Trackdown (TV series)

Trackdown
Robert Culp as Hoby Gilman (1957)
Genre	Western
Written by	D.D. Beauchamp Frank Burt Fred Freiberger Norman Jacobs Christopher Knopf Sidney Marshall John McGreevey John Robinson Sam Peckinpah
Directed by	Thomas Carr Lawrence Dobkin Richard Donner Don McDougall R.G. Springsteen
Starring	Robert Culp Ellen Corby Peter Leeds Norman Leavitt James Griffith Gail Kobe Addison Richards
Narrated by	Ed Prentiss
Theme music composer	William Loose and John Seely
Composer	Harry King
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	71 plus pilot
Production
Producer	Vincent M. Fennelly
Cinematography	Guy Roe
Running time	25 minutes
Production company	Four Star Productions
Release
Original network	CBS
Picture format	Black-and-white
Audio format	Monaural
Original release	October 4, 1957 (1957-10-04) – September 23, 1959 (1959-09-23)
Chronology
Related shows	Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater Wanted: Dead or Alive

Trackdown is an American Western television series starring Robert Culp that aired on CBS between 1957 and 1959. The series was produced by Dick Powell's Four Star Television and filmed at the Desilu-Culver Studio. Trackdown was a spin-off of Powell's anthology series, Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater.

Overview[]

Trackdown stars Robert Culp as Texas Ranger Hoby Gilman. It is set in the 1870s after the American Civil War. In early episodes, stories focused on Gilman going to different Texas towns in pursuit of wanted fugitives. At midseason, the series became set in the town of Porter, Texas. Episodes touched on multiple Western themes and topics, so it was known as "the thinking man's Western."^[1][2]

Gilman is the de facto sheriff in Porter. His friends in the town include Henrietta Porter, portrayed by Ellen Corby (who later played Esther Walton on CBS's The Waltons). She is the widow of the town's founder and owns The Porter Enterprise newspaper. Occasionally, his duties as a Texas Ranger took him out of town, where he used his fast gun to "track down" and apprehend wanted criminals throughout the Lone Star State.

The pilot episode, "Badge of Honor", directed by Arthur Hiller, aired on Zane Grey Theater on May 3, 1957. Gilman, then an ex-Confederate cavalry officer, returns to his Central Texas hometown called "Crawford" after the war. He finds the town under the control of a ruthless gang led by an ex-Confederate colonel, Boyd Nelson, played by Gary Merrill. The town sheriff, portrayed by The Lineup star Tom Tully, is a drunken shell of the man whom Gilman had once known, who is afraid to face the outlaws. When a Texas Ranger came to arrest Colonel Nelson, he is fatally shot in the back. His Ranger badge falls on the dusty road. Gilman, who previously served with the Texas Rangers, was weary of the Civil War and did not want to continue as a lawman, but after learning of the Ranger's death, he picked up the badge and finished the job of bringing Nelson and his gang to justice.

Trackdown carried the endorsement of both the State of Texas and the Texas Rangers, an accolade no other Western television series has received. Some episodes were inspired by the files of the Rangers.^[3]

Episodes[]

Season 1: 1957–58[]

Season 2: 1958–59[]

Background and production[]

Development[]

All Trackdown episodes were produced by Vincent Fennelly.^[4] John Robinson wrote 14 segments, including the pilot. Richard Donner was one of the directors. Sam Peckinpah wrote one episode, "The Town", about a cowardly community afraid to resist the clutches of an outlaw gang, but he did not direct any Trackdown episodes. Robert Culp wrote one episode titled "Back to Crawford", which featured his then-wife, Nancy Asch-Culp. This episode was directly related to the first regular-eries episode, "The Marple Brothers", as Nancy portrayed a former childhood friend of Hoby's, Merrilee Quintana, with whom Hoby was once in love, who was out to kill his sister Norah as revenge for his killing her young husband in the line of duty, who was one of the evil Marple Brothers whom he encountered in episode one.^[5][6] His sister was played by actress Peggy Webber, reprising her role from the series pilot.^[7][8] She went on to guest-star in "Child Out of Time", an episode of Culp's series I Spy a few years later.^[9]

In an interview, Robert Culp stated that Trackdown was conceived by its creators as "the Western Dragnet".^[1][10][11] The pilot of the series was written by John Robinson, who according to Culp in that same interview, was partly responsible for the creation of Dragnet^[11] along with that series' star, Jack Webb.

