John Craven

Matinee Theater is an American anthology series that aired on NBC during the Golden Age of Television, from 1955 to 1958. The series, which ran daily in the afternoon, was frequently live. It was produced by Albert McCleery, Darrell Ross, George Cahan and Frank Price with executive producer George Lowther. McCleery had previously produced the live series Cameo Theatre which introduced to television the concept of theater-in-the-round, TV plays staged with minimal sets. Jim Buckley of the Pewter Plough Playhouse recalled: When Al McCleery got back to the States, he originated a most ambitious theatrical TV series for NBC called Matinee Theater: to televise five different stage plays per week live, airing around noon in order to promote color TV to the American housewife as she labored over her ironing. Al was the producer. He hired five directors and five art directors. Richard Bennett, one of our first early presidents of the Pewter Plough Corporation, was one of the directors and I was one of the art directors and, as soon as we were through televising one play, we had lunch and then met to plan next week’s show. That was over 50 years ago, and I’m trying to think; I believe the TV art director is his own set decorator —yes, of course! It had to be, since one of McCleery’s chief claims to favor with the producers was his elimination of the setting per se and simply decorating the scene with a minimum of props. It took a bit of ingenuity.

Robert Montgomery Presents is an American dramatic television series which was produced by NBC from January 30, 1950 until June 24, 1957. The live show had several sponsors during its seven-year run, and the title was altered to feature the sponsor, usually Lucky Strike cigarettes, for example, Robert Montgomery Presents Your Lucky Strike Theater, ....The Johnson's Wax Program, and so on.

Climax! is an American anthology series that aired on CBS from 1954 to 1958. The series was hosted by William Lundigan and later co-hosted by Mary Costa. It was one of the few CBS programs of that era to be broadcast in color. Many of the episodes were performed and broadcast live.

An anthology series containing drama, psychological thriller, fantasy, science fiction, suspense, and/or horror, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist.

The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp is a television western series loosely based on the life of frontier marshal Wyatt Earp. The half-hour black-and-white program aired for 229 episodes on ABC from 1955 to 1961 and featured Hugh O'Brian in the title role.

Four Star Playhouse is an American television anthology series that ran from 1952 to 1956, sponsored in its first bi-weekly season by The Singer Company; Bristol-Myers became an alternate sponsor when it became a weekly series in the fall of 1953. The original premise was that Charles Boyer, Ida Lupino, David Niven, and Dick Powell would take turns starring in episodes. However, several other performers took the lead from time to time, including Ronald Colman and Joan Fontaine. Blake Edwards was among the writers and directors who contributed to the series. Edwards created the recurring character of illegal gambling house operator Willie Dante for Dick Powell to play on this series. The character was later revamped and spun off in his own series starring Howard Duff, then-husband of Lupino. The pilot for Meet McGraw, starring Frank Lovejoy, aired here, as did another episode in which Lovejoy recreated his role of Chicago newspaper reporter Randy Stone, from the radio drama Nightbeat.

The Big Valley is an American western television series which ran on ABC from September 15, 1965, to May 19, 1969. The show stars Barbara Stanwyck, as the widow of a wealthy nineteenth century California rancher. It was created by A.I. Bezzerides and Louis F. Edelman, and produced by Levy-Gardner-Laven for Four Star Television.

Wanted: Dead or Alive is an American Western television series starring Steve McQueen as the bounty hunter Josh Randall. It aired on CBS for three seasons from 1958–61. The black-and-white program was a spin-off of a March 1958 episode of Trackdown, a 1957–59 western series starring Robert Culp. Both series were produced by Four Star Television in association with CBS Television. The series launched McQueen into becoming the first television star to cross over into comparable status on the big screen.

Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond is an American anthology series created by Merwin Gerard. The original series ran for three seasons on ABC from January 1959 to July 1961.

Thriller is an American anthology television series that aired during the 1960–61 and 1961–62 seasons on NBC. The show featured host Boris Karloff introducing a mix of self-contained, macabre weird-horror and morbid, hitchockian crime stories, in some of which he also starred.

