TV WESTERNS ON DVD PT 3. FORGOTTEN SERIIES.

MAN WITHOUT A GUN

Hands up anyone who remembers this series ! Hands up those who have actually heard of it ! You can be forgiven if neither as it has been out of circulation for many years. It is from the 'golden age' of the TV western 1957/60 & the days when every other show was a western.

Rex Reason, a tall dark handsome type was the star. Reason along with his brother Rhodes Reason , were popular leading men in the late 50's early 60's. Rex Reason had done several western films prior to his starring role on 'Man Without a Gun'. The series was set in the dusty town of Yellowstone in Dakota, a jumping off place for the badlands. Consequently, the usual unsavoury elements would arrive in town & cause trouble. Reason played Adam McLean, owner & operator of the 'Yellowstone Sentinel', a newspaper which he circulated throughout Dakota. He followed the 'pen is mightier than the sword' adage so never wore or used a gun. He was quite adept with his fists though, but left the gunplay to his friend and co-star Sheriff Frank Tallman portrayed by Mort Mills. Mills was a regular on TV westerns from this period though his sallow features usually cast him in a 'heavy' role, After MWAG ended Rex Reason went on to play another newspaperman on the Warners series 'The Roaring 20's'.

At a half hour in length, 'Man Without A Gun' was no better or worse than similar shows of the period & achieived a respectable two season run in syndication. The show could have done with opening out a bit & was a little set bound, which sometimes gave it a pedestrian feel.

No of seasons - 2

No of episodes -52 - There was also possibly a pilot.

Network - Syndicated - UK - Never shown.

Copyright - possibly 20th Century Fox.

Season 1 - 39 episodes

Season 2 - 13 episodes

DVD RELEASE - None.

Possible release - Most Unlikely,

GRAY MARKET

Not an easy series to track down. I have been able to find about half of them, most of which are of watchable but moderate quality, though some are poor. They seem to emanate from 16mm prints, presumably old TV station copies. Pleased to hear from anyone who has any.

Chris,
Sorry to bother you Pard,BUT,I dont know,or remember,if I,ve mentioned a wee fave tv series of mine,I,m sure it was called The Quest,Barbra Hershey was in it,she played,I think,a single mother out west,with a son,or wee brother,and ran for at least one series? I fair enjoyed it,and "wonder" if it,s available.
I only bring this up because of your previous question,"does anybody remember,or know,a series called Man Without A Gun",by the way Chris,NO,I dont remember it,but I do remember Rex Reason.
Davy,westernnut.

Hi Davy,
THE QUEST starred KURT RUSSELL and TIM MATHESON. I don't remember BARBARA HERSHEY being in it though. Having said that it's been a long time since it was on Television. Bronc.

The Quest was a short lived series from about 1976. As Bronc has said Kurt Russell & Tim Matheson played brothers.

The series with the lovely Barbara Hershey you are thinking of Davy is 'The Monroes' from the 60's.

There are no official releases. The Monroes is certainly available on the gray market, not sure about the Quest, quite likely though.

Barbara Hershey co-starred in a 1966 series The Monroes:


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Monroes_(1966_TV_series)

I don't have any of the Man Without a Gun, but I remember it well, with Rex Reason & Mort Mills. Haven't seen any since it aired when I was a kid. Later, if I remember, I will post what Rex Reason told us about the series when we spent an afternoon with him back in the 1980's. The Monroes I also remember...wish they would release it....Liam Sullivan (who played Major Mapoy in the series) was a friend since I was a kid. He loved that show and the location, which was at the Grand Tetons in Wyoming near Yellowstone. Ben Johnson was also in the series. Just watched Liam Sullivan the other night in an episode of "The Virginian."

CHEERS/THANKS Pards,
The Monroes!!!!
Aye,I really liked that wee series,makes me wonder how I thought it was called The Quest,probably an "age thing",not a word Pards,ha!
Davy,westernnut.

