Still the hottest woman ever to grace a TV set.
Posted on 08/04/2025 5:39:28 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The sixties was one of the more creative decades in modern history: The music, the clothes, the movies, the pop culture. But maybe most creative were the goofy TV comedy series.
The sixties were one of the most creative periods for art in modern American history. Mostly known for innovative music, now called "classic rock," the decade also broke meaningful ground in the areas of dress, pop culture, literature, movies and more. The sixties reminds this journalist of the fertile twenties in American literature with Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, John Steinbeck and the like.
What isn't acknowledged much is the outrageous creativity of sixties television comedy series. Think about the goofiness of "Green Acres" (sophisticated New Yorkers moving to a rural farm), "I Dream Of Jeannie" (an astronaut and a genie) and "Mr. Ed" (a man with a talking horse). What minds came up with that stuff, I can't imagine, but there was a refreshing innocence about the shows, and, to this day, many are still in syndication.
I picked out five of the more memorable to look at, listed below in random order.
(1) "I Dream Of Jeannie": With the Cold War space race between the U.S. and former Soviet Union in full swing, this series had some relativity to the time period. It ran for five seasons on NBC, starting in 1965.
Major Anthony Nelson, an astronaut played by Larry Hagman, later to star in “Dallas,” becomes stranded on a remote island when his reentry capsule meanders off-course. While on the island, he finds a bottle that's washed up on shore. When he uncorks it, out pops actress Barbara Eden, a beautiful genie dressed in Persian garb who helps rescue him and is his willing "slave" going forward.
(Excerpt) Read more at forbes.com ...
Wanted:Dead or Alive....
While we’re at good old shows...
Highway Patrol
Lassie
Rin-Tin-Tin
Whirlybirds
Sea-Hunt
77 Sunset Strip
Aquanauts
Sky King
Sgt. Preston of the Yukon
Man from UNCLE
I Spy
Zorro
The Untouchables
Naked City
Peter Gunn
Superman
Combat
Gallant Men
It wasnt noticed when I was younger, but it is true that those shows had a large impact on myself and probably the other children who watched the shows. They didn’t paint a completely accurate picture of how the world works.
No Rat Patrol?
Still the hottest woman ever to grace a TV set.
Someone called Jim Clash writes it.
The Prisoner
Mr. Clash furthermore seems to suffer from a reading comprehension/listening problem. He must have read (or heard) “Texas tea” from the Beverly Hillbillies’ theme song and completely ignored the rest.
As a child, I LOVED the Francis films and still do.
Writers can't write, actors and actresses cant act, everything is either badly done remakes, stolen ideas from times long passed, and VERY WOKE!
Every old film, stage play, radio show, or T.V. show was NOT "brilliant", or even good; however, a great deal of it was.
Why is that? Well, if I have to produce a reason, it's because having to write well in school ( and yes, that goes for even in the lower grades ), reading for pleasure ( which means that you have to use your imagination, and throw in listening to a radio show as well ), children amusing themselves with imaginative games/pretending to be someone else, is long gone.
And no, AI won't be any better, because it has no soul and is NOT a human, so it can't "feel"! It'll be garbage in/garbage out, with the end result being some damned repeated thing, in the "voice" of Shakespeare, Hemingway,Jane Austin, you name it.
Some T.V. shows were made from books, such as the TOPPER series ( which was directly taken from the film series of that name), Bewitched ( both take-off of two of Thorne Smith's books...Topper and THE PASSIONATE WITCH, which was first made into the film I MARRIED A WITCH ) and then there were the new weekly plays on the three major networks, and a decade later, plays on channel 13 ( which was a local channel and then became PBS ), every Friday night.
And yes, I'm going way back to the late 1940s through the 1950s.
In the '50s, there was Bilko, Car 54 Where Are You, and many other great comedy series.
Re '60s shows...F TROOP, STAR TREK, and many others, not mentioned.
The Adams family was taken from the cartoons of Edward Gory.
Original plays, such as MARTY ( which was first written especially FOR T.V., was then made into a film ), and many other "new" writers were given a chance, because T.V. needed to fill time slots. But most of them were really very good and the authors went on to become very famous and wrote film scripts.
When you talk about mass media - the networks and cable channels, Hollywood, big record labels, etc - sure, a lot of it, even most of it, is schlock.
But go to places where individuals and small groups put their stuff out - YouTube, Dailymotion, your local music venues, there’s still hope.
Support Your Local Brewery, Restaurant, Artists’ Gallery, or What-Have-You - they’re much more deserving.
I now binge watch old BRIT T.V. shows on YouTube and TCM.
Today, there are IMBECILES making T.V.Shows, films, and play, which are ALL utter and complete GARBAGE!
We got our first T.V. set in the summer of 1949 and though, because of my age and bedtimes, I missed out on seeing a lot of the really GREAT stuff, I did manage to see the tail end of the GOLDEN AGE OF T.V.!
I was luckier with great film and some stage plays, though. :-)
Was just talking about stuff in general, though I think it also applies to film and TV - like the Coen brothers, for example.
No, not all old films were good; however, so many were made, that there are a plethora of riches to watch.
And then....there are the 1,000s of discs we have, to watch.
I'm old enough to have been "spoiled" bu all of the old GREAT things, so refuse to pay any attention to today's tripe.
But each to his or her own..............
“bu”=by.
By the time we dropped Dish Network we were watching three channels for $120/month - WeatherNation, TVG (a horse racing channel) and TCM.
But have you noticed how woke even TCM has become since Ben Mankiewicz took over from Robert Osborne? And it’s too bad AMC has become unwatchable.
And the above are but two writers for T.V., whose quality of work far surpasses anything written today, for T.V. and films.
TCM has gone completely NUTS with its WOKE and DEI hires, so we don't watch the intros...just the movies. :-)
“They had something back then that is sorely missing from today’s creative talent... An imagination.’
Even the kids shows were better back then. Andy Devine, Sandy Becker, Wonderama, and all the rest. They were entertaining, not preachy and not overbearing with trying to teach lessons.
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