The Fugitive, Newhart, M*A*S*H and other famous series finales… here on Share-a-Vision Radio

Thanks to everyone who participated in our salute to Famous Series Finales. Frankie and I enjoyed talking about the final episodes of The Fugitive, M*A*S*H, The Mary Tyler Moore Show, St. Elsewhere, Nichols, Route 66 and other famous finales. We also had a great time with our special surprise guest, Robert Newhart (Bob Newhart’s son), who shared memories about the final episode of Newhart, plus his dad’s classic sitcom from the ’70s, and a whole lot more.

If you missed our webcast, you can stil catch the archive by clicking the link below:
http://www.share-a-vision.com/audio/ksav-talk-072407.mp3

Ed Robertson
www.edrobertson.com

Famous Finales

Those who follow TV history know that next month marks the 40th anniversary of the ”The Judgment,” the famous two-part final episode of The Fugitive (ABC, 1963-1967) in which Dr. Richard Kimble (David Janssen) finally cleared his name after four long years on the run from an unjust murder conviction. The finale originally aired on August 22 and 29, 1967; Part 2 attracted a phenomenal 72 percent share of the total U.S. television audience that night, a figure that has been topped only on two occasions since: the “Who Done It?” episode of Dallas of November 21, 1980, which answered the question “Who Shot J.R.?”, and the final episode of “M*A*S*H”  (the most-watched series episode of all time), which aired on February 28, 1983. 

The Fugitive finale not only remains one of the most highly watched single episodes of a TV series ever, it marked the very first time a television series went out on its own terms with a definitive final episode. 

This week on Talking Television with Dave White, Frankie Montiforte and I will pay tribute to the final episode of The Fugitive, as well as other famous series finales, from the heartwarming final episodes of M*A*S*H and The Mary Tyler Moore Show, to the surprise ending of Newhart, to the controversial endings of St. Elsewhere and The Sopranos, and a whole lot more.

We all have our favorite final episodes. Which series finale was your favorite? Let us know. Join us for our webcast this Tuesday, July 24 beginning at 10:30 pm ET, 7:30 pm PT on Share-a-Vision Radio, KSAV.org.  

Ed Robertson

www.edrobertson.com

Literary Detectives

Earlier this month, CBS reran Jesse Stone: Death in Paradise, one of three made-for-television movies based on the best-selling Jesse Stone mystery novels by Robert B. Parker, the man who also gave us Spenser. Tom Selleck starred as Jesse Stone.  I’ve read Death in Paradise and Night Passage (the first book in the Jesse Stone series), plus my wife and I are both tremendous fans of Parker in general and the Spenser novels in particular. The tone and dialogue of the movie is true to form, and Selleck does a good job as Jesse. I liked the movie much more than I thought – and I say that because as much as I like Parker (and for that matter, as much as I enjoy Tom Selleck as an actor), I never pictured Selleck as Jesse Stone. I’m not sure why – and I’m not sure I had any other actor in mind to play him – but for whatever reason, I never pictured Selleck. 

That got me thinking about some of the other examples of “literary detectives” – private eyes or police characters from mystery novels that were later adapted for television. Because whether we mean to or not, we tend to look at these shows differently. We don’t look at them as “television shows” because we can’t help but compare them to the novels.   

Matter of fact, we did a program on this very subject a few months back (around the time CBS originally aired Death in Paradise) for Share-a-Vision Radio. We looked at examples of literary detectives that were successfully adapted for television, like Spenser: For Hire and Mike Hammer, and a few that weren’t successful, such as the 1975 adaptation of Ellery Queen starring Jim Hutton.  We also talked private-eye characters that were strictly “made for television,” but which definitely had literary roots – characters like Jim Rockford and Harry Orwell.  

The segment runs about 20 minutes, and obviously there’s only so much ground you can cover in such a short amount of time. If there’s a favorite literary detective of yours that we didn’t get around to mentioning, please let us know. I have a hunch we may end up doing another program on this sometime soon. 

Ed Robertson
www.edrobertson.com