Irwin Allen tv Shows

[jim48]

Not to take this off topic but does anyone remember Billy Mumy in another TV series a few years later called "Sunshine"? I remember seeing him time to time on the show playing a guitar and singing.
Ok, I looked it up. It was based on a TV movie (1973) of the same name and it lasted one season (1975). Bill was not the star but a supporting player. It was about a musician wanabe in Canada raising his daughter, because his wife died of cancer. I remember the movie well, the TV series not so much.

Back on topic, I liked LIS from the first episode to the last. I also like the musical score from the last season.

Re-the music. Hmm. Irwin Allen was always looking for ways to spice-up his shows. After the first year of Voyage he brought in Jerry Goldsmith and Gerald Fried to compose a new theme. Goldsmith's actually got on the air for one or two shows until ABC objected. How can you beat Paul Sawtell's Voyage theme? Allen wasn't quite pleased with Johnny Williams' Lost in Space theme and brought in another composer for a new second-season theme but that didn't work out. By re-designing the opening montage of LOS Allen was able to justify a new theme, provided by Johnny Williams. Same with Land of the Giants. Williams did the first year theme, then Allen re-did the opening montage for the second year which caused Williams to compose a kick-ass new theme for Year Two. I love his second-season Land of the Giants theme! Meanwhile, Voyage continued with Paul Sawtell's beautfiul theme.

 

[dragon04]

Y'all can find many of your favorite Irwin Allen shows at my thread.

 

[crazyeddie]

Re-the music. Hmm. Irwin Allen was always looking for ways to spice-up his shows. After the first year of Voyage he brought in Jerry Goldsmith and Gerald Fried to compose a new theme. Goldsmith's actually got on the air for one or two shows until ABC objected. How can you beat Paul Sawtell's Voyage theme? Allen wasn't quite pleased with Johnny Williams' Lost in Space theme and brought in another composer for a new second-season theme but that didn't work out. By re-designing the opening montage of LOS Allen was able to justify a new theme, provided by Johnny Williams. Same with Land of the Giants. Williams did the first year theme, then Allen re-did the opening montage for the second year which caused Williams to compose a kick-ass new theme for Year Two. .

My appreciation of how good the Johnny Williams music was for LIS came to me late. I was watching the episode "The Derelict" the other day, where the Jupiter 2 was drawn into the mysterious alien ship. As John and Don (and later, Will and Smith) were making their way through the strange crystalline forest, I was struck by how perfectly Williams' eerie violin music set the mood of alien other-worldliness. And in the episode that followed, "Island in the Sky" (possibly the best one of the series in terms of dramatic content), it was the electrifying suspense of Williams' music that made the moments of the Jupiter 2's descent and crash on Priplanus one of the best space shipwreck scenes of all time......one that still gives me goosebumps when I watch it.

 

[drwayne]

Matching subtle moods with music can be quite tricky. Ideally, it adds to the story, but
without the viewer *really* noticing it in real time. First season did that really well, IMHO.

(In the Doomsday Machine in Star Trek, the piece called "Going Aboard" tha plays when
they board the Constellation is another example of perfect match - to me - the sense
of a gravely wounded animal, it's heart barely beating)

Wayne

 

[crazyeddie]

Matching subtle moods with music can be quite tricky. Ideally, it adds to the story, but
without the viewer *really* noticing it in real time. First season did that really well, IMHO.

(In the Doomsday Machine in Star Trek, the piece called "Going Aboard" tha plays when
they board the Constellation is another example of perfect match - to me - the sense
of a gravely wounded animal, it's heart barely beating)

Wayne

Ah yes! Great episode, and the music that accompanied the climactic scene where they were trying to fix the transporter and beam Kirk back before the Constellation exploded, with it's clocklike countdown and escalating drumroll, made it a perfect sphincter-clenching moment! They used it again, very effectively, in "Assignment: Earth", when Gary Seven was racing against time to detonate the nuclear warhead as the Beta-5 computer relentlessly tracked it's decent.

Try to imagine such scenes without the music.......and almost all the drama and excitement is lost. Music is important!

 

[drwayne]

Absolutely it is vital! When it is done right, it is a driving force taking where the
story needs you to go - without you noticing. If you notice the music in the
heat of the moment - then they did it wrong.

Another spot in the Doomsday machine where the music works well is when
they first get the Constellation moving again. All the way through to the
Constellation and the Enterprise using phaser fire to get both ships out
of harms way.