A television anthology series hosted by Alfred Hitchcock featuring dramas, thrillers, and mysteries.

Sugarfoot is an American western television series that aired on ABC from 1957 to 1961. The series stars Will Hutchins as Tom Brewster, an Easterner who comes to the Oklahoma Territory to become a lawyer. Jack Elam is cast in occasional episodes as sidekick Toothy Thompson. Brewster was a correspondence-school student whose apparent lack of cowboy skills earned him the nickname "Sugarfoot", a designation even below that of a tenderfoot.

Laugh along with funnyman Jack Benny as he brings his underplayed humor to TV along with regular performers from his radio show days.

An anthology series that explored the ways sudden and unexpected wealth changed life for better or for worse. It told the stories of people who were given one million dollars from a benefactor who insisted they never know him, with one exception.

High-priced Houston lawyer Clinton Judd and his assistant Ben Caldwell take difficult cases throughout the U.S.

The Public Defender is a half-hour 69-episode television dramatic series starring Reed Hadley as Bart Matthews, an attorney for the indigent. The series aired on CBS from March 11, 1954 to June 23, 1955, a season and a half.

The Adventures of Jim Bowie is an American Western television series that aired on ABC from 1956 to 1958. Its setting was the 1830s-era Louisiana Territory. The series was an adaptation of the book Tempered Blade, by Monte Barrett. The series stars Scott Forbes as the real-life adventurer Jim Bowie. The series initially portrayed Jim Bowie as something of an outdoors-man, riding his horse through the wilderness near his home in Opelousas, where he would stumble across someone needing his assistance. He was aided by the Bowie Knife, his ever-present weapon. He designed it in the first episode, The Birth of the Blade.

Cavalcade of America is an anthology drama series that was sponsored by the DuPont Company, although it occasionally presented a musical, such as an adaptation of Show Boat, and condensed biographies of popular composers. It was initially broadcast on radio from 1935 to 1953, and later on television from 1952 to 1957. Originally on CBS, the series pioneered the use of anthology drama for company audio advertising. Cavalcade of America documented historical events using stories of individual courage, initiative and achievement, often with feel-good dramatizations of the human spirit's triumph against all odds. This was consistent with DuPont's overall conservative philosophy and legacy as an American company dating back to 1802. The company's motto, "Maker of better things for better living through chemistry," was read at the beginning of each program, and the dramas emphasized humanitarian progress, particularly improvements in the lives of women, often through technological innovation.

Stagecoach West is an American Western drama television series which ran for thirty-eight episodes on the ABC network from October 4, 1960, until June 27, 1961. Characters Luke Perry and Simon Kane operate the Timberland Stage Line from fictitious Outpost, Missouri to San Francisco, California. Simon's 15-year-old son, David "Davey" Kane, joins the two as they face stagecoach robbers, murderers, inclement weather, and human interest stories. Perry and Kane, who are both deputy U.S. marshals, had been on opposite sides of the American Civil War; Kane, a captain in the Union Army, while Perry had fought for the Confederate States of America. The one-hour black-and-white program was offered at 9 p.m. Eastern on Tuesdays opposite NBC's Thriller, hosted by Boris Karloff, and CBS's The Red Skelton Show. Rogers became well-known a dozen years later on M*A*S*H, and Bray later portrayed the forest ranger Corey Stuart on Lassie from 1964–1969, both on CBS. Child actor Richard Eyer had starred in a number of films in the 1950s, including Friendly Persuasion and Desperate Hours. Stagecoach West was produced by Dick Powell's Four Star Television. It is believed that the series was cancelled despite the high quality of its production because of the glut of westerns on television at the time that it aired. The same fate had fallen on CBS's Johnny Ringo, a 1959 one-season spin-off of Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater.

Letter to Loretta is an American anthology drama series telecast on NBC from September 1953 to June 1961 for a total of 165 episodes. The filmed show was hosted by Loretta Young who also played the lead in various episodes. Letter to Loretta was sponsored by Procter & Gamble from 1953 through 1960. The final season's sponsor was Warner-Lambert's Listerine.