Robert Wagner: themes

Showing posts with label themes. Show all posts

Monday, 19 September 2011

Opening Theme: DANGER MAN (1960-1962 and 1964-1968)

The British espionage series Danger Man, starring Patrick McGoohan as secret agent John Drake, ran as a half-hour series 1960-62. It was revived as a one-hour series 1964-68, and retitled Secret Agent when it aired in the U.S. The original "The Danger Man Theme" and "High Wire" themes were composed by Edwin Astley. The U.S. theme "Secret Agent Man" was composed by P.F. Sloan and Steve Barri, and recorded by Johnny Rivers.

Danger Man Opening

Danger Man Theme - Edwin Astley Orchestra - 1965 45rpm

Secret Agent Man Intro Theme Song (Johnny Rivers)

Danger Man TV Preview

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Opening Theme: IRONSIDE (1967-1975)

Theme by Quincy Jones. Series starring Raymond Burr.

Ironside Opening Theme - Main Version

Quincy Jones - Ironside (Original Version, Good Quality)

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Opening Theme: THE FUGITIVE (1963-1967)

"The Fugitive" Original TV Series Intro

The Fugitive Second Season

The Fugitive Final Episode Opening

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Opening Theme: ADAM-12 (1968-1975)

Adam-12 1st Season Opening

Adam-12 Season 4 Opening

Adam-12 Season 7 Opening Credits

Adam-12 Promo (Long Version)

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Sunday, 18 September 2011

Opening Theme: MR. AND MRS. NORTH (1952-54)

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Thursday, 12 August 2010

M SQUAD (1957) vs. POLICE SQUAD (1982)

A pair of main titles from classic cop shows -- the original and its parody: M Squad (NBC, 1957-60) starred Lee Marvin as Detective Lieutenant Frank Ballinger, a member of a special unit of the Chicago Police assisting other units battling violent crime city-wide. The 1982 parody series Police Squad starred Leslie Nielsen as Detective Frank Drebin; it only lasted six episodes on ABC, but led to the successful Naked Gun movies.

1957 M Squad TV Lee Marvin -- theme by Count Basie

Police Squad! Intro (In Color) -- theme by by composer Ira Newborn (parody of the M Squad theme)

M Squad Theme - Count Basie - 1959

More Cop TV Themes:
Hawaii Five-O 2010, 1996, 1975
Opening Theme: THE ROOKIES
Opening Theme: KOJAK
Opening Theme: STREETS OF SAN FRANCISCO
Mystery TV Themes: DRAGNET (1950s, 2003)

Tuesday, 10 August 2010

Opening Theme: HETTY WAINTHROPP INVESTIGATES

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

Henrietta "Hetty" Wainthropp, a sixty-ish housewife in Lancashire, England, was introduced as an amateur sleuth in David Cook's 1986 novel Missing Persons. However, a TV movie based on the book led to a series -- and rather than keep her amateur status, the producers decided to make crime her business. Thus was born Hetty Wainthropp Investigates (BBC One, 1996-1998), wherein Hetty (played by Patricia Routledge) and young sidekick Geoffrey Shawcross (Dominic Monaghan) open up a proper office for private investigations.

As described by Thrilling Detective: "While the series is definitely aimed at fans of 'cozies' rather than hard-boiled fiction -- it's highly unlikely, for instance, that the non-violent, bus-pass-owning Hetty will ever get mixed up in a car chase, a shootout, or a wild fistfight -- Hetty has at least a few 'tough guy' qualities that make her more than just a eccentric P.I wannabe. First and foremost, she's quite strong willed and plain-spoken, and her cases occasionally take her into some (relatively) rough locales that would make Miss Marple faint dead away."

Hetty Wainthropp Investigates Opening/Closing Titles

More TV Main Titles:
Opening Theme: BARNABY JONES
Opening Theme: MRS. BRADLEY MYSTERIES
Opening Theme: MISS MARPLE
Opening Theme: CRAZY LIKE A FOX
Opening Theme: PERRY MASON RETURNS

Tuesday, 3 August 2010

Opening Theme: CRAZY LIKE A FOX

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

Crazy Like a Fox (CBS, 1984-1986) starred Jack Warden as free-spirited private detective Harry Fox. Co-star John Rubinstein as played his son Harrison, a high-strung attorney frequently dragged into his father's cases. Crazy Like a Fox aired a total of 35 episodes.

The series was followed in 1987 by the TV movie Still Crazy Like a Fox, where the Foxes found themselves stirring up trouble in London. Monty Python's Graham Chapman guest-starred as Detective Inspector Palmer in one of his last roles before his death in 1989.

More TV main titles:
Opening Theme: THE ROCKFORD FILES
Opening Theme: DIAGNOSIS MURDER
Opening Theme: MATLOCK
Opening Theme: BARNABY JONES
Opening Theme: NBC Mystery Movie (COLUMBO)

Thursday, 29 July 2010

Opening Theme: MRS. BRADLEY MYSTERIES

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

British TV drama The Mrs Bradley Mysteries (BBC, 1998-99) starred Diana Rigg as Adela Bradley and Neil Dudgeon as her faithful driver George Moody. The 1920s mysteries, which found the duo taking their Rolls Royce to solve murders among the well-to-do and repressed, were inspired by the novels by Gladys Mitchell, who published some eighty novels in her lifetime. As Rigg introduced the character on PBS Mystery: "Over the course of some sixty-six mysteries, Adela Bradley married and divorced three husbands, was made a Dame of the British Empire, and a consultant to the British Home Office. She also developed prodigious abilities at pub darts, snooker, billiards, and knife throwing. One thing she cannot do is knit."

