Monday, October 14, 2019

Film Chest Media Group Sets Nov. 19 As The DVD Debut Date For Deadline: The Complete Series


DVD & Blu-ray Release Report, Ralph Tribbey
Headline!   Headline!!   Read all about it!!!

The Film Chest Media Group announced this past week that years of both research and ends-of-the-earth searching have finally paid off with the news that all 39 episodes of Deadline will be available for the first time on DVD on Nov. 19.

Back in 1959 Arnold Perl produced a 30-minute episodic series titled simply Deadline.   The gimmick was that each of the episodes was based on headlines (news stories) that appeared in newspapers of the time.   Real stories, only the names of the participants were changed.

Filmed in glorious black and white, the series was hosted by one of the original Mercury Theatre participants, Paul Stewart, he would appear in Citizen Kane as Raymond and go on to have quite the career in both film, television and radio (Twelve O'Clock High, Walk Softly, Stranger, Deadline - U.S.A., Kiss Me Deadly, King Creole, etc. are among his numerous film credits).

The series, once it aired, did not go into syndication, but literally disappeared.   Film Chest finally tracked down the missing elements to a storage facility in New Jersey … all 39 broadcast episodes in pristine condition, unseen since the 1959/60 television season. 

DVD & Blu-ray Release Report, Ralph Tribbey
The guest stars in the series reads like a who’s who of actors from the period, many of them were just getting started in their careers.   Example, the opening episode, which aired on Sept. 17, 1959, featured three-time Oscar nominee Diane Ladd in one of her earliest television appearances.   Larry Haines, who would go on to win three Emmys for his portrayal of Stu Bergman on the soap opera Search for Tomorrow, was her co-star and he played the role of a crusading reporter who exposes labor racketeers.

In the episode that aired on Nov. 12, 1959, future TV star George Maharis (the following year, 1960, he would hit it big as Buz Murdock in Route 66) plays a college-age killer with an airtight alibi until a crusading reporter (played by Walter Brooke) cracks the case.

39 complete episodes — the entire run of the series — are included in the collection … other guest stars in series are Robert Lansing, Peter Falk, Frank Sutton (who is perhaps best known as Sgt. Vince Carter on the Gomer Pyle: USMC sitcom) and future two-time Emmy-winner Michael Conrad (as Sgt. Phil Esterhaus on Hill Street Blues).

Bonus features include an interview with Broadcast Journalism Professor Joe Alicastro, the series promotional trailer and an extensive photo gallery.

DVD & Blu-ray Release Report, Ralph Tribbey



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