"I Led 3 Lives" TV series-in color?? (1 Viewer)

[nostalgic TV guy]

"I Led 3 Lives" was a TV series that ran from 1953-56. It has not been in re-runs since the 1960's and has never been released 'officially' in any format. The only way to see it is from bootlegs (mediocre to poor quality) made from old film prints copied to VHS.

I have 105 episodes on (poor quality) DVD's from multi-generational VHS copies. What I was shocked to discover in viewing the episodes is that about 20 of the episodes I have are in color! Almost all of them the color is badly faded and shifted badly to reddish (which is typical of color film prints from this era).

There is one episode I have ("Homing Station" from 1954) which actually has decent color. It is amazing to watch such an old TV series from the early 1950's and see (at least part of it) filmed in color!

I did do a google search on this forum and did find an old post discussing this. This post said there are rumors of random episodes being filmed in color.

Secondly, an Internet search turned up a couple of episode lists of this series and some of the episodes I only have in black-and-white are mentioned as being in color. All in all, I see at least 25 or 30 epiosodes as being in color and who knows how many more are out there.

Although I realize realistically, there is no hope of this series seeing any kind of a DVD release, the possibility of 30 or more color episodes would make an interesting package release, considering the total reluctance of many companies to have anything to do with series that are not in color. (If the prints are faded, the original negatives would be faded to an extent too, although possibly in an opposite color shift to the prints. There was a new process introduced in the 1990's for restoring faded color movie prints. The process won an Academy Award and was used on the 1990's atomic bomb documentary "Trinity and Beyond". According to the info on the Internet, this process works better than even so-called "digital restoration".)

 

[Bert Greene]

Ziv did seem to dabble in color quite a bit, as there are also color episodes of "Boston Blackie" and "Mr. District Attorney." I've often wondered the extent to which this was done. With all the outdoors, on-location shooting done on these shows, the color episodes would be particularly fascinating, on a visual level, if restored from negatives and made available.

Of course, Ziv started early with color, on "Cisco Kid," and were still giving it a shot several years later, in the first season of "Science Fiction Theater." I'm not sure, but I think their "Eddie Cantor Comedy Theater" was also shot entirely in color. Anyway, it would be interesting to learn about all those scattershot color episodes to "I Led Three Lives" and such. I have a couple on tape as well, but the color is so faded, they appear more like sepia-toned prints. On the other hand, a single color episode of "Mr. District Attorney" that appeared on the Nostalgia Channel (precursor to Goodlife/AmericanLife) in the late-1980s retained a fairly decent color.

 

[Bob Gu]

It's sad that all these early color shows are hidden away. The show's producers had the guts to put extra money into the production for the color episodes, thinking they would been rerun forever when the switch to color happened and they wind up being buried or syndicated with black and white prints.

The Gene Autry Show's 15 color episodes were restored quite awhile ago and were promised to be released in 2007,along with the B&W episodes as part of the Gene Autry's 100th birthday celebration. But it didn't happen, since Autry Entertainment's deal with Image ended when Image was taken over by another company.

There are 52 color episodes of The Adventures Of Wild Bill Hickok deep in Sony's vault. That would be a great color episodes only release.

 

[silverking]

Cisco Kid was shot in colour as the producers were able to buy up a lot of colour stock cheaply. As they assumed it would only be seen in black & white
no effort was made in the processing which is why when viewed today many episodes have poor colour balance & mismatched colour.

I have also heard that the first episode of 'Sea Hunt' was shot in colour.

 

[nostalgic TV guy]

There is a book that has been published about "IL3L" by a Martin Grams. It is supposed to have all the history of the series I.e. shooting locations, excerpts of scripts, etc. I've ordered this and as soon as it arrives, maybe it will give some information about the color episodes.

I've had photography as a hobby for over 30 years, including having my own color darkroom. To me, the poor color we see on today's prints is very typical of the fading that happened in the dye layers of these old Eastman color film stocks. There are 3 dye layers in the prints, each colored yellow, magenta and cyan. Through these three dye layers all the colors we see can be reproduced, at least enough to make a satisfactory representation. The cyan colored dye is the most unstable and fades first. This is what gives these old prints the reddish cast, when the cyan colored dye has started to fade. The longest lasting dye color is the magenta.

The Eastman Color film and the color negative-positive process was introduced in 1950. The color fading was worst during the 1950's era and by 1962 there were improvements in the film stock, although the fading problems wouldn't disappear ( no pun intended) until the late 1970's.

