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Everyone seems to prefer the 1950s black-and-white television series Dragnet to its late-1960s color do-over. I guess I do too, but not by much, and I've been thinking about the differences between the two.

Purists will insist that the original Dragnet is the radio show, from which the first TV series was adapted, and that's true. But the radio Dragnet had a subtle difference, colored by producer-star Jack Webb's insistence on authenticity. With a conviction that might have drawn admiring approval from Erich von Stroheim, Webb took portable recorders to Los Angeles' police headquarters to ensure that Dragnet's sound effects were as authentic as possible. When you hear the phone ring on Joe Friday's desk, you can be sure that's exactly what an L.A. police detective's phone sounded like. When he dashes downstairs to report to his captain, the number of footsteps heard is precisely the correct number. Less obsessively but more effectively, the show's assorted witnesses, suspects and police functionaries almost invariably speak in the workaday monotone of the real world, not like actors do in the emotionally-fortified world of canned drama.

Radio made the authenticity relatively easy. But television was a whole new medium, and Webb (who directed every episode he could, in addition to starring and producing) was confronted with a new set of restrictions. Shooting schedules were very tight, and budgets were low, in spite of the show's healthy ratings. Out of necessity, Webb soon began shooting his many conversation scenes in tight close-ups; each actor would deliver his side of the conversation in one long take, reading off a cue card, and the editor would cut from one speaker to the other as rapidly as the dialogue tumbled out.

The forced economy of the TV series, I think, encouraged Webb to borrow from film noir conventions for Dragnet. It always seems to be dark outside. There's never a trace of glamor or comfort. Witnesses and suspects live in little rooms. The police detectives, technicians and supervisors always have cramped little offices, with little to look at but filing cabinets and venetian blinds.

But when Webb did have money to work with (for the motion picture edition of Dragnet (1954)), a lot of that noir element is missing.

So it shouldn't be a surprise that the 1960s television revival should have a different look, a different feel. Shot in color at Universal, that show (technically titled Dragnet 1967, then Dragnet 1968, etc.), retains its trademark dialogue delivery, as Friday and his partner go about solving cases in the same old way. But now, somehow it always seems to be broad daylight outside. Rooms are still spare, but brightly (maybe too brightly) lit. The fedoras are gone, so too the chain-smoking. More than anything, the noir is gone.

This was deliberate. The whole point of doing the revival was to update Dragnet for a new, modern era. As always, it's about the slow, methodical unraveling of a crime, and sometimes it's not even all that interesting a crime. There isn't a lot of slam-bang action, but there isn't supposed to be. Compared to other cop shows, it's less exciting, sometimes less compelling. But Jack Webb himself is still letter-perfect as Joe Friday (who's still just a sergeant in a plain grey suit after twenty years of cracking every case assigned to him). His new partner, played by Harry Morgan, is a little more interesting than the one played by Ben Alexander in the old days, though neither of them compare to the great Barton Yarborough of the radio series. The basic drama of realistic police crime-solving work is still there, and it's still got its durable appeal.

The modern Dragnet finds Friday confronting the public safety perils of a new generation, chiefly surly, drug-addled hippies and violent lefty radicals. (The very first episode of Dragnet 1967 tackles LSD.) The generation gap presented Webb with a temptation he couldn't resist, namely an irregular series of stern, seething lectures that Friday delivers to various young losers. Personally, I enjoy these fast-spoken, clipped-delivery speeches (they're the closest Friday can come to slapping some sense into these punks), but they weaken the franchise. They don't really belong. And the generation gap dates the show something awful, which explains why a series that seemed to be all over the dial in syndication throughout the 1970s steadily disappeared from syndication in the 1980s. It was then subjected to a more-or-less affectionate parody by Dan Aykroyd before submerging for a couple of decaades, until the DVD releases of the Dragnet revival.

Oddly, the original black-and-white Dragnet is buried deep. The original 35mm elements are supposedly still out there, somewhere, but all that circulates are the same 25 or 30 episodes that grey-market video opeerators transferred from scratchy 16mm prints long ago. Even the dedicated bootleggers don't seem to have a stash of Dragnet. If the original materials still exist, it's a wonder that they haven't been brought to market (even Dennis the Menace is on DVD now!), but fans like me can always hope.

It's interesting to compare the very earliest radio episodes to those just a few months later. The first ones feature rather typical melodramatic "radio" acting by all, and even Webb's Friday comes off more like one of his earlier hard-bitten private eye characters. But what we think of as the classic Dragnet style was soon to come; everybody tones it down and adopts a more pseudo-naturalistic acting style. I'd like to be in on the creative process that went on then; it happened so relatively quickly that Webb must have early on realized that he wasn't really getting the new, realistic style that he'd envisioned. I've been listening to scads of the shows over the past couple years (they're great for a half hour session on a gym treadmill), and had avoided the first ones until recently; the difference in style was pretty startling.

