| The Adventures Of Ozzie And Harriet |
Article Index for The Adventures |
Website Links For Adventures |
Information AboutThe Adventures Of Ozzie And Harriet |
|
''The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet'' was a Long-running American Radio and Television Series , airing on ABC from 1952 to 1966 after a ten-year run on radio. Starring Ozzie Nelson and his wife, singer Harriet Hilliard (she dropped her maiden name after the couple ended their music career), the show's sober, gentle humor captured a large, sustained audience, although it never rated in the top ten programs, it was an iconic snapshot of post- World War II American family life. ORCHESTRA In the early 1930s, a booking at the Glen Island Casino landed Ozzie Nelson's orchestra national network radio exposure. After three years together with the orchestra, Ozzie and Harriet signed to appear regularly on ''The Baker's Broadcast'' (1933-1938), hosted first by Joe Penner, then by Robert L. Ripley and finally by cartoonist Feg Murray. The couple married (October 8, 1935) during this series run, and they realised working together in radio would keep them together more strongly than continuing their musical careers might have done. The Nelsons joined the cast of '' The Red Skelton Show '' in 1941, with Ozzie and Harriet providing much of the show's music. The couple staying with that NBC series for three years. They also built their radio experience by guest appearances (together and individually) on many top radio shows, from comedies such as ''The Fred Allen Show'' to (perhaps unusually) the mystery titan '' Suspense '', in a 1947 episode called "Too Little to Live On". RADIO When Skelton was drafted, Ozzie Nelson was prompted to create his own family situation comedy. ''The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet'' launched on CBS October 8, 1944, making a mid-season switch to NBC in 1949. The final years of the radio series were on ABC (the former NBC Blue Network) from October 14 , 1949 , to June 18 , 1954 . In an arrangement that amplified the growing pains of American broadcasting, as radio "grew up" into television (as George Burns once phrased it), the Nelsons' deal with ABC gave the network itself the right to move the show to television whenever it wanted to do it. They wanted, according to the Museum of Broadcast Communications, to have talent in the bullpen and ready to pitch, so to say, on their own network, rather than risk it defecting to CBS (where the Nelsons began) or NBC . Their sons, David and Ricky , did not join the cast until five years after the radio series began. The two boys felt frustrated at hearing themselves played by actors and continually requested they be allowed to portray themselves. Prior to April 1949, the role of David was played by Joel Davis (1944-45) and Tommy Bernard, and Henry Blair appeared as Ricky. Other cast members included John Brown as Syd "Thorny" Thornberry, Lurene Tuttle as Harriet's mother, Bea Benaderet as Gloria, Janet Waldo as Emmy Lou, and Dick Trout as Roger. Vocalists included Harriet Nelson, The King Sisters , and Ozzie Nelson. The announcers were Jack Bailey and Verne Smith. The music was by Billy May and Ozzie Nelson. The producers were Dave Elton and Ozzie Nelson. 1 MOVIE In 1952 the Nelsons starred with Rock Hudson in a feature film, ''Here Come the Nelsons'', which among other things depicted Ozzie as an advertising executive assigned to a campaign promoting women's underwear. That was a considerable difference from the radio and later television series, which never made it clear exactly what Ozzie did for a living. TELEVISION Early episodes of the television version of ''The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet'' found humor in family and parenting dilemmas, usually hooked around Ozzie's earnest but stumbling efforts to steer his boys the right way. As the two boys grew up, many plots focused on their love lives and aspirations. The show premiered on ABC television October 10 , 1952 , staying until September 3 , 1966 . The show strove for a kind of realism: the exterior shots of the Nelsons' TV home were pictures of their actual southern California home. Interiors were shot on sound-stage sets designed to recreate the Nelson family home. RECORDINGS ''The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet'' made a , 1957 , episode, "Rick the Drummer," performing a version of Fats Domino 's hit "I'm Walkin'" and later signed a recording contract with Domino's label, Imperial Records. Episodes after Rick himself became one of the nation's top rock and roll stars, and one of the few late-1950s hit-making teen idols who actually had sustainable musical ability, were some of the show's best-rated episodes. When David and Rick married in 1961 and 1963 (respectively), their wives joined the cast. Even with the boys growing up and the show filmed in color, ''Ozzie and Harriet'' would be locked forever, as the Museum of Broadcast Communications puts it, "in spirit and in the popular imagination denizens of the black-and-white 1950s." TELEVISION AND HOME VIDEO RELEASES It has been suggested that at least most of the series is in the Public Domain , and has been unofficially released on home video (including VHS and DVD) on many different low-budget company labels. In the decades since the show's cancellation, the series has been continuously shown on stations in public-domain prints. In the late 1980s-early 1990s, The Disney Channel (under license from Western International Syndication and the Nelson Trust, then-ancillary owners of the series) previously aired the show as remastered from original 35MM elements, with new introductions by Harriet Nelson. The Rick Nelson Company, LLC, currently owns the rights to the original film elements. An officially released video version of ''The Best of the Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet'' (under license from The Rick Nelson Company) was released May 1 , 2007 by '' Shout! Factory ''. Both the Nelson company and David Nelson hold copyright ownership for any new material derived from the film elements. SEQUEL AND THE NELSONS' POST-TV LIVES David Nelson produced a short-lived syndicated sequel ('' Ozzie's Girls '', 1973) in which Ozzie and Harriet rented the boys' old room to two college students, portrayed by Susan Sennett and Brenda Sykes. Following a lull that consumed most of the 1960s, Rick Nelson found an impressive new niche and comeback in music. He formed and led a well-respected band melding rock and roll and country music, the Stone Canyon Band; their classic hit single, " Garden Party ," was Rick's none-too-nostalgic look back to his years as a 1950s teen rock idol, hooking around his new band's appearance at a rock and roll revival concert. Ten years after his father's death in 1975, Rick Nelson was killed in an airplane crash ( December 31 , 1985 ) en route to a New Year's Eve concert; he has since been inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame . Harriet Nelson died in 1994. Ozzie, Harriet, and Rick have been interred together in Forest Lawn - Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles, California . David Nelson is still a producer of feature films and television commercials. REFERENCES LISTEN TO
EXTERNAL LINKS
|
|
|