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Pow Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 27 Sep 2014 Posts: 3739 Location: New York
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Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2021 7:48 pm Post subject: Dick Tracy (1967 unsold pilot) |
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Dick Tracy is a 1967 television pilot produced by William Dozier (The Green Hornet, Batman) based upon the famous long running newspaper comic strip character created by Chester Gould.
"The Plot to Kill NATO" is the title for this thirty-minute pilot.
The always watchable Victor Buono is the villain Mr. Memory who has mental telepathy with his super computer which can convey voluminous information to this arch foe.
The plot involves nothing less than the kidnapping of several delegates en route to attend an important meeting with various NATO representatives. A foreign power has hired Mr. Memory in order to disrupt this vital conference with the hope it will destroy NATO entirely.
Police Chief Patton (Ken Meyer) puts his best team on solving the case of the missing delegates.
Dick Tracy (Ray MacDonnell) works with detective Lizz (Jan Shutan who played Scotty's love interest, Lt. Mira Romaine on ST:TOS episode "The Lights of Zetar ), along with detective Sam Catchem (Monroe Arnold).
In Tracy's garage there is a life-size human target board which has a secret sliding panel (I love secret sliding panels) that leads to a lift. The lift descends into his criminal investigation laboratory.
The pilot is played mostly straight with some camp elements in it. It is colorful, moves right along and is entertaining in a 1967 manner.
Davey Davison, a lovely looking woman we only see in the opening credits plays Tess Trueheart Tracy, Dick's wife.
Playing their daughter Bonnie Braids is a pre-Brady Bunch Eve Plumb who, like Davison, only appears in the credits but not in the pilot.
It ain't Hill Street Blues or Law & Order, but it wasn't intended to be realistically grim and intense as these award winning series were.
Had the show been picked up by a network I wonder if we would have seen any of Dick Tracy's classic nemesis from the Gould comic strip such as Flattop, Prune Face, The Mole and others?
If so, the production would require a hefty budget for the Make-up Department in order to make the criminals look dastardly & like their visages in the newspaper.
And of course we get to see a decent looking depiction of Tracy's famous video-audio wristwatch.
Now if I could just get that theme song out of my head. |
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Krel Guest
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Posted: Thu Jul 29, 2021 9:54 pm Post subject: |
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I read about this after the movie came out, I always wanted to see it.
A couple of things I read. They rented a piranha for the torture scene, but it wasn't particularly aggressive. When it came time to film the scene, when the performer put his hand in the tank, the piranha rushed to the opposite side of the tank and tried to hide.
Dean Jeffries wrote that he built a special shape-changing Police car. I don't know if it was used in the pilot, or how much of the car changed shape. If I had to guess, I would say that it could change from a standard Police cruiser to an unmarked car.
David. |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Fri Jul 30, 2021 5:55 am Post subject: |
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________________________________
Well, there's good news and there's bad news.
The good news is that YouTube has the videos below. The two female costars are lovely. Brunet Jan Shutan was a hot TOS babe in The Lights of Zetar.
I don't think Davey Davison as Tess Trueheart actually makes it into the pilot, but I could be wrong. I just "sampled" it, and it does indeed have a Green Hornet flavor (which is a good thing, of course).
The bad news is . . . the title theme is the worst song ever recorded.
Seriously, the absolute worst.
Ever!
______________ "Dick Tracy" TV Intro/Closing
__________
_____________ Dick Tracy unsold TV pilot 1967
__________  _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Last edited by Bud Brewster on Fri Aug 27, 2021 5:56 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Pow Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 27 Sep 2014 Posts: 3739 Location: New York
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Posted: Fri Jul 30, 2021 4:17 pm Post subject: |
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Mentioned in my post: Jan Shutan's guest star role on ST:TOS; Davey Davison not appearing in the pilot at all.
Bud, sounds as if you barely glanced at what I wrote.
Never knew anything regarding about a morphing auto being built for the pilot. It doesn't show up in the pilot but I wish it had. |
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Bud Brewster Galactic Fleet Admiral (site admin)