Some of the conventions are amusing to hear popping up over and over throughout the run. A couple examples: the victims and witnesses who inevitably stray from the point with irrelevant asides: when asked to describe their stolen car, the victim will say something like, "Oh it was a nice blue color. I'd always wanted one like that, but when we were first married George -that's my husband, George - we couldn't afford one. So when we saw this one in the lot, I..." Every single time. Or the lengthy interrogations of mugs who they've got dead to rights. The guys always just go into tough-guy denial mode, as if reading from the same script - which they are, of course! But it gets pretty repetitive.

The low budget of the b/w series was a two-edged sword, I think. It enforced a more compact, dialog-driven plot and so wound up retaining the feel of the radio version. Watching the TV show, I'm disappointed that there's so little location shooting, but on the other hand doing so might have presented the temptation to "open up" the plots and the show might have gotten more conventional. I liked the 1954 film for what it was, but I think that for a feature it wouldn't have hurt at all to have less backlot and more real LA.

When they were first on, I watched some of the color series, but I found it embarrassing with all of Webb's moralizing and preaching, plus the frankly absurd middle-aged Hollywood guy take on contemporary culture. And I missed Ben Alexander. He could pull off the quirky and, let's face it, really bone-headed personal stuff with a completely straight face.

[Mike Gebert]

I used to send out a newsletter to my advertising agency clients selling my, I guess, distinctive sensibility, by commenting on whatever struck my fancy. Here's something I wrote about Dragnet in it once.

Webb, Master

They never believe me at first when I say that Jack Webb was one of the most distinctive artists ever to work in television. It’s hard to get past the innumerable parodies of the original Dragnet and Webb’s reputation as the squarest person of the 60s. So I have to turn on Nick at Nite (this usually doesn’t come up until I have them trapped anyway) and show them.

We all know the staccato Dragnet speaking rhythm (“I guess you forgot one thing.” “What’s that, officer man?” “It’s against The Law.”) but it’s a surprise to see that it’s matched in the editing rhythm— in an era of park-the-camera two-shots, Webb pingpongs on every line.

And when you look at Webb’s images you realize that the world really was black and white to him—shot after shot is pepper-haired man in gray suit against taupe wall. When a suspicious swinger’s red flocked wallpaper suddenly appears, it hits you the way the 60s must have hit Webb.

Webb gave his actors one line at a time, so they’d be so preoccupied with remembering it that they wouldn’t attempt to act— thus producing the flatly realistic Dragnet dialogue style. His fascination with the seedy side of LA, the bars and cheap apartments where losers wash up and come in contact with the law, is unique in TV and matched only by Charles Bukowski in literature— though Webb’s unsympathetic take on it isn’t Beat, it’s beat cop.

In short, Dragnet’s sublime squareness was the result of a conscious aesthetic. That doesn’t make it good, you say. Maybe not, but there’s a reason Dragnet gets remade and parodied and Hawaii 5-0, say, doesn’t. To a formulaic genre, Webb brought a personal style that expressed his worldview perfectly. We should all aim to bring as much to our beats.

There was already a hint of the generation gap theme on a 1952 episode: "The Big Seventeen". A bunch of teenagers get unruly in a movie theatre and trash the place when the manager asks them to settle down. The ostensible reason for their antics is found in a little box that's handed to Friday: it contains marijuana. The depiction of pot as a source of violence likely seems rather dubious today, but it was probably one of the first times that illegal drugs were depicted on primetime television. Another episode, "The Big .22 Rifle for Christmas" contains some of the most haunting scenes ever done by child actors on TV. The title itself will probably tell you why.

If you want to compare the two series even more directly, watch "The Big Little Jesus", a story about a nativity Christ statue being stolen. It originally aired on 24 Dec. 1953 and was the only episode of the original series filmed in colour (although it seems to be available only in B&W). Fourteen years later, the script was re-used as "The Christmas Story".

-HA

[Mike Gebert]

And in that case, I prefer the color version, because its depiction of skid row in color and Bobby Troup* as the loser they initially bust and hold for the Jesus caper is so vividly, Bukowskianly pathetic. Lots of movies show a Los Angeles I feel like I've never seen, but that LA-- I know that LA exists.

* Who was, at that point, the new husband of Webb's ex-wife Julie London. Later he would cast them both in Emergency.

