Gunsmoke (1955)

Watchseries; Doing a review of Gunsmoke is a labor of love. 635 episodes over twenty years! Starred James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillon, the steadfast beacon of Dodge City, dogged in his pursuit of killers, thieves and villains. Amanda Blake portrayed the beautiful, fiery Miss Kitty Russell, the proprietor of the Long Branch saloon, and Milburn Stone as the curmudgeon Doc Adams, always stroking his face and patching up countless wounds. Marshal Dillon's sidekick was first Dennis Weaver as Chester Goode, the loyal helper with a limp who always seemed to encounter trouble. Burt Reynolds was Quint Asper, the half-breed blacksmith who could fight with his hands or a gun. And in Season 9, the introduction of Ken Curtis as Festus Haggen, Matt's deputy, the tough, whiskered companion, whose running verbal feuds with Doc Adams ( you ole scudder! ) were always of great amusement. In Season 1, the introductory soliloquy by Matt Dillon as he walked ruefully through Boot Hill cemetery, reflecting on the unfortunate inhabitants, and remarking that men were quicker to draw their guns than to draw upon their logic in the face of danger. The acting was hallmark, the stories exciting and a great cast of characters who appeared in each episode, such as John Dehner, Darren McGavin, Steve Forrest, Lee J. Cobb, John Anderson, Richard Kiley, Ricardo Montalban, Betty Davis, Bruce Dern, Nehemiah Persoff and James Gregory to name a select few. The show's themes of courage, redemption, justice, honor, revenge, love and loyalty stand as timeless monuments to the greatness of each week's episode. Gunsmoke defines the western genre as none other ever will!

Doing a review of Gunsmoke is a labor of love. 635 episodes over twenty years! Starred James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillon, the steadfast beacon of Dodge City, dogged in his pursuit of killers, thieves and villains. Amanda Blake portrayed the beautiful, fiery Miss Kitty Russell, the proprietor of the Long Branch saloon, and Milburn Stone as the curmudgeon Doc Adams, always stroking his face and patching up countless wounds. Marshal Dillon's sidekick was first Dennis Weaver as Chester Goode, the loyal helper with a limp who always seemed to encounter trouble. Burt Reynolds was Quint Asper, the half-breed blacksmith who could fight with his hands or a gun. And in Season 9, the introduction of Ken Curtis as Festus Haggen, Matt's deputy, the tough, whiskered companion, whose running verbal feuds with Doc Adams ( you ole scudder! ) were always of great amusement. In Season 1, the introductory soliloquy by Matt Dillon as he walked ruefully through Boot Hill cemetery, reflecting on the unfortunate inhabitants, and remarking that men were quicker to draw their guns than to draw upon their logic in the face of danger. The acting was hallmark, the stories exciting and a great cast of characters who appeared in each episode, such as John Dehner, Darren McGavin, Steve Forrest, Lee J. Cobb, John Anderson, Richard Kiley, Ricardo Montalban, Betty Davis, Bruce Dern, Nehemiah Persoff and James Gregory to name a select few. The show's themes of courage, redemption, justice, honor, revenge, love and loyalty stand as timeless monuments to the greatness of each week's episode. Gunsmoke defines the western genre as none other ever will!

