Today, I want to know what was the best TV drama that was developed as a star vehicle.
Pop Culture Theme Time is a feature where I put a question to you to see what you think about a particular theme. I might later revisit the theme for a future Drawing Crazy Patterns or Top Five.
One of the great dichotomies in television is that good comedies are REPEATEDLY done as star vehicles, meaning that the star came first, and the show was created specifically for the star. There are so many shows that are based on a standup comedian’s act, or at least based on the premise of, “Hey, remember that guy? What if we built a show around that guy?” Good DRAMAS, though, are almost NEVER star vehicles. There have been many, many, MANY TV dramas that were star vehicles, and they almost always are terrible.
However, I’m sure there are SOME good ones, so I was hoping that you would all try to come up with your picks for the best TV drama that was a star vehicle. Here are some notable examples that WEREN’T star vehicles. Columbo was a play before it was a TV series. Rockford Files was invented before James Garner was cast as Jim Rockford. Magnum P.I. was conceived as a series before Tom Selleck was cast as Thomas Magnum. Murder, She Wrote was written as a star vehicle…for Jean Stapleton. When she passed, Angela Lansbury was asked. Again, the best TV dramas are almost always created by a writer FIRST, and THEN the actor is cast. Mad Men, Breaking Bad, The Sopranos, all created before the actor was attached.
A notable exeception, and my pick, is Matlock, which originated when Brandon Tartikoff saw Andy Griffith play a lawyer in the hit NBC miniseries, Fatal Vision, and told Dean Hargrove to come up with a drama with Griffith as a lawyer. Hargrove approached Griffith, they talked about the idea, and came back to Tartikoff with Matlock, and the rest was history. Was Matlock an amazing show? No, but it WAS good, and for a star vehicle TV drama, that’s a rarity.
Okay, so that’s MY pick! What’s yours?
And feel free to suggest future Pop Culture Theme Time topics to me at brian@poprefs.com!