I remember seeing Jack Webb as a guest on the "Tonight Show" in a "Dragnet" skit with Carson. The way Webb slipped into the Friday character was impressive. He had perfect pitch and cadence like it was an episode of the series. It made Carson's punch lines that much funnier, and Webb seemed like a pretty good sport in making fun of his franchise. It was on one of those anniversary shows, where they always showed Ed Ames hitting an Indian figure drawn on a wooden board right in the crotch with a Tomahawk.

[Christopher Jacobs]

I remember seeing Jack Webb as a guest on the "Tonight Show" in a "Dragnet" skit with Carson. The way Webb slipped into the Friday character was impressive. He had perfect pitch and cadence like it was an episode of the series. It made Carson's punch lines that much funnier, and Webb seemed like a pretty good sport in making fun of his franchise.

"He copped the copper clappers." One of Carson's classic comedy clips!

I wonder if Jack Webb had a soft spot in his heart for the silent film era. Maybe it's to be expected about an old cop show set in Los Angeles, but references to silent movies are all over the place in Dragnet, such as:


"The Big Producer" (8/26/54): In this adaptation from a radio episode, porno photos are being peddled around a high school. The young entrepreneur (played by Martin Milner, of all people, long before Webb cast him for a lead in Adam-12), has been getting the photos from a former silent movie producer. Webb could easily have portrayed this producer in a very negative light, but instead he's presented as a wistful hard-luck case, who leads Sgt. Friday through a weed-covered backlot, reminiscing at length about the westerns he'd made there in better days. Unexpectedly, it's a very sentimental wrap-up to the episode.

"The Bank Examiner Swindle" (2/23/67): Con artists have been bilking elderly people out of their savings. Friday and Gannon interview the victims, and one of them's a former silent star living in a once-grand, now-seedy residential hotel. After explaining how the con men took her money, and recalling the glory of her former stardom, she mentions she's been hoping for a come-back (which we know will never happen). Obviously a lonely old lady, she instinctively strikes a regal pose for the police photographer. Gannon asks her for her autograph. "I didn't know you collect autographs," Friday says to him as they leave. Gannon replies, "I don't."

"The Subscription Racket" (4/20/67): Visiting a local TV station, Friday and Gannon meet the staff film editor (Doodles Weaver). In a rambling conversation, the editor mentions he lives in Tarzana, then talks with Gannon about the history of Tarzan in the movies. Soon the editor is wondering aloud who Elmo Lincoln's leading lady was, but by this time Friday is pulling Gannon away. Time to get to work.

All great observations. I too have been listening to the radio shows in chronological order and have been noticing the same trappings that Paul pointed out. The early episodes do tend to be on the melodramatic side, but not in a way that is any different than other radio drama from that period. When they settled into their format, it's clear why it was such a popular show, even that late in the game.

I don't think enough credit is given to Webb, who was hipper than his on-screen persona let on. A great audiophile and jazz collector, I can't imagine the color shows (which I actually like) aren't played somewhat tongue-in-cheek, with a generous dose of pandering to the middle-class, middle-aged audience. Camp was certainly "in" at the time—during the same period, "Batman" ruled the ratings with another burlesque on a dead-serious 1940s franchise. So in many ways, it's not hard to see "Dragnet" taking the same leap, and some of those color episodes are definitely as over-the-top as some of the "Batman" shows, which incidentally also took a liking to the old silent pictures.

As for the '50s series, it would be nice to see these get a revival with new transfers. My understanding was that whoever took over the Mark VII right may still have the elements to these shows, including the color "Big Little Jesus," a show that was part of NBC's winter-spring color show push. Unfortunately, the show has lapsed into PD, and given the state of the home video market, I think the chances of this are unlikely, but I thought the same about "One Step Beyond," which is under similar circumstances, and the first season was released on DVD with new transfers from the original elements, so I suppose that anything is possible.

I love the radio series and, given the limited number of 50's episodes available, I greatly prefer the original television series to the Universal reboot. The 60's show is simply too artificial with far too few genuine dramatic moments. The color show is artless, to say the least. That's not to say it's lousy, just comparatively uninvolving.

The '54 Warner feature is excellent, but it's got one telltale foreboding of what was to come in the 60's - that damn elevator scene. You know the one. Friday and Smith get into the elevator, the doors close, and ALMOST simultaneously the two detectives lift their heels as the elevator rises. Then, when the elevator "stops", they lift their heels again. ALMOST together.

And, boy, does Virginia Gregg have some great scenes and monologues!

