Fact-Checking Inside Star Trek: The Real Story

[JonnyQuest037]

I like listening to old-time radio drama while I'm doing other tasks, and there is one I particularly enjoy called Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, with an insurance investigator as the hero.

It was billed as "the transcribed adventures of the man with the action-packed expense account - America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator."

Nate Ford in Leverage was an insurance investigator before the series, and there were a number of episodes involving his former colleagues. White Collar was about the FBI White Collar Crimes Division, but insurance investigator Sarah Ellis was a recurring (and briefly regular) character.

This thread took a turn.

 

[bbailey861]

I like listening to old-time radio drama while I'm doing other tasks, and there is one I particularly enjoy called Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, with an insurance investigator as the hero.

It was billed as "the transcribed adventures of the man with the action-packed expense account - America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator."

That sounds kind of silly now, but it was actually pretty good.

Kor

It still is. SiriusXM still plays them on their Radio Classics channel.

 

[Maurice]

It only had one pilot, and was bought by the network, but they heavily altered the show prior to full production.

Right. Gilligan had only one pilot, and CBS tampered with it, adding scenes to the front end without the knowledge or consent of creator/producer Sherwood Schwartz; it tested very badly and was re-edited several times and not approved. Finally Sherwood Schwartz edited it himself, cut the network additions, and undid a bunch of the stuff he'd been told to do to made it back into what he'd intended. Then it sold.

 

[Christopher]

Right. Gilligan had only one pilot, and CBS tampered with it, adding scenes to the front end without the knowledge or consent of creator/producer Sherwood Schwartz; it tested very badly.and it was re-edited several times and not approved, until finally Sherwood Schwartz edited it himself, cut the network addtions, and undid a bunch of the stuff he'd been told to do to made it back into what he'd intended.

Well, the aired premiere episode, "Two on a Raft," was still very different from the original pilot. For one thing, it replaced three of the original pilot cast members and replaced them with Tina Louise, Russell Johnson, and Dawn Wells (although there are a few glimpses of the original cast in the opening scenes of the castaways waking up on the shore). The aired premiere was actually cut together from pieces of the first two or three filmed episodes, and a lot of the pilot material wasn't used until the Christmas-episode clip show, where they flashed back to their first days on the island.

 

[Harvey]

Well, the aired premiere episode, "Two on a Raft," was still very different from the original pilot. For one thing, it replaced three of the original pilot cast members and replaced them with Tina Louise, Russell Johnson, and Dawn Wells (although there are a few glimpses of the original cast in the opening scenes of the castaways waking up on the shore). The aired premiere was actually cut together from pieces of the first two or three filmed episodes, and a lot of the pilot material wasn't used until the Christmas-episode clip show, where they flashed back to their first days on the island.

I don't think it's that unusual for a pilot to be significantly re-shot for use as part of the weekly series. I Love Lucy completely re-shot it's pilot episode during the first season and The Bob Newhart Show re-shot several scenes when it used the pilot as a regular episode, as well.

 

[Christopher]

I don't think it's that unusual for a pilot to be significantly re-shot for use as part of the weekly series. I Love Lucy completely re-shot it's pilot episode during the first season and The Bob Newhart Show re-shot several scenes when it used the pilot as a regular episode, as well.

We talked about something similar in this thread back in August of last year, starting in post #587, when the question of the veracity of the "first-ever second pilot" claim was initially raised. Gilligan's Island and Lost in Space were both put forth as earlier examples of "second pilots," and I responded to clarify that their premiere episodes weren't actually second pilots, but mixtures of pilot footage and new/reshot material. Then you brought up the Dick Van Dyke Show example, as well as some of the other examples you listed in your recent post. Clearly you managed to track down even more after that.

 

[Maurice]

Well, the aired premiere episode, "Two on a Raft," was still very different from the original pilot...

And? So? I wasn't discussing the premier episode; just clarifying that Gilligan did not have a second pilot.

 

[Christopher]

And? So? I wasn't discussing the premier episode; just clarifying that Gilligan did not have a second pilot.

