"Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea" ABC-TV episode question..

[Steve Hoffman]

There is this wacky cable channel (American Life or some such nonsense) that is showing dead TV series from the 1950s and 60s. Sometimes I watch Maverick, Mission Impossible, The Man From U.N.C.L.E., Combat or 77 Sunset Strip for a laugh and to make me feel old as hell.. I love looking at the photography, etc. from that time. Even the filming style of a weekly TV show back then looks more movie-like than anything on TV now. Lighting is a lost art I guess..

At any rate, they have been showing a bunch of old Fox shows like 12 O'Clock High, Lost In Space (or as I call it, Lost On Stage 20) and Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea, the black and white episodes. They are grittier than I remembered as a little kid, sort of Cold War scary. My question is, tonight they showed an episode that I only caught the end of. Eddie Albert was in it, and they were at some polar ice cap trying to explode something or other. At any rate it was in Living Color (oops, wrong network) and when the end credits rolled I saw "Copyright 1963".

Whaaa? Did they film the show that early? I know it started on ABC in September, 1964. Did they film this episode in color at the beginning and switch to monochrome to save $$?

Anyone know?

By the way, did STAR TREK take every idea from VOYAGE? I mean, give Captain Crane a girdle and you'd have the Enterprise.

[Joel Cairo]

That was the series' pilot episode, Boss, titled "Eleven Days to Zero".

After the cheapskates at ABC picked up the series, they switched to filming in B&W for a while...

-Kevin

[Steve Hoffman]

Really? Wow. They must have struck new prints. Neat-o.

Thanks.

By the way, two things I never realized about the show as a kid.

First, it is supposed to take place in the future. Never got that.

Second, the SEAVIEW is not part of the Navy but a privately built vessel.

Oh well.

[Steve D.]

Steve,

I am a big fan of American Life network. I really liked watching the old FBI series they ran for a while. As for Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. It was originally a 1961 motion picture with Walter Pidgeon in the Adm. Nelson role. TCM runs it. The TV series takes place 10 years in the future (1974?). The Seaview submarine was the brainchild of retired Adm. Harriman Nelson, director of the super-secret Nelson Institute of Marine Research at Santa Barbara, Ca. The series ran until March, 1968. The series pilot, while filmed in color, was originally broadcast in b&w on ABC. Episodes in color were first broadcast starting in the fall of 1965.

-Steve D.

[crimsoncing]

Really? Wow. They must have struck new prints. Neat-o.

Thanks.

By the way, two things I never realized about the show as a kid.

First, it is supposed to take place in the future. Never got that.

Second, the SEAVIEW is not part of the Navy but a privately built vessel.

Oh well.

I love this show and just finished a SEAVIEW model kit I found in a hobby shop.

For the record the last time the "Seaview" was shown on a TV show was a later showing of WONDER WOMAN episode when they used a old shot from VTTBOTS and it was suppose to be a Russian Commie sub off the coast of New York getting ready to launch a missle at the world trade center.

[TOCJ-4091]

I'm glad that they changed characters and installed Sharkey as the 'Chief'.....his predecessor ('Curley') wasn't my favorite. Hedison's nephew was a pal of mine in elementary school up in Mass.... we lads were all so envious that he actually got to hang with 'The Captain.'

[Sneaky Pete]

Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea was one of my all time favorites. I always turned the couch into a "submarine" and played out the stories with my little brother. I'd love to watch the reruns, I have not seen it since I was a kid.
Unfortunately my cable provider doesn't have the American Life Network.

[spice9]

I was going to buy the DVDs of this series when it came out a few years ago (3 seasons are available) but they decided to split up each season into two box sets (13 episodes each) and overcharge for each. So I didn't go for it.

[Andrew]

Too bad that channel isn't on Directv!

[tps]

I've had the Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea soundtrack for a while. I certainly remember watching those episodes on TV back in the day. With the poor frequency response of the TV network audio, I was shocked the first time I heard the title track from the CD. It put a whole new perspective on the arrangement and mix.

[davenav]

I'm glad they split up the seasons for the new dvd's. Because of this, I don't have to pay for the dreck that ensued midway through the second season. After that, every episode seemed to be called 'Attack of The Rock Men' or some such.

But yeah, those b&w first season episodes are very good indeed. Did any show ever have a more slam-bang opening than the one in the pilot?

[kevinsinnott]

I didn't know Jerry Goldsmith composed music for Voyage. That's always a good sign.

[Anthology123]

Steve,
Gene Roddenberry has openly admitted much of Star Trek was taken from the film, "Forbidden Planet".

[davenav]

I didn't know Jerry Goldsmith composed music for Voyage. That's always a good sign.

