Gunsmoke
Gunsmoke was a western drama television series. John Meston created the series. It ran for twenty years from 1955 to 1975. Each episode ran for 1 hour. In 1955, CBS television network tried to hire John Wayne. They finally decided on James Arness to play the role of Matt Dillon in the Gunsmoke series. The main cast was Arness, Dennis Weaver playing Chester Goode, Milburn Stone as Doc Adams, and Amanda Blake as saloon keeper Miss Kitty Russell. Ken Curtis played Festus Haggen and Burt Reynolds played a blacksmith.
Gunsmoke | |
---|---|
Created by | Norman MacDonnell John Meston |
Starring | James Arness Milburn Stone Amanda Blake (Seasons 1-19) Dennis Weaver (Seasons 1-9) Ken Curtis (Seasons 9-20) Burt Reynolds (Seasons 8-10) Buck Taylor (Seasons 13-20) Glenn Strange (Seasons 7-18) Roger Ewing (Seasons 11-12) |
Theme music composer | Rex Koury Glenn Spencer |
Country of origin | United States |
No. of seasons | 6 ('Marshal Dillon', syndication re-titling of half-hour episodes) 14 ('Gunsmoke'), 20 (total seasons) |
No. of episodes | 233 ('Marshal Dillon', syndication re-titling of half-hour episodes), 402 ('Gunsmoke') 635 (total episodes) (list of episodes) |
Production | |
Running time | 26 minutes (1955–1961), 50 minutes (1961–1975) |
Production companies | CBS Productions Filmaster Productions The Arness Production Company (1961–'64) |
Original release | |
Network | CBS |
Release | September 10, 1955 March 31, 1975 | –
Between 1955 - 1961, the episodes were 30 minutes long. After that, they were one hour long. 635 episodes were made between 1955 to 1975. Many well known actors have been on the series. These include John Wayne (presenter of the pilot), Bette Davis, Harrison Ford, Jon Voight, Kurt Russell and Jodie Foster. In 1987, Gunsmoke: Return to Dodge was made. Arness returned in the role of Dillon. Later television movies included Gunsmoke: The Last Apache (1990), Gunsmoke: To the Last Man (1992), Gunsmoke: The Long Ride (1993) and Gunsmoke: One Man's Justice (1994).
References
change- Information on Gunsmoke Archived 2010-07-13 at the Wayback Machine
- Gunsmoke episodes at the Internet Movie Database