Joined: 14 Dec 2013 Posts: 17637 Location: North Carolina
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Posted: Fri Jul 30, 2021 10:03 pm Post subject: |
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Pow wrote: | Bud, sounds as if you barely glanced at what I wrote.. |
Please forgive me, I did scan through it quickly!
Then I spent considerable time desperately trying to find a nice poster to add to the top of your thread (like I always do . . . but without success this time ), as well as formatting the two videos which I added to jazz up the thread, and then "sampling" the episode to get a feel for the program.
So, after all that — I ended up plum forgetting that you'd already told us about Davidson and Shutan!  _________________ ____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)
Last edited by Bud Brewster on Thu Mar 07, 2024 4:49 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Pow Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 27 Sep 2014 Posts: 3739 Location: New York
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Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:21 am Post subject: |
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In the immortal words of Gomer Pyle: "Shame, shame, shame."
Ah, that's okay. Whenever I'm posting I always try to read all the other folks posts just so I don't repeat something, or ask a question that has already been addressed earlier.
But sometimes I fly through the previous posts too quickly and miss something. Especially when there are 5 or more pages to cover.
I don't even try with Forbidden Planet anymore. Not with its gaziilion pages. |
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Krel Guest
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Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:55 am Post subject: |
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I've heard the TV theme, and I agree that it's not very good.
I always thought a good theme for Dick Tracy would be "I Fought the Law" by The Bobby Fuller Four. I picture the end credits with the guest criminal (if they survive) at the base of the rock pile turning big rocks into little rocks. Standing on the top of the rock pile is Dick Tracy, his trench coat waving in the breeze.
David. |
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Pow Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 27 Sep 2014 Posts: 3739 Location: New York
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Posted: Sat Jul 31, 2021 11:21 pm Post subject: |
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Bobby Fuller & his band's I Fought the Law would be a splendid choice for a Dick Tracy show, David.
Bravo!
I remember Bobby's suspicious death being covered on an episode of the Unsolved Mysteries TV show. |
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Krel Guest
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Posted: Sun Aug 01, 2021 4:24 pm Post subject: |
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"Dick Tracy" was my favorite newspaper strip as a kid. The local paper quit carrying the strip in the mid 70s. I once asked my Dad why Dick Tracy had a yellow hat and trench coat. My Dad explained about the limited color pallet news papers could print. He said that the yellow was probably suppose to represent camel hair wool, that was popular fabric for hats and coats in the 1930s.
David. |
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scotpens Space Sector Commander

Joined: 19 Sep 2014 Posts: 919 Location: The Left Coast
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Posted: Tue Aug 03, 2021 1:27 am Post subject: |
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I was a big fan of the Dick Tracy comic strip until it started getting silly with the magnet-powered space coupe and the moon people and Moon Maid. (Did she ever have another name?) Science fiction wasn't really Chester Gould's bag. |
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Pow Galactic Ambassador

Joined: 27 Sep 2014 Posts: 3739 Location: New York
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Posted: Fri Aug 27, 2021 5:29 pm Post subject: |
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Browsing through an old book of mine titled Making a Monster: The Creation of Screen Characters by the Great Makeup Artists by Al Taylor & Sue Roy.
It is an excellent and detailed book that goes into depth about the history of makeup artists throughout history.
I noticed on page 205 of the chapter profiling legendary makeup artist John Chambers (The List of Adrian Messenger-1963, The Planet of the Apes-1968, The Outer Limits-1964 Star Trek-1966, The Wild, Wild West-1965,) he is working on an actor sitting in a makeup chair.
The elaborate makeup he's created is for that of Prune Face, a foe of Dick Tracy. The caption under the photo says it is for an NBC pilot for Dick Tracy.
When the pilot was produced for DT by William Dozier, an article says that the series was not picked up by either ABC or NBC. Dozier's Greenway Productions already had a relationship with ABC. ABC produced both his Batman & The Green Hornet TV series.
So I'm wondering if this makeup was gonna be for a DT show? Prune Face was not in the 1967 pilot at all.
Were they planning ahead for future episodes if the series was picked up? Was this only a demo reel for the networks to show how the elaborate makeups could be created by the talented John Chambers for the show?
Is it for some other unknown DT pilot?
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