Gunsmoke watchseries. Gunsmoke

That Gunsmoke is the greatest TV western of all time is hard to dispute. it may be the great TV show of all time. Think of what your favorite show might have been like after 20 years on the air and then compare it to Gunsmoke, which was probably as good as anything on TV for it's entire twenty year run. Not too many shows were on so long that their runs can be divided into eras, but Gunsmoke has three of them. The first is the half hour black and white era, (1955-61). This is the most praised era of the show and the era of it's greatest popularity, (it was the #1 show on TV the last four of those years). Critics praise the "tight scripting" of those days and James Arness has said he prefers John Meston's "little morality plays" to the later hour episodes, which some critics have called "bloated". I like the half hours because they show the program in it's formative years, when the cast was young, (and the right age for their characters). I also like you can get four of them to a cassette, rather than two. But these shows are basically about incidents, rather than stories. They lack character and story development. The second era is the hour long black and white era. This is my favorite, firstly because it's the earliest one I remember from the times I watched it with my father and secondly because it's the best. With the extra hour to work with and a new group of writers to do the work,. the series matured. The supporting cast became stars, (nearly every famous episode featuring Chester, Festus, Doc or Kitty comes from this period). It also is the era when the second lead was introduced. the first and best was Burt Reynolds as Quint Asper, who's entire run is in this era. The writers also increased the scope of the show by focusing on "guest characters" with the regulars as supporting players. Unfortunately, the general public didn't share my enthusiasm for this era, (or they found something better to do on Saturday nights). Gunsmoke fell from #1 to #36, (in an era where there were only three networks), and actually got briefly canceled until William Paley saved it. But the old Saturday night spot was taken by Mannix so the show was moved to Tuesday, where it was expected to die a natural death among shows intended for younger viewers. In the greatest upset in TV ratings history, the show was discovered by a new generation and rebounded to #2, earning it another 8 years on the air, by which time the western craze it had started was long over and all it's rivals, even Bonanza, were long off the air.

By this time, color had taken over. And it didn't do the show much good. Magazine reporters used to say: black and white for drama, color for excitement. Gunsmoke was about drama. Gunsmoke used to use an outdoor set for daytime Dodge City scenes. That disappeared in favor of an indoor set about 1960. In black an white the indoor set sufficed. In color it looked garish and stagy. Color had the same effect on the actors who were now too old for their roles. Real western marshals served for a few months at a time, (and, by the way, US Marshals were never town marshals). it became increasingly ridiculous to see Matt Dillon still gunning down the young whippersnappers after a decade or more. Miss Kitty went from a purdy young thing to a middle aged painted lady. Doc became increasingly enfeebled as Milburn Stone's health declined. Somehow the color film brought out all the wrinkles more than black and white. There where compensations. E

First, I want to agree to every positive word said about Gunsmoke and ALL of the actors throughout the series. I grew up watching every episode of Gunsmoke that I could. More than entertaining TV, you actually learned 'Life Lessons' from the stories. They were all top of the line. But, more than that.....

In 1955, I was only SEVEN YEARS OLD when Gunsmoke started. By the time I turned 18 years old, I was still glued to the TV every time it came on. In 1967, just as the new Fall series was getting started, I had the rug pulled out from under my feet when I was drafted into the U. S. Army. No more TV and no more Gunsmoke for me. Then I was sent to Vietnam, where I spent 13 months of my two year tour of duty.

When I returned to my civilian life back in Oklahoma in 1969, I had no interest in watching ANY TV . I had no idea, and would never have expected that Gunsmoke was still on the air. Time went by ever so slowly as I had to deal with a devastating condition, unknown to me at the time, as PTSD. Eventually there came a time when I ran out of booze, money and none of my friends were available to run around with to get my mind off of all of the things I didn't want to think about.

So I turned on the TV and started flipping through the channels. Good God Almighty!!! There before my eyes was an episode of Gunsmoke. I couldn't believe it! I settled back in my chair and started watching, getting drawn into the story, loving the characters, and escaping from the life I wanted to get away from. From then on I could barely stand it until the next week when it would come on again.

Now this story may sound a little fantastic to some of you. But I honestly believe that all of those characters and stories on Gunsmoke helped to save my life. They gave me something to look forward to, something to really enjoy once again. And as time went by, other things developed in my life, for the better, and better and better. Thank you Matt and Kitty, Chester and Festus, Doc, Sam, Newley and all the others. Thank you Gunsmoke for all of those wonderful shows!!!

AND, Yes, of course, I am watching all of the reruns on the various cable channels I can find. Yeeeeehaaaaa!

