evening (7:30pm). Paley made the decision to move the show to Monday at 7:30pm (later 8pm after the Prime Time Access Rule took effect) and gave the show a second life.

"Doc" ran on CBS Saturday nights for two seasons (1975-1977).

 

[BD Sullivan]

Except that the latter version of Doc starred Barnard Hughes instead of John McIntire and the format had either been changed or it became a completely different concept.

 

[cspotrun]

i actually LIKE the half hour Drama's from the late 50's early 60's.. Zone, Gunsmoke,Dragnet, Have Gun Will Travel and the others, they get to the point without wasting your time. i can't say ANY of the shows that went to 60 minutes were any better, just Longer. Money must have been the reason to stretch out these shows to an hour OR networks wanted to fill 60 min time slots instead of 30 for drama's. i agree with the hour long twilight zones, they were Perfect at 30 mins. when you think about it Comedy shows have it right, can't think of any hour long Filmed "Series Comedy" Shows. remember that old line about "Brevity"....

 

[BD Sullivan]

Comedy shows have it right, can't think of any hour long Filmed "Series Comedy" Shows.

There was CBS's "Husbands, Wives and Lovers" in early 1978, a show that was created by Joan Rivers. Not surprisingly, it only lasted a few months.

 

[Corky Marlowe]

Encore Westerns is currently running both the half hour and hour long episodes of Gunsmoke. They really don't hold up very well and he hour long episodes often seem like padded half hour scripts.


It was my observation both then (early 60s) and now in reruns, that most of the 30 minute shows that converted to 60 minutes seem like padded half-hour scripts.

IIRC, both Twilight Zone and Alfred Hitchock went to 60 minutes the same year. the Hitchcock shows seemed a bit padded, but the one hour Twilight Zones were atrocious - they moved at a glacial pace, and had none of the suspense of the half-hour shows.

Serling supposedly hated the hour long Zones. As far as the early years of hour long "Gunsmoke", I read once (maybe on the late, great Jump The Shark) that Ernie Anderson's "Ghoulardi" once did a Gunsmoke bit soon after the show went to an hour. The parody featured long scenes of pretty much nothing happening, and viewers were calling the station to complain about how boring the parody was.

 

[FredLeonard]

A long time ago, I heard a "party" episode of the Gunsmoke radio show - put together with the actual radio show cast and crew. The radio Gunsmoke was noted for the detail and the realism of its sound effects.

In this "episode," Matt goes into the Long Branch and meets Kitty (bar sounds in the background). They go up the stairs (sound of foot steps) and into a room (door sound), get undressed (sound of Matt taking off his gun belt) and go to bed (sounds of bed springs creaking, headboard banging, moaning....).

It was hilarious.

Anybody know if this recording is posted online anywhere (and have a link to it)?

 

[radiorob2.0]

A long time ago, I heard a "party" episode of the Gunsmoke radio show - put together with the actual radio show cast and crew. The radio Gunsmoke was noted for the detail and the realism of its sound effects.

In this "episode," Matt goes into the Long Branch and meets Kitty (bar sounds in the background). They go up the stairs (sound of foot steps) and into a room (door sound), get undressed (sound of Matt taking off his gun belt) and go to bed (sounds of bed springs creaking, headboard banging, moaning....).

It was hilarious.

Anybody know if this recording is posted online anywhere (and have a link to it)?

William Conrad played Matt Dillon in the radio version of "Gunsmoke". I can't find reference on the internet but Conrad shared an amusing story involving an innocent misuse of the past tense of "hang". Apparently the writers used the word "hung" in a way that gave the line a whole different meaning.

Trivia time.....

What is actor Gary Busey's significance in the series "Gunsmoke"?

 

[BD Sullivan]

A long time ago, I heard a "party" episode of the Gunsmoke radio show - put together with the actual radio show cast and crew. The radio Gunsmoke was noted for the detail and the realism of its sound effects.

In this "episode," Matt goes into the Long Branch and meets Kitty (bar sounds in the background). They go up the stairs (sound of foot steps) and into a room (door sound), get undressed (sound of Matt taking off his gun belt) and go to bed (sounds of bed springs creaking, headboard banging, moaning....).

It was hilarious.

Anybody know if this recording is posted online anywhere (and have a link to it)?

Trivia time.....

What is actor Gary Busey's significance in the series "Gunsmoke"?

He was the last person to die on the show--appearing in the last filmed episode.

 

[anotherguyTN]

Concerning the hour long Twilight Zone episodes, I've noticed that Netflix doesn't include them in the episodes that are available online.