More mystery TV main titles:
THE AVENGERS w/ The New Avengers
RUMPOLE OF THE BAILEY
MISS MARPLE
HAMISH MACBETH
THE SAINT
THE ADVENTURER
THE PERSUADERS
PERRY MASON RETURNS
DIAGNOSIS MURDER
MATLOCK
BARNABY JONES
NBC Mystery Movie (COLUMBO)
THE ROCKFORD FILES
QUINCY, M.E.

Tuesday, 27 July 2010

Opening Theme: PERRY MASON RETURNS

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

Years after the legendary series Perry Mason (CBS, 1957-1966), star Raymond Burr and co-star Barbara Hale reunited for a series of Perry Mason TV movies starting in 1985. The first, Perry Mason Returns, found Mason resigning his position as appellate court judge to defend his secretary, Della Street, on murder charges. William Katt (Hale's son) played Paul Drake, Jr. (son of private investigator Paul Drake, portrayed by the late William Hopper in the original series.)

The series was produced by Dean Hargrove and Fred Silverman -- they also produced Matlock, Jake and the Fatman, and Diagnosis: Murder.

The Perry Mason TV movies continued even after Burr's death in 1993 -- his final performance as Mason was in The Case of the Killer Kiss. Subsequent telefilms starred other actors as lawyer friends of Mason -- one with Paul Sorvino as Anthony Caruso (1993), and three with Hal Holbrook as "Wild Bill" McKenzie (1994-95). Hale appeared in these as Street.

Thursday, 22 July 2010

Opening Theme: DIAGNOSIS MURDER

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

The mystery series Diagnosis: Murder (CBS, 1993-2001) starred Dick Van Dyke as Dr. Mark Sloan, a medical doctor who solves crimes with the help of his son, homicide detective Steve Sloan (played by real-life son Barry Van Dyke). The series was a spin-off of Jake and the Fatman (itself a spin-off of Matlock.) One of the fun angles of the show was how the producers would work in elements of other series -- ranging from cast reunions (Star Trek and M*A*S*H) to guest stars appearing as their characters from other series (Mike Connors as Joe Mannix, Andy Griffith as Ben Matlock, and Barbara Bain as Cinnamon Carter from Mission: Impossible.)

Diagnosis: Murder also led to a series of original novels by Lee Goldberg, an executive producer and writer on the TV show.

Season One

Season Six

Season Seven

Tuesday, 20 July 2010

Opening Theme: RUMPOLE OF THE BAILEY

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

British legal mystery series Rumpole of the Bailey (1975-1992), created and written by John Mortimer, starred Leo McKern as an ageing London barrister who defends any and all clients. The television series led to a series of short stories, novels, and radio dramas.

Thursday, 15 July 2010

Opening Theme: MISS MARPLE

With the release of my new whodunit Nursing a Grudge starring geriatric amateur sleuth Earl Walker, this blog is featuring senior citizen detective shows the next several weeks ...

Agatha Christie's famed amateur sleuth Miss Jane Marple was introduced in the short story "The Tuesday Night Club," published in The Royal Magazine December 1927. Her first full-length novel was Murder at the Vicarage 1930.

Over the years, the character has been played by several actresses in film and on TV. From 1984-1992, the BBC series Miss Marple, starring Joan Hickson, adapted all the original Miss Marple novels. Starting in 2004, the ITV series Agatha Christie's Marple has starred Geraldine McEwan and now Julia McKenzie.

The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side, BBC, 1990 (starring Joan Hickson)

Agatha Christie's Miss Marple (starring Geraldine McEwan)

Masterpiece MYSTERY!: Miss Marple (starring Julia Mckenzie)

More themes:
Agatha Christie's Great Detectives (anime)
MATLOCK
BARNABY JONES
QUINCY
THE EQUALIZER
HARRY O
NBC Mystery Movie (COLUMBO)
PERRY MASON
Hardy Boys / Nancy Drew Mysteries
Checkmate
Magnum P.I.
Monk
Simon & Simon
THE ROCKFORD FILES

From The Thrill of it All:
Agatha Christie meets Doctor Who
Detectives: HERCULE POIROT by Agatha Christie
Detectives: MISS MARPLE by Agatha Christie
Detectives: TOMMY and TUPPENCE by Agatha Christie
Detectives: SHERLOCK HOLMES by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Detectives: HAMISH MACBETH by MC Beaton
Detectives: HORACE RUMPOLE (Rumpole of the Bailey) by John Mortimer
Detectives: JESSICA FLETCHER (Murder She Wrote) by Donald Bain
Detectives: DR. MARK SLOANE (Diagnosis Murder) by Lee Goldberg
Retirement is Murder: 10 Senior Sleuths
100 Mystery Series: 1887-2010
Murderous Beginnings: 40 Detective Fiction Firsts
All Aboard For Murder: 10 Mysteries and Thrillers On Trains
Christmas Can Be Murder: 10 Seasonal Mystery Titles