There is even a subtle ending change in the Enterprise fanfare that is used
several times that changes things for the better. Which reminds me of
another thing. The contrast in music at the start of the episode after the
opening credits. The Constellation is shown, with subdued music, and
then the Enterprise - with a stronger tempo. It practically screams "riding
to the rescue"

Messages can be subtle as well. In LIS, when "The Keeper" appears, most of
the time the music conveyed great power and control - and it was one of the
"standard" tracks used with aliens.

Wayne

 

[drwayne]

OOOOhhhh, yeah

In the obsession episode, where Kirk and an ensign beam aboard simultaneously
with a matter/anti-matter explosion - the episode that made "cross-circuiting to B"
a classic line - Spock and Scotty working the transporter - good music match.

 

[jim48]

Sol Kaplan's "The Doomsday Machine" score was played to death during the second year of Star Trek, as his score for "The Enemy Within" had been the year before. I don't know why he didn't do a show during the third year. He was a promising film composer until the Hollywood blacklist caught up with him. His two Star Trek scores demonstrate what could have been had he continued composing for movies. That score is still available today--most of it--on CD. I'm no music composer but I have to say that over the years listening to his two Star Trek scores it took me a long time to connect the dots, as in the various motifs he employed, such as the motif for the starship Constellation, the motif for "evil" Kirk, the motif for "meek" Kirk, all the while employing Alexander Courage's Star Trek motifs, namely the Enterprise fanfare. I never will understand the construction of music, let alone film/television compositions.

 

[jim48]

My fifty-year-old memory is taxed. Didn't Irwin Allen do a movie about a city beneath the sea as a pilot for a series? What was the premise? What year?

 

[ZenGalacticore]

"Gentlemen" -charged micro-molecular explosion on the transporter pad- "Gentlemen!" -another charge on pad- "I suggest you beam me aboard!"

Scotty- "Try her now Mr. Kyle!"

Mr. Kyle tries... [another charged micro-explosion].

Scotty- "Damn!"

Scotty then enters the matter-antimatter tunnel, adjusts 'something' with his reverse polarity wrench, slides back down to the deck, and at the last moment says:

"Try her again Mr. Kyle! And give her all she's got!!!!!!!"

Or something like that... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

:lol:

 

[yevaud]

Christopher Lloyd as a Klingon: "MALK! Chow CHOOK!!!"

*Transporter Dissolve Effect*

 

[vogon13]

"Gentlemen" -charged micro-molecular explosion on the transporter pad- "Gentlemen!" -another charge on pad- "I suggest you beam me aboard!"

Scotty- "Try her now Mr. Kyle!"

Mr. Kyle tries... [another charged micro-explosion].

Scotty- "Damn!"

Scotty then enters the matter-antimatter tunnel, adjusts 'something' with his reverse polarity wrench, slides back down to the deck, and at the last moment says:

"Try her again Mr. Kyle! And give her all she's got!!!!!!!"

Or something like that... :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

:lol:

In the out takes for that episode is a scene where Dr. McCoy is fixing Kirk's groinally fused underwear due to the transporter only working at 99.9993% efficiency when Mr. Kyle did get it to go . . .

 

[drwayne]

My fifty-year-old memory is taxed. Didn't Irwin Allen do a movie about a city beneath the sea as a pilot for a series? What was the premise? What year?

"City Beneath The Sea"

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0065556/

There are Flying Subs in it too!

 

[drwayne]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87KrzQImEF4

Note who the president is.

 

[crazyeddie]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87KrzQImEF4

Note who the president is.

Irwin Allen was notorious for re-using props. In the opening scenes, is it just my imagination, or do those saucer-shaped buildings on pedestals in the background look suspiciously like windowless Jupiter 2's to you?

 

[jim48]

I just love that this thread continues to live. However, what are your thoughts on The Time Tunnel and Land of the Giants? Come on!

 

[crazyeddie]

I just love that this thread continues to live. However, what are your thoughts on The Time Tunnel and Land of the Giants? Come on!

Those two shows never reached the popularity or cult following of VTTBOTS or Lost in Space, so it's kind of understandable that people don't have as much to say about them. All I remember about them is that I got bored with them quickly and stopped watching, only catching them occasionally in reruns.

 

[jim48]

Well, Ed, The Time Tunnel tried hard, perhaps too hard, to entertain. I've been watching a lot of it on Hulu lately and man did they cast a wide net! As with the other Irwin Allen shows, some of it came close to being intelligent. It was a very entertaining show, doomed, however, by being up against The Wild, Wild West on Friday nights. Land of the Giants? Again I'm surprised it got picked up for a second year, but then hey, viewers decide and once again, some of it came close to being intelligent. I'm still waiting to hear from die-hard fans of both shows out here. Where are you?!!