If your my age (51) you certainly remember seeing old movies (mainly the 1950's era) run on late night TV with the color shifted just like what you see on these old ZIV programs. The problem happened with movies shot in the 1950's that were shot and meant to be seen in color. It's not something that happened with these old TV programs because they were going to be broadcast only on B&W sets.

Having done my own color film and print processing, I don't believe the problems we see are due to any so-called bad processing as some might speculate (color film must be developed to exacting time and temperature standards) but merely color fading in the film the shooting negatives were copied to.

A local UHF station used to broadcast episodes of "Cisco" 10 or 12 years ago. I remember being surprised to see such an old TV program in color, knowing that Color TV as we know it did not exist until 1954 and even then it was extremely limited (only 68 total hours of color broadcasting were done in in 1954, this is not much more than one hour per week!) and color sets were extremely expensive (equivalent in today's money of $2500-$3000).

The color of the "Cisco" episodes I saw looked better than almost all of the IL3L episodes I have. It was not as good as even a color program of the 1960's but still very interesting to see. Considering that IL3L has many outdoor location shots from the L.A. area (as opposed to movie backlot stages used in the film industry) , it would certainly be worth preserving. It's cool to see the two-tone 1950's automobiles!

 

[DeWilson]

Supposedly to save money ZIV bought alot of color "ends" - which are the end of each film negative batch.

 

[nostalgic TV guy]

Yes, this was very common. Companies would buy enough film of the same emulsion number to film an entire movie. There would always be a few hundred/thousand feet left, not enough to make another movie, so they would sell the film "ends".

Film would vary, very slightly in color and speed from emulsion to emulsion but since this was a color negative to positive process, it was easy to compensate during the printing stages for any minor differences.

Film of this kind was even sold to consumers, if the film was 35mm. Then it would be loaded to 35mm. still camera cartridges and sold in ads through photo magazines. This was done starting in the early 1950's up until the start of the digital era, just a few years ago. One of the most popular companies doing this in recent years was Seattle Film Works, which closed in 2003.

 

[nostalgic TV guy]

I have received the book about IL3L and there is no information about which episodes were shot in color. There is a chapter about all the misinformation and inaccuracies that has spread about this series. Much of the 'trivia' told about this series is completely in error. The Wikipedia entry is full of errors.

For example, the myth that the FBI and J. Edgar Hoover approved each episode is wrong. Only the very first episode, the pilot, had approval by the FBI (in the form of a letter) on how the FBI agents were protrayed. ZIV received a letter Ok-ing the protrayl of the FBI agents and this was the ONLY contact EVER between the FBI and ZIV regarding the series.

Also, Wikipedia states that Herbert Philbrick narrated each episode. This is untrue, each episode was narrated by the series lead, Richard Carlson. There are other Wikipedia errors as well. Apparently the person who posted the Wikipedia non-facts never even saw the series since viewing one episode would prove that the series was narrated by Carlson.

One of the most infamous "facts" about the series was that it was Lee Harvey Oswald's favorite TV show. This statement makes no sense in light of the facts. Oswald's brother stated that Oswald watched the TV show before his brother entered the Marine Corps. But his brother entered the Corps in 1952 and the first episode of IL3L was not aired until October 1953. Adding to this is the fact that IL3L did not go into immediate reruns when it left prime time in 1956. It was rerun back in the 1960's, too late for Oswald to see it "as a boy".

I have also read online that Oswald's brother did not visit home during his military service and the series was off the air by the time he was discharged.

From what Martin Grams says about the series, it may be possible that Oswald's brother has the series confused with another spy show of the era. Grams recounts several incidents where strangers have talked to him about remembering the series and it turns out they were describing another series, such as the radio show "I Was A Communist For The FBI".

It has been so many years since the series has been broadcast on TV, and so few people have seen it that makes it very easy for rumors and wildly inaccurate "facts" to be told and retold about the series.

 

[Mike*HTF]

Thanks for this, Kevin. I've long wondered about this book and your thoughts are helpful.

How complete is the information on the episode list (cast, etc.)?

 

[nostalgic TV guy]

Well, it depends on what you mean by complete!

