CBS/Paramount and B/W shows (1 Viewer)

With the announcement today of the final season of Have Gun.., It occured to me that CBS couldn't have that many B/W shows left unreleased in their library, so I looked it up. I found a real positive track record. Assuming releases of the final season of Perry Mason and continuation of Gunsmoke, it appears that the following are the only B/W shows left unreleased in their vaults: My Three Sons- 3,4,5 Bilko - Remaning eps. Ben Casey The Millionaire Our Miss Brooks The Rebel Not too shabby. We can only hope that Warner has that good of a track record a couple years from now.

But going by the descriptions, they've never even made a set of tape masters for "Our Miss Brooks" and "The Millionaire" which would require a transfer project that would surprise me if they went through with it. I would more likely expect Bilko to make it the rest of the way as an MOD program.

Personally, I don't real see much being realistically released among this group with the exception of The Rebel if they farm it out to something like Timeless which is big on westerns. My Three Sons looked like it stalled for good.

Technically there's never been an official first season of The Beverly Hillbillies. There are a ton of public domain releases and even The Ultimate Collection from MPI. There's never been a remastered, hi-def release of Season One. Hopefully we'll see it and the color episodes both. I'm now seeing listings on Amazon, though no matching product yet, for The Complete Series and Season Five both. I'm hoping this is good news!

My Three Son's sales sucked because the show was butchered. Get it right and I'm sure it would be a success for a good bit of the run. As far as myself and many of the fans that look to online to make purchases were concerned, season 1 and season 2 aren't out there on DVD and we made sure to inform those less aware of the plight of it at places like Amazon's review pages. And that's where the majority of your DVD sales come from over the past half decade or so. Sadly the message seems to have flown over CBS/Paramount's heads. This show's best hope is if all the effort on The Fugitive pays off and they decide to revist another successful series and take a second look at this and start over. If they put some thought in it, I believe that they would realize that a huge chunk of their potential sales for those two seasons evaporated due to what they did to it. It's just a matter of them deciding to give it a second chance and do it properly this time. My suggestion would be budget releases of season 1 & season 2 with the proper audio tracks returned to their transfers and then start onwards from there. I don't see why this wouldn't have a shot of getting at least the first 9 seasons out that are the favorites of most of the fans and the show is always a popular favorite everytime a channel appears dedicated to classic TV in recent decades. Particularly if it isn't done via split seasons. Isn't Make Room for Daddy a CBS show? It certainly aired there at least for the more memorable run of the show when some cast changes were made and it started becoming a ratings hit. Either way, that's a big glaring hole in B&W tv on DVD with one cut season and one decent effort for a very successful half dozen seasons (And I believe the fans would enjoy the first four seasons as well if whatever survives were to be given a chance on DVD). Also what about the Jack Benny Show? They were the production company for the first half decade and they aired everything but the very end of it. So I would think at least a good chunk of this would fall under their umbrella today. And it's not color but is instead stalled out after the two B&W seasons made it out, but I think Petticoat Junction stands a chance of a revival if we wanted to expand this a bit into shows that started as B&W that have color seasons absent on DVD. Sure sounded like they were close multiple times to greenlighting more of it. I hope someday to look at my shelves and see more than just the first two seasons there. Any other CBS owned shows that have their B&W runs out but are stalled out with the color era?

LeoAmes said:

My Three Son's sales sucked because the show was butchered. Get it right and I'm sure it would be a success for a good bit of the run. As far as myself and many of the fans that look to online to make purchases were concerned, season 1 and season 2 aren't out there on DVD and we made sure to inform those less aware of the plight of it at places like Amazon's review pages. And that's where the majority of your DVD sales come from over the past half decade or so. Sadly the message seems to have flown over CBS/Paramount's heads. This show's best hope is if all the effort on The Fugitive pays off and they decide to revist another successful series and take a second look at this and start over. If they put some thought in it, I believe that they would realize that a huge chunk of their potential sales for those two seasons evaporated due to what they did to it. It's just a matter of them deciding to give it a second chance and do it properly this time. My suggestion would be budget releases of season 1 & season 2 with the proper audio tracks returned to their transfers and then start onwards from there. Isn't Make Room for Daddy a CBS show? It certainly aired there at least for the more memorable run of the show when some cast changes were made and it started becoming a ratings hit. Either way, that's a big glaring hole in B&W tv on DVD with one cut season and one decent effort for a very successful half dozen seasons (And I believe the fans would enjoy the first four seasons as well if whatever survives were to be given a chance on DVD). Also what about the Jack Benny Show? They were the production company for the first half decade and they aired everything but the very end of it. So I would think at least a good chunk of this would fall under their umbrella today. And it's not color but is instead stalled out after the two B&W seasons made it out, but I think Petticoat Junction stands a chance of a revival if we want to expand this a bit into shows that started as B&W that have color seasons absent on DVD. Sure sounded like they were close multiple times to greenlighting more of it. I hope someday to look at my shelves and see more than just the first two seasons there.