And you said that Schwartz "undid a bunch of the stuff he'd been told to do to made it back into what he'd intended." That could be misconstrued to mean that what aired was essentially the same as the original pilot, so I was clarifying that it was actually very different.

 

[Warped9]

It would be interesting to see the other version of Gilligan's Island.

 

[Christopher]

It would be interesting to see the other version of Gilligan's Island.

TNT aired the original pilot in 1992, and I saw it then. It wasn't that impressive; John Gabriel was nowhere near as great a Professor as Russell Johnson, and secretaries Ginger and Bunny were much less interesting than the movie star and the farm girl who replaced them. The whole thing doesn't seem to be legally available online, but it's available on the first-season DVD set. And the pilot's title sequence, complete with interminable calypso theme song, is available on YouTube.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

And the pilot's title sequence, complete with interminable calypso theme song, is available on YouTube.

Wow. That really took a long time (over 2 minutes!) to tell us only a little information. It really shows you how slower-paced shows were back then (even the three-hour tour is now a six-hour tour!). Can you imagine any television show having a two-minute opening credits sequence nowadays?

It's also interesting that we don't really get a good look at any of the characters that they cut from the show.

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

It would be interesting to see the other version of Gilligan's Island.

You can get a taste of it from this small clip:

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[Warped9]

^^ Yeah, I saw that the other day. I can see why they changed it.

 

[Drone]

Huh. I didn't know that Longstreet or Banacek were about claims adjusters. I thought they were just straight-up detectives (I've heard of, but never watched, either show). Of course, when you think "thrilling detective series" you rarely think "insurance salesman."

Banacek basically recovered things, though he was compensated by the insurers. Longstreet was an insurance investigator, but the conceit was that was blinded at the outset, but decided to continue his career, with the help of martial arts training. I just read this, but it's interesting that Franciscus was also the lead in The Investigators, also cited above, and both aired in the same time slot!!!

 

[Drone]

You can get a taste of it from this small clip:

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Yet another appearance by one Johnny WIlliams!!! I know he had other tv work prior to LIS, but I didn't realize he was involved here. Though his theme was dumped, he apparently did compose incidental music for the first season.

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

^^ Yeah, I saw that the other day. I can see why they changed it.

The eventually-replaced cast members don't really stand out. Although, it's tough to judge their performances in that brief clip. One thing is certain: that theme music is horrid.

 

[Maurice]

To be fair, Schwartz came up with that song at the last minute for his network pitch, because it was felt they needed a shorthand way to set up the premise (much like the "final frontier" narration) and as soon as the show got picked up he hired a professional songwriter to write the series theme.

 

[BeatleJWOL]

"Jacob's Brown's mission is to publish only meticulously-researched historical 'biographies' designed to dispel folklore and shed new light on events from America's pop cultural past."

Oh.

The Jacobs Brown Press inaugural publication

but I'm sure that's not related.

 

[Nebusj]

I like listening to old-time radio drama while I'm doing other tasks, and there is one I particularly enjoy called Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar, with an insurance investigator as the hero.

It was billed as "the transcribed adventures of the man with the action-packed expense account - America's fabulous freelance insurance investigator."

That sounds kind of silly now, but it was actually pretty good.

And it was a long-lived show! It went through different lead actors as Your Truly Johnny Dollar, and shifted formats between weekly-30-minute and daily-15-minute-serial installments, but it kept on going. It was one of the last set of United States network scripted radio programs. (There've been a couple attempts to revive the format since, but they're like vaudeville revivals, imitating program style without reviving the business structure they existed within, and it's the structure that's the distinguishing trait.)

It's not a bad premise for a show. The Expense Report particularly makes a great Captain's Log-style narrative and expository hook. I'm a little surprised it wasn't able to make it to television.

Also, it had several pilots before going to series. In radio, of course, but still.

 

[Green Shirt]

"Jacob's Brown's mission is to publish only meticulously-researched historical 'biographies' designed to dispel folklore and shed new light on events from America's pop cultural past."
Oh.

Neil

As Maxwell Smart would say, "Missed it by THAT much".