Yes, but thankfully his less-than-galvanizing new theme music for season two was rejected after one airing. The original Paul Sawtell theme is magnificent.

[crimsoncing]

I always thought it was funny that a "monster" would show up on Lost In Space and then a week later the same monster (painted a different color) would be in the bottom of the ocean attacking the Seaview.

That first season of Voyage is classic. After that it was a crap shoot at best. Thank God for quality Tv like Star Trek and Batmen :)

[HGN2001]

The pilot episode of VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA was filmed in color - mostly so Irwin Allen could integrate the sub footage from his movie of the same name. He knew that should the show be picked up by ABC, that it would have to air in black & white.

When they DID go for the show, he struck a new black & white print from the color pilot, re-jiggered the title sequence, and that's the way it ran for years.

The show didn't fare too well in syndication, but sometime in the late '80s, early '90s, a new print of the pilot was sent out in the package, this time the color version.

When the DVDs were made, another edit was made to the color pilot, adding in the season two opening credits in place of the original pilot credits. Why that was, no-one seems to know.

http://home.earthlink.net/~hgn2001/sitebuildercontent/sitebuilderpictures/misterror.jpg
An exterior shot that reveals the top of the tank wall in the background!

Harry

[billdcat]

American Life TV (formerly GoodLife TV), has a bunch of great old
Warner Brothers and now 20th Fox shows that they program.

Too bad here in my area, when Comcast took over Adelphia
they dropped this channel.

Does Direct TV or Dish carry it?

[jborsma]

A friend of mine is Irwin Allen's nephew and now lives in what used to be Mr. Allen's "second" home (in Bel Air). He's got the very same Seaview model that was in Admiral Nelson's office (in the movie) on a display in his living room. He also has the original mono mixes of all the music that was used for "The Towering Inferno" sitting on the floor in his office.

[tps]

Actually my first memory of watching "Voyage" was in black and GREEN. My dad picked up a non-working TV for a buck at an auction, but it needed a new picture tube. He couldn't find the proper one, but he found a 10" round, green phospor tube with the same pinout at a surplus store. I watched "Voyage" and other shows of the day on that green phosphor CRT. Uncle Martin ("My Favorite Martian") really was a little green man on my TV!

[Joe Fornarotto]

Wow,great thread....one of my favorite TV shows. I have the DVD's. Great information on the series and the pilot. This forum always comes up with something to fill the brain.
Thanks for the photo Harry.
Another one of my favorites was "The Time Tunnel"...glad I never sprung for the Laser Discs from Japan when they came out...now I have the DVD's.

JF

[Hawkman]

Another one of my favorites was "The Time Tunnel"...glad I never sprung for the Laser Discs from Japan when they came out...now I have the DVD's.

JF

Same here. BUT...another annoying DVD split. It was only ONE season and they split the DVD release into TWO sets.

For God's sake. :thumbsdn:

[JohnG]

I loved the show as a kid. I've caught a few of the episodes on DVD but the show doesn't hold up for me as it was when I was 7 or 8.

But still it was a neat concept.

[HGN2001]

A revealing black & white photo of the Seaview model with some perpective on size.

[dgsinner]

I'm glad they split up the seasons for the new dvd's. Because of this, I don't have to pay for the dreck that ensued midway through the second season. After that, every episode seemed to be called 'Attack of The Rock Men' or some such.

But yeah, those b&w first season episodes are very good indeed. Did any show ever have a more slam-bang opening than the one in the pilot?

Every one of Irwin Allen's shows had that second season curse. Like the writers all crapped out or something.

Lost In Space also started with that Cold War scary creepiness Steve mentioned in Voyage. In the first episode, Dr. Smith is a spy trying to sabotage the Jupiter 2 and kill them all. In those early episodes he's constantly plotting against the Robinsons and his character is not nice--he's clearly a cold-hearted murderer. By the second season, he'd become a bumbling cowardly clown.

I guess, though, in another light, the Irwin Allen second season curse could be seen as some kind of turn to campiness, instead of outright writers block. In a nod to the Beverly Hillbillies, Lost In Space had the Robinsons meet up with some space hillbillies whose spacecraft opened up into a beat up mountain shack with a porch and hillbilly accessories. I seem to remember a butter churn...Not an idea I'd have come up with as a budding SF scriptwriter.

Dale

[Steve Hoffman]

Dale,

I think it also had to do with the switch from monochrome to color. Color had to be well lit in those days. It sort of drained the creepiness out.

Take THE AVENGERS for example. Same thing. Less camera setups, trick shots, etc. and more lighting, stagnant camera scenes.

Just a theory.

Imagine if they shot THE TWILIGHT ZONE or THE OUTER LIMITS in color. Urggh..