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I was doing some looking on Make Room For Daddy today and found some old threads on here. Apparently the Thomas estate isn't willing to release all of the seasons. Do the search feature on here and you should find the thread. I decided to go looking as I found some shows of Make Room For Granddaddy on YouTube and I came over here to search. Variety shows don't generally make it to DVD unless it's a best of release. I wouldn't mind seeing Jack get a season set release if elements exist, but it's not likely to ever happen.

The Jack Benny Program is owned by Universal. Make Room for Daddy is privately owned, I think. Richard Diamond has split ownership, but I believe the majority of the episodes are held by CBS/Paramount.

I'm not sure about about some of these shows mentioned but I got my info from the CBS syndication bible and Benny, Danny Thomas, and Richard Diamond are not included there.

The syndication bible has a lot of information, but it only covers those series the studio has available for syndication. Series lacking usable prints or considered too short or unknown to be sold are not included, even when the studio owns them. For example, we were recently discussing Nero Wolfe in another thread. It's a CBS/Paramount property, but with only 14 episodes, it isn't included in the syndication bible. The Defenders (with E.G. Marshall and Robert Reed) is a black and white CBS/Paramount property with well over 100 episodes, but for reasons of their own, they have chosen not to make it available for syndication.

I wasn't aware that The Defenders was a CBS property. I watched a lot of syndicated 60's shows as a kid and once I learned of it later and the amount of episodes it carried, I have often wondered why it was never aired in reruns. Same with the 4 Warner late 50's/early 60's detective shows.

I wonder also, Frank. It's possible that it seems to someone there that it might be too much a product of its time, but doesn't it seem like it would have been worth a try? Especially since the show was actually revived for Showtime at one point before E.G. Marshall's death. It's hard to fathom how it wouldn't be popular enough to syndicate but would be popular enough to revive.

Frank Soyke said:

With the announcement today of the final season of Have Gun.., It occured to me that CBS couldn't have that many B/W shows left unreleased in their library, so I looked it up. I found a real positive track record. Assuming releases of the final season of Perry Mason and continuation of Gunsmoke, it appears that the following are the only B/W shows left unreleased in their vaults: My Three Sons- 3,4,5 Bilko - Remaning eps. Ben Casey The Millionaire Our Miss Brooks The Rebel Not too shabby. We can only hope that Warner has that good of a track record a couple years from now.

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Yes, that's all that's left. With the exception of: The Baileys of Balboa, The Blue Angels, Boots and Saddles, Border Patrol, Breaking Point, The Brothers Brannagan, The Cara Williams Show, Climax, Danger, December Bride, The Defenders, Desilu Playhouse, Flight, For The People, Frontier Doctor, Grey Ghost, Great Adventure, Gunslinger, Harrigan and Son, Hotel De Paree, How to Marry a Millionaire, The Jim Backus Show, The Lineup (aka San Francisco Beat), Mr. Adams and Eve, The New Breed, Not For Hire, Official Detective, The People's Choice, Pony Express, The Reporter, Richard Diamond (1st 3 seasons), Sheriff of Cochise, Slattery's People, The Third Man, This is Alice, Trackdown, Union Pacific, Walter Winchell File, The Web, Wendy and Me, Playhouse 90, Whirlybirds, Glencannon, Mama, Way Out, The Nurses, Fair Exchange, Those Whiting Girls, Glynnis, Silent Service. And of course one of the greatest sitcoms of all-time, which they will never let out of the vaults, Amos and Andy.

Neil Brock said:

Yes, that's all that's left. With the exception of: The Baileys of Balboa, The Blue Angels, Boots and Saddles, Border Patrol, Breaking Point, The Brothers Brannagan, The Cara Williams Show, Climax, Danger, December Bride, The Defenders, Desilu Playhouse, Flight, For The People, Frontier Doctor, Grey Ghost, Great Adventure, Gunslinger, Harrigan and Son, Hotel De Paree, How to Marry a Millionaire, The Jim Backus Show, The Lineup (aka San Francisco Beat), Mr. Adams and Eve, The New Breed, Not For Hire, Official Detective, The People's Choice, Pony Express, The Reporter, Richard Diamond (1st 3 seasons), Sheriff of Cochise, Slattery's People, The Third Man, This is Alice, Trackdown, Union Pacific, Walter Winchell File, The Web, Wendy and Me, Playhouse 90, Whirlybirds, Glencannon, Mama, Way Out, The Nurses, Fair Exchange, Those Whiting Girls, Glynnis, Silent Service. And of course one of the greatest sitcoms of all-time, which they will never let out of the vaults, Amos and Andy.