Here is what Rex Reason had to tell us about Man Without a Gun:

In 1957, Rex was signed to star as Adam MacLean, a crusading newspaperman in the old west, in the television series, Man without a Gun.
“I did three and a half shows a week, six days a week; I was married then, had
a couple of young children and the pressure was on me. I was doing my own
stunts and it was a hard show.”
After these months of pushing himself Rex collapsed and came down with brain fever. “They were planning for my funeral,” remarked Rex. “After six days my fever was up to one hundred and nine degrees, and I still survived.” Rex spent ten months of that year on his back, and had to learn to walk, write, pick up a glass – everything, all over again. “So it was a period of time that was paid by my residuals because the first thirty-nine episodes were run over and over again. I had one hundred percent residuals, so had a lot of money coming in.” After Rex recovered he filmed another thirteen episodes a year later.

Here is what Liam Sullivan had to say about The Monroes. Please excuse the text if it comes out strange because when I cut and paste on to the forum this happens. I try to edit and fix it up but it never usually comes out right. Anyway, here's The Monroes:
Liam co-starred with Michael Anderson Jr. in a television series called The Monroes, a western set in Wyoming about five orphaned children attempting to claim their dead father’s land title on land being used by an English cattle baron named Major Mapoy, which was the character Liam played. The entire series was filmed on location near Jackson, Wyoming and the Grand Teton Mountains. “That was one of my favorite times,” Liam said.
“We went up there in November of 1965 to do the pilot. It cost six
hundred thousand dollars and took three weeks to film. Bernard Kowalski
directed it more like a feature.”
The original intent of the show which they tried to preserve the best they could
was the relationship between the major and the kid. The major really didn’t
want anybody on the land; he didn’t want these kids there or have to bother
with them, but he couldn’t very well kick them off because their father had
planted his belt buckle as a sign that he was taking possession of that little
piece of ground. On the other hand, the kid didn’t want to acknowledge that he
needed any help from the major. So Liam played it, “I’m not going to help you
because I don’t want you here,” and Anderson played “I don’t need your help.” “But it wound up that we did, we helped each other,” Liam informed. “I loved that show. I think the look of that, especially the pilot, was one of the most beautiful pieces of film I have ever been in.The cabin was actually constructed on the banks of the Snake River. One side of it was on kingpins and they could pull the
pins out and lift the side of the cabin away, so when you rode up to the front
and hitched your horse and opened the door and went inside the camera moved on past the end and kept on shooting as you walked into the interior.”

Liam mentioned an outdoor sequence around a campfire that they began filming one afternoon. Liam had finished his scene and left, but there were several more pages to go when it became dark and so they knocked off for the night. During the night it snowed. They returned the next day to pick up the scene, but it would never match. “It’s not a very heavy snow. Let’s knock off for a couple of days and do some interior shots, maybe by then the snow will melt,” the director decided. Next night it snowed again. They were beginning to panic
because there had been some people in the earlier part of the scene that had
been dismissed and gone back to California. They became concerned that they would have to re-shoot the whole thing. The cinematographer said, “Why don’t we put Ben Johnson (who played Liam’s foreman)
up on a horse, put the camera down low and shoot against the sky and have him look around and say, ‘I have a funny feeling; I bet there will be snow before
morning.’” “They did and inserted that, and when they picked up the scene the
next day, what do you know? It snowed,” he laughed.
"I loved The Monroes. I loved the character. It’s too bad they didn't get a
second year because they had written story lines for the major. The fiancée he
had left behind in England came to America to try and get him to go back and he wouldn’t because he hadn’t finished what he had set out to do. There was a whole back story about his father. The major was a bastard and he had determined to come to America and make enough money so
he could go back to London and meet his father, who was a wealthy man and had never acknowledged him, on an even basis: toe to toe, dollar for dollar and
pound for pound, and say to him ‘You never acknowledged me, I don’t need you anymore because I have made it on my own.’ And that was all for the second season which we never got to.”