Here is some of the typical information that's given for an episode:

Pilot #1 "Pilot"
Production #1001/1B
Typed script by Donn Mullally, N.D.
Typed Script with Producer's Suggestions, N.D.
Mimeo (2 annotated versions), N.D.
Master Mimeo (annotated), April 1, 1953
Revised Master Mimeo, May 9, 1953
Filmed April 3 and 4, 1953

Cast: Richard Carlson (Herbert A. Philbrick); Jean Cooper (Sally); Robert Anderson (Wilkerson); Walden Boyle (Adams); Emerson Treacy (Doc); John Frank (Comrade Lothar); Gregory Walcott (lawyer Bob); Mitchell Kowal (the man); William Grueneberg (the clerk) and Earl Keen (the prosecutor).

Production Credits
Production Chief: Maurice Unger
Director: Eddie Davis
First Assistant Director: Eddie Stein
Second Assistant Director: Bobby Ray
First Cameraman: Curt Fetters
Second Cameraman: Robert Hoffman
First Assistant Cameraman: Hugh Crawford
Casting Director: Ralph K. Winters
Sound Mixer: Garry Harris
Recorder: William Sosteleo
Boom Man: Jay Ashworth {continues for another 13 entries-I won't type them all}

Plot: Philbrick spends the day as John Q. Citizen, constantly strained by the fear of being watched and scrutinized, suspected by the Communist Party as a counterspy. Revealing to the television audience each of the members of the cell meeting as regular Joes' about town, Philbrick points out which of them is a lawyer, a store owner, a scientist, and all with one common Red demoninator. During the emergency cell meeting, Comrade Sally confesses to all that she is a deviationist and hangs her head in shame. Comrade Wilkerson reinstates to the cell members that the policy is still the same...{again, I won't type the complete entry}

Memorable Quotes: After Comrade Sally confesses, Philbrick remarks "Confession is good for the soul. If the Comrades don't believe in the soul, they do believe in confessing. It's a big emotional thing with them, like a huge public bath where everyone scrubs everyone else's back. It's sickening..."

Trivia, etchilbrick was to meet special agent James Adams, but when a Comrade enters the diner, Philbrick gives him a special signal...{continues on for another 2 paragraphs}

Production Notes; Comrade Wilkerson's car was needed for the second day of filming. A car for the F.B.I. was needed for both days of filming. Total cost for this episode was $980.00. No stock footage was used for this episode.
Total Crew Hours: 24
Make Ready and Film: 20 hours
Travel Time: 4 Hours

What is more important in the book is that the episode titles I have seen listed on the Internet (and the ones on my DVD's) are incorrect! For example, on the Internet is a site called "The Classic TV Archive". This website gives an episode listing of the series with epiosde titles. Many of the titles are "made up" guesswork and incorrect! For example: this guide lists episode #2 in the series as "Bess". But there is no episode with this title at all. Episode #2 is titled "Pilot #2" and is a variation of the original pilot #1. The episode I have on DVD listed as "Bess" is actually "Camera" episode #61.

On my DVD's there is a later episode titled "Camera" but it is the wrong episode for this episode title! I have seen several other episode listings on the 'net and they are all incorrect! This may be the first listing of episode titles for the series with all the correct titles!

 

[Mike*HTF]

Yes, I would say this qualifies as complete.

Obtaining accurate cast info on this series has been incredibly difficult - many thanks - I believe I need this book.

 

[nostalgic TV guy]

Mike,

A couple of interesting facts from the book: by May 1954 the program was seen on 157 stations and was among the top ten shows in the country, collecting several awards including the George Washington honor medal of the Freedom Foundation at Columbia University. Also, two scripts were written by a man who went under the pen name of Robert Wesley, better known to most people as Gene Roddenberry (gee, where have I heard that name before?)

As for buying the book, the least expensive place I found on the Internet for a copy was oldies.com. It was $5 cheaper than Amazon but this $5.00 savings cost me in other ways. They shipped the book via some method called "UPS Mail Innovations" where it was shipped partway via UPS, then entered the U.S. Mail system. After waiting three weeks I had never received the book and called oldies.com customer service. (Fortunately, oldies.com had used a delivery conformation number on the package.) It seems the book had entered some US mail processing facility at Forest Park, Illinois. Oldies.com customer service immediately declared this location as a "black hole" where packages went in and never came out. They asked me to wait another week before sending another copy of the book. (Fortunately this wasn't necessary.)

After my package spent three weeks lost at the facility of Forest Park, it did leave there and I finally received the book (ordered Dec. 27, shipped Dec. 30, received January 29 for a grand total of 30 days shipping time.)

 

[Mike*HTF]

Very helpful news Kevin, as I was about to go the "cheaper" route.
Cheers.