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I should have clarified that I was pointing out series that CBS has made available for syndication.I can't address every one, but I am fairly certain that most shows on this list have never been syndicated and have not been shown since they were first run. The ones I am not certain if they were ever syndicated are: Richard Diamond, Lineup, December Bride, The People's Choice, The Nurses, and Playhouse 90. Maybe someone can clarily this. The Defenders has already been discussed and the mess with Amos and Andy has been well documented. As far as the others, The are almost all (save one or two) one season shows that have never been re-run. CBS's bread and butter is not releasing one season and done shows. It's just not happening. Truthfully, none of the other major distributors (Shout, Warner, and Sony) touch one season shows. Liscensing to Timeless or another indie is the only was this stuff has any chance to be seen. IMO

Some of those shows, like December Bride and The Lineup were heavily syndicated. Many of them were shows that came to CBS from either Republic or Worldvision through the mergers. Some, like Whirlybirds, were first-run syndication series that ran for many years.

Thanks much for clarifying. I am especially curious about Richard Diamond. I don't recall ever seeing it in reruns when I was a kid (or since). Maybe in a different market than me. Of course I never knew Run For Your Life (not CBS) was syndicated either until 1990 when WOR outta New York aired it. I could go on about that show as it's my holy grail, but that's for another thread.

Neil Brock said:

Yes, that's all that's left. With the exception of: The Baileys of Balboa, The Blue Angels, Boots and Saddles, Border Patrol, Breaking Point, The Brothers Brannagan, The Cara Williams Show, Climax, Danger, December Bride, The Defenders, Desilu Playhouse, Flight, For The People, Frontier Doctor, Grey Ghost, Great Adventure, Gunslinger, Harrigan and Son, Hotel De Paree, How to Marry a Millionaire, The Jim Backus Show, The Lineup (aka San Francisco Beat), Mr. Adams and Eve, The New Breed, Not For Hire, Official Detective, The People's Choice, Pony Express, The Reporter, Richard Diamond (1st 3 seasons), Sheriff of Cochise, Slattery's People, The Third Man, This is Alice, Trackdown, Union Pacific, Walter Winchell File, The Web, Wendy and Me, Playhouse 90, Whirlybirds, Glencannon, Mama, Way Out, The Nurses, Fair Exchange, Those Whiting Girls, Glynnis, Silent Service. And of course one of the greatest sitcoms of all-time, which they will never let out of the vaults, Amos and Andy.

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Also the excellent American history series The Great Adventure. With only the one, albeit full, season, I can't see it ever making DVD release unless History Channel or one of its branches wanted it for broadcast. If it ever did,I'd buy it in a heartbeat -- even at a premium price.

Ben casey was on ABC.

disctrip said:

Ben casey was on ABC.

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According to the syndication bible, CBS/Paramount owns the rights to Ben Casey

Neil Brock said:

Yes, that's all that's left. With the exception of: The Baileys of Balboa, The Blue Angels, Boots and Saddles, Border Patrol, Breaking Point, The Brothers Brannagan, The Cara Williams Show, Climax, Danger, December Bride, The Defenders, Desilu Playhouse, Flight, For The People, Frontier Doctor, Grey Ghost, Great Adventure, Gunslinger, Harrigan and Son, Hotel De Paree, How to Marry a Millionaire, The Jim Backus Show, The Lineup (aka San Francisco Beat), Mr. Adams and Eve, The New Breed, Not For Hire, Official Detective, The People's Choice, Pony Express, The Reporter, Richard Diamond (1st 3 seasons), Sheriff of Cochise, Slattery's People, The Third Man, This is Alice, Trackdown, Union Pacific, Walter Winchell File, The Web, Wendy and Me, Playhouse 90, Whirlybirds, Glencannon, Mama, Way Out, The Nurses, Fair Exchange, Those Whiting Girls, Glynnis, Silent Service. And of course one of the greatest sitcoms of all-time, which they will never let out of the vaults, Amos and Andy.

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The rest are fine, but as an Afro-American, I'll take a pass on Amos and Andy. If the powers-that-be at CBS wanted to come up with a black sitcom, they could have got some writers to do some research on Afro-American people, and then write a better show with better characters than Amos and Andy. Using those characters was an affront to black people, and the blacks of the time let the network know in no uncertain terms why it was so.

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