Trackdown brought Culp to national public attention, eight years before he starred with Bill Cosby in I Spy.^{[citation needed]}

The series narrator was character actor Ed Prentiss.^[12]

Hoby Gilman used a Smith & Wesson .44 Schofield revolver instead of the more-popular Colt Peacemaker.^{[citation needed]}

Guest stars[]

Other notable appearances[]

In addition to Steve McQueen, who starred in the successful Trackdown spinoff, Wanted: Dead Or Alive, four other future co-stars of television series also produced by Four Star Television played in Trackdown episodes:

Russell Thorson, who later co-starred in the ABC/Four Star hit series The Detectives played in the Trackdown episodes "The Protector" as a crooked sheriff, and "McCallin's Daughter" as Dr. Aaron Hosper.^[13][14]

Johnny Crawford, one of the original Mouseketeers from The Mickey Mouse Club and future co-star of the successful ABC/Four Star series The Rifleman as Mark McCain, also played Eric Payne in two Trackdown episodes, "The Boy" and "The Deal".^[15][16]

Don Durant, who went on to star in the popular (but cancelled after one season) CBS/Four Star series, Johnny Ringo, played in the Trackdown episodes "Killer Take All" and "A Quiet Night in Porter".^[17][18]

Karen Sharpe, who also co-starred in Johnny Ringo as Johnny's love interest Laura Thomas, was featured in the Trackdown episode "The Young Gun".^[19]

Release[]

Spin-off[]

Steve McQueen first appeared as the bounty hunter Josh Randall in a March 1958 episode ("The Bounty Hunter"), which served as the pilot of his own subsequent CBS series, Wanted: Dead or Alive, a spin-off of Trackdown, launched the following broadcast season. Both series were presented in half-hour episodes and filmed in black and white. McQueen also appeared in a May 1958 episode of Trackdown titled "The Brothers", in which he played a dual role.

Syndication[]

Syndicated reruns of this series have been broadcast in the early 2000s on TV Land and other cable networks. CBS Television Distribution now has the TV distribution rights to Trackdown due to CBS's ownership of the show via its co-production with Four Star.^{[citation needed]}

From 2016 to 2020 , episodes of Trackdown then aired Saturday mornings on MeTV.^[20]

Home media[]

Unlike the series that spawned it, Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, and the series which it spawned, Wanted: Dead or Alive, Robert Culp's Trackdown, as of 2018, has not had an official DVD release.^{[citation needed]}

Cultural references[]

"The End of the World" received considerable media attention after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States in 2016, nearly 60 years after the episode first aired.^{[21][22][23][24]} In the episode, a rabble-rousing doomsayer named Walter Trump (played by Lawrence Dobkin) comes to town. He scares the townsfolk with talk of an impending disaster and claims to be the only person who can save them – by building a wall. He also threatens to sue Hoby when accused of dishonesty. By the end of the episode, he is arrested as a conman and fraud. The coincidental similarity to Donald Trump's name and proposed border wall was noted.^[21]

A Vanity Fair author wrote, "of all the books and movies that presaged the rise of our reality-TV President... none are so eerily on the nose as this once-obscure, 1958 episode of Trackdown in which a demagogue named Trump attempts to convince a town that only he can save its citizens... by building a wall."^[22] The Wrap asked, "Want to talk about a weird coincidence?.... Some may call this episode titled 'The End of the World' the ultimate illustration of life imitating art, considering the episode aired May 9, 1958... it is pretty amusing, especially when the TV character threatens, 'Be careful, son. I can sue you.'"^[23] The San Francisco Chronicle stated, "the character's speech is so similar to the President-elect's, it almost seems as if Donald Trump borrowed some catchphrases from Walter Trump."^[24]

References[]

External links[]

• Trackdown at IMDb
• Trackdown episode guide