Subconsciously I'm always comparing today's actors with the core actors of Gunsmoke, and today's actors come up short. Burt Reynolds In the book foreword of James Arness biography tells it best how behind the scenes how everyone took it so seriously that they were telling a story to show pretty much the truth of how it was in the late 1800s often based on true stories. The first half hour, black-and-white shows in my opinion were the best followed by the one hour black and whites, but after the 10th season it seemed to just become a basic well done drama, but I read that was caused by many people saying the early shows were too violent but more enjoyable to me as they were gritty as it probably actually was.

When you're talking TV westerns there are only two really that are at the top, interchangeably as it were. One is CBS's Gunsmoke and the other is NBC's Bonanza. Then you discuss anything else.

It's interesting to speculate how John Wayne's career might have taken a different turn had he accepted the offer to star in a weekly half hour television show about the Marshal of Dodge City. But of course he didn't do it, but instead pushed hard for an even taller marshal for the Kansas frontier town. James Arness had co-starred with the Duke in Big Jim McLain, Island in the Sky, and Hondo. He certainly brought a Duke like presence to the role of Marshal Matt Dillon.

A lot of people forget that Gunsmoke was a radio series for several years before it came to television. It ran parallel on radio in the declining years of radio drama and the voice of Matt Dillon on the radio was William Conrad. Certainly a capable enough actor, Conrad's squat appearance just didn't match the description on radio of Dillon. Why do you think John Wayne was the first choice?

Besides the regulars on every week which included Dennis Weaver as the stiff legged somewhat mentally challenged Deputy Chester Goode, Milburn Stone as testy and cantankerous Doctor Galen Adams, and Amanda Blake as Matt's significant other, Kitty Russell of the Longbranch saloon, the writers were smart enough to make sure the producers kept a recurring cast of regulars as the townspeople. Roy Roberts the banker, Eddy Waller as the livery stable owner, Glenn Strange as the bartender in the Longbranch, and for a while Burt Reynolds as a blacksmith, popped up in several episodes a year, even just with a line or two. It kept a great sense of continuity and the whole community of Dodge City became like familiar friends.

Poor Dennis Weaver who related the stiff leg was his idea to establish individuality of his character and that he had to study yoga in order to walk with it and mount a horse said that he would have done something different if he knew how difficult it was going to be. He read for the Matt Dillon part and took the role of Chester because he needed the work. But after several seasons, he naturally did not want to spend his career typecast as a half wit. He quit and the rustic Festus Hagen came on as the Deputy. Festus was uneducated, but was by no means stupid. His arguments with the cantankerous Doc Adams were classic. Festus was played with real flair by Ken Curtis.

If Gunsmoke is remembered for something other than a really great western series, maybe the best we ever had on television, it's the show that was saved by White House intervention. Along about 1965 because of declining ratings CBS was considering giving it the axe. But in an interview Lady Bird Johnson happened to mention that Gunsmoke was her favorite television show. That offhand comment revived interest in the series and CBS kept Gunsmoke on for another decade.

Gunsmoke was an adult western, the plot situations were adult, but it's characters were both real and morally upright. Matt Dillon was no kid's cowboy hero like Gene Autry or Roy Rogers, but he was honest and decent and a fine role model who was incorruptible. And he and Kitty Russell had an adult romance going in the same manner as Perry Mason and Della Street. It was unspoken that sex as well as liquor was to be had at the Longbranch, but Miss Kitty had eyes only for the Marshal.

As did America for twenty satisfying years.

The original title of "Kitty's Love Affair" was "End of the Run." The story depicted a gunfighter who fell in love with Kitty and hoped that, by buying a ranch and settling down, he could encourage her to marry him. The original ending had the gunfighter (Richard Kiley) hanged. Unfortunately, John Mantley, the producer, decided that, yet again, Matt would save the day. Before Mr. Kiley was cast in the role of Will Stambridge, the writers (S.L. Kotar and J.E. Gessler) were told there could be no kissing scenes between the gunfighter and Miss Kitty because "Gunsmoke fans would never allow it." After Richard accepted the role, the script was altered to allow Will to kiss Kitty four times! This was the highest rated episode in the twenty year history of Gunsmoke.