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The forgotten story of 'Captain Video', the first science fiction series on television

2021-08-12T02:31:53.228Z


Only 24 of about 1,500 chapters of the pioneering production remain, broadcast between 1949 and 1955 by the now defunct DuMont Television Network.


Foundation

, the serial adaptation of Isaac Asimov's celebrated futuristic saga, hits Apple TV + in September.

However, long before her, and

The Expanse

,

Doctor Who

and

Star Trek

, there was

Captain Video and His Video Rangers

, the first science fiction series on television.

The pioneering production, broadcast between 1949 and 1955 in the United States, had the collaboration of Asimov himself, Arthur C. Clarke and other well-known writers of the genre of the moment who today have fallen into oblivion.

Only 24 chapters of about 1,500 produced are preserved.

Some of them can be seen in their original version with English subtitles through the website Archive.org and YouTube.

More information

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  • The mass hysteria that prophesied 'the Twilight Zone'

The series was created by screenwriters Lawrence Menkin and MC Brook, commissioned by James Caddigan, director of programming for DuMont Television Network, a short-lived American television channel that tried to compete with the oligopoly of CBS, NBC and ABC in the 1940s. fifty.

DuMont lacked the structure and financial backing of its rivals, which were already national broadcasters, but it sought to compensate through innovation.

Its programming included, in addition to this production, some of the first television spots in the United States headed by minorities, such as the musical program

The Hazel Scott Show

, presented by an African-American woman,

and the detective series

The Gallery of Madame Liu-Tsong

, starring Anna May Wong, the first Asian actress to succeed in Hollywood.

Captain Video's

hero

— played by Al Hodge for most of its broadcast — was the commander of a kind of sidereal policeman with the ability to travel to the future and to other planets. Captain Video came from the same bloodline as Flash Gordon and Diego Valor, when intergalactic adventurers went to space shaved and unkempt, Martians wore Roman robes and helmets, and mad scientists with malevolent laughs threatened to destroy Earth every week. Jack Gould, a critic for

The New York Times

in 1949, was right at the time when he predicted that the production would "entertain adults and fascinate young people" with fantasies of "the electronic age to come."

The official spaceport from 'Captain Video' with some of the toys inspired by the series Smithsonian Institute

Historian David Weinstein, in his book on DuMont titled

The Forgotten Network

(Temple University Press), indicates that the series was not only a science fiction landmark but also in stores.

It was the first production born from television to adapt to cinema and comics, in addition to having lines of toys, clothes, cereals and sweets.

Weinstein writes: "Ads and articles featured children in their

Captain Video

uniforms

, from helmets to ties to atomic disintegration rifles."

The other television channels soon had their own space adventurers and, ahead of other science fiction franchises by several decades, DuMont also conceived a spin-off series entitled

The Secrets Files of Captain Video.

.

When space heroes fall to Earth

Despite its success, the financial problems of the channel on which it was broadcast affected the series from beginning to end.

The interior of the captain's ship was painted cardboard, the futuristic gadgets were made of household appliances and car parts and, in the middle of the program, 10 minutes of some western were inserted to fill the half hour that its broadcast should last, which was carried out six times a week in prime time.

Actors could earn more money from their public appearances than from their television roles, and not having a percentage of the earnings was the reason for the resignation of Hodge's predecessor as the lead.

Not even the popularity of its star series could rescue the channel and

Captain Video

was canceled in April 1955, a few months before DuMont ceased broadcasting.

The station's former assets in the New York area would later become part of Fox, which in 1986 would become the fourth US network.

Al Hodge as Captain Video in a publicity photo DuMont Television Network

A former artist of the channel reported in 1996 to the Library of Congress of the United States that DuMont's entire media library - according to some sources, consisting of about 20,000 videos - was disposed of in New York Bay in the 1970s to make room in the stock. Some experts, such as Weinstein, question this account. What is certain is that only 24 chapters of

Captain Video

are preserved out

of an estimated 1,537, preserved by the Film and Television Archive of the University of California, Los Angeles. Of these, five can be viewed in digital format.

Al Hodge, who starred in the series for five years, could never get over the character's fame. The actor, once one of the best-known faces on television, died alone and broke, in a cheap room in a Manhattan hotel surrounded by memories of his former futuristic glory.

The New York Times

collects a curious scene during Hodge's funeral: a teenager approached the crowd of fans and nostalgic people to ask if any famous people had died. When the young man admitted never having heard of Captain Video, journalist Aviva Cantor pointed out a

Star Trek

garment

. “He led us to that. He was the first, ”he told her.

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Source: elparis

All news articles on 2021-08-12

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