If you're a Webb fan, be sure to check out his radio series PETE KELLY'S BLUES (also a dynamite feature film).

As a kid I found DRAGNET to be enjoyable (if sometimes easy to laugh at) but unfortunately I was watching at the end of the series when episodes would stop dead so that Friday could deliver a lecture on crime prevention. Those parts were just plain boring.

Later when Harry Morgan's career started up again in MASH he called those his "Sleepwalking years"

As a kid I found DRAGNET to be enjoyable (if sometimes easy to laugh at) but unfortunately I was watching at the end of the series when episodes would stop dead so that Friday could deliver a lecture on crime prevention. Those parts were just plain boring.

You have to be patient with Dragnet. Sometimes you're seeing nothing but phony-looking interior sets and the equally phony-looking "city street" standing sets on the Universal backlot. It seems like all the character actors are the same eight or ten people you saw in earlier episodes, and too many scripts follow the same old formulas. Webb was producing and directing every episode, as well as performing in nearly every scene, cranking out two dozen episodes a year-- on a budget.

But Dragnet can often surprise you, too. There's "The Shooting" (March 1967), which winds up with a noirish climax in which a shotgun-toting Friday bursts into a suspect's skid-row room snarling, "Flinch and you'll be chasing your head down Fifth Street!"

You see Friday on the hot seat thorughout "The Shooting Board" (September 1967), under investigation himself for shooting at a suspect and nearly drummed out of the police department. There's a psycho serial killer in "Homicide: The Student" (September 1969), and a neo-Nazi plants a bomb in an elementary school in "The Big Explosion" (January 1967).

I'm finding that the show hit its stride in the second season, then began losing some momentum. It's not necessarily a show to watch every day, but I keep coming back to Dragnet and enjoying it.

But Dragnet can often surprise you, too. There's "The Shooting" (March 1967), which winds up with a noirish climax in which a shotgun-toting Friday bursts into a suspect's skid-row room snarling, "Flinch and you'll be chasing your head down Fifth Street!"

I love that scene. I watched those DRAGNET 1967-70 repeats over and over again when I was a kid.

Webb's newspaper movie, -30- , is very good too. Great transfer on the Warner Archive disc.

The '54 Warner feature is excellent, but it's got one telltale foreboding of what was to come in the 60's - that damn elevator scene. You know the one. Friday and Smith get into the elevator, the doors close, and ALMOST simultaneously the two detectives lift their heels as the elevator rises. Then, when the elevator "stops", they lift their heels again. ALMOST together.

Actually, no. It was a quick knee-bend. And it happened in the early b&w episodes, EVERY time Friday and Smith got into an elevator. When it was three or more people - as with Milburn Stone, Webb and Herb Ellis in "The Big Jump" - NOBODY could do it at the same time. But, since most TV screens were 12 inches or less back then, it was easy to get away with.

When that scene came up in the '54 feature, a few audiences laughed and critics commented on it.

There are exactly 59 b&w episodes in circulation... just gotta know where to look (and to put up w/VHS in some cases).

Michael J. Hayde

Just revisited "The Big Girl," about a transvestite robber(!), with among its cast, voice-over veteran Art Gilmore as Captain Didion (his regular role on the series), Carolyn Jones as a floozy, and most interestingly of all, Production Designer Harper Goff as a redneck!

It's interesting to watch the series progress throughout the years. One thing I've noticed watching the '53-'54 season and the '58-'59 season back-to-back is the photography. I think the feature film somewhat upped the ante as far as the cinematography and overall production quality of the series goes, and the later entries in the series use faster cutting and less opticals, but also employ the use of a zoom lens, making some episodes (such as "The Big Counterfeit," the penultimate '50s episode) more dynamic.

Try this site:

www.dvdclassicscorner.net/

Countless interviews available by this guy via telephone with his guests.

Just revisited "The Big Girl," about a transvestite robber(!), with among its cast, voice-over veteran Art Gilmore as Captain Didion (his regular role on the series), Carolyn Jones as a floozy, and most interestingly of all, Production Designer Harper Goff as a redneck!

It's interesting to watch the series progress throughout the years. One thing I've noticed watching the '53-'54 season and the '58-'59 season back-to-back is the photography. I think the feature film somewhat upped the ante as far as the cinematography and overall production quality of the series goes, and the later entries in the series use faster cutting and less opticals, but also employ the use of a zoom lens, making some episodes (such as "The Big Counterfeit," the penultimate '50s episode) more dynamic.

Carolyn (billed as "Caroline") Jones also turns up in the aforementioned episode about the silent film producer-turned-pornographer.