by David Krell | Jan 7, 2014 | David Krell
When Ken Reeves arrives at George Washington Carver High School, he is about as welcome as a cat at a mouse convention. The basketball team doesn’t like him. The Vice Principal doesn’t like him. And Reeves doesn’t know how to gain the trust of...
by David Krell | Jan 6, 2014 | David Krell
Welcome Back, Kotter meets the fish-out-of-water theme. That’s The White Shadow. An NBA journeyman player has a career-ending knee injury, then takes a job as a basketball coach at an inner-city Los Angeles high school where he unwillingly, sometimes...
by David Krell | Jan 3, 2014 | David Krell
Based on the eponymous play, Inherit the Wind showcases the Scopes Monkey Trial. This 1960 film stars Spencer Tracy and Fredric March as the fictional counterparts to Clarence Darrow and William Jennings Bryan, respectively. In the legal thriller Jagged Edge (1986),...
by David Krell | Jan 2, 2014 | David Krell
Lawyers are prominent in films, representing every strata of society from rape victims to Santa Claus. They are the bastions of justice, their cinematic appearances reinforcing their prevention of order descending into chaos. In Miracle on 34th Street (1947), an...
by David Krell | Jan 1, 2014 | David Krell
A common thread runs through Saturday morning cartoons of the 1970s. Music. Rankin-Bass produced Kid Power for ABC. Think Peanuts and Our Gang go through diversity training as songs convey messages of peace, love, and harmony for children. ABC aired original...
by David Krell | Nov 28, 2013 | David Krell
A year after Underdog debuted on NBC in 1964, the titular super-canine made his first of many appearances in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. A shrewd bit of marketing boosted the publicity surrounding Underdog’s inaugural parade float. NBC aired the...
by David Krell | Nov 6, 2013 | David Krell
Ib Melchior’s special effects expert, David Hewitt, wrote a script entitled The Wizard of Mars. At the suggestion of his financial backers, he met with Felix Feist, a television director. Feist worked with Irwin Allen on the television series Voyage to the...
by David Krell | Nov 5, 2013 | David Krell
Lost in Space aired soon after the Space Family Robinson comic book’s debut, leading one to conclude that the theme of Space Family Robinson and the usage of the Lost in Space indicates a nexus between the comic book and the television show. Such is not the...
by David Krell | Nov 4, 2013 | David Krell
In 1958, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) evolved from the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). NASA’s mission consisted of beating the Russians in the Space Race. No easy task, this. The year prior to NASA’s...
by David Krell | Oct 11, 2013 | David Krell
During its eight-year run on NBC from 1986 to 1994, L.A. Law showcased legal issues without tidying everything in a package for the audience. It was a more realistic way of looking at law practice, which can be messy, full of ambiguities, conflicts, and unresolved...
