SMALL SCREEN, BIG SCORES: PART FOUR

By Scott Bettencourt

ALOHA MEANS GOODBYE - Charles Fox
Sally Struthers as an ailing woman in danger in Hawaii; script by Joseph Stefano, from the novel by Naomi Hintze (You'll Like My Mother)

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MISS JANE PITTMAN - Fred Karlin
28:00 of score on the Reel Music CD The Fred Karlin Collection Volume 1; 1973/1974 Emmy winner Music Composition For a Special Program, Emmy nominee Best Song or Theme; the life of a black woman (Cicely Tyson) in the South, spanning the 1850s to the 1960s; one of the most acclaimed TV movies of the era

BAD RONALD - Fred Karlin
A disturbed teen hides in a family's house

BETRAYAL - Ernest Gold
Amanda Blake is menaced by a young couple; from a Doris Miles Disney novel, directed by Gordon Hessler (The Golden Voyage of Sinbad)

BORN INNOCENT - Fred Karlin
Runaway Linda Blair has a tough time in reform school; controversial due to an explicit-for-television shower rape scene cut from many broadcasts

CHEZ LES TICH - Jean-Claude Petit

DEATH SENTENCE - Laurence Rosenthal
A murder trial juror discovers the real killer is her own husband -- what are the odds?

THE DEATH SQUAD - Dave Grusin
Cop thriller that sounds a lot like Magnum Force, starring Robert Forster and Melvyn Douglas

DR. MAX - Billy Goldenberg
Lee J. Cobb as an inner city doctor; directed by James Goldstone

DOUBLE SOLITAIRE - Lyn Murray

THE ELEVATOR - John Cacavas
People trapped in an elevator -- who will survive? Directed by Jerry Jameson

ENTRE TOUTES LES FEMMES - Georges Delerue

THE FAMILY KOVACK - Harry Sukman
Chicago set family drama

FER-DE-LANCE - Dominic Frontiere
Deadly snake loose on an American submarine, with David Janssen and Hope Lange

THE GODCHILD - David Shire
A reworking of John Ford's Western 3 Godfathers, this time with Jack Palance, Jack Warden and Keith Carradine; directed by Shire's Yale classmate John Badham

GREAT EXPECTATIONS - Maurice Jarre
Score LP on Pye; Michael York as Pip, Sarah Miles as Estella, James Mason as Magwitch; co-starring Margaret Leighton, Robert Morley, Anthony Quayle, Joss Ackland, Rachel Roberts; shot by David Lean's DP, Freddie Young

THE HEALERS - David Shire
Hospital drama with John Forsythe, directed by Tom Gries

HITCHHIKE! - Gil Melle
Cloris Leachman picks up a murderous hitchhiker; directed by Gordon Hessler

HONKY TONK - Jerry Fielding
Story of con men in the Old West, with Richard Crenna, Stella Stevens and Margot Kidder; directed by Don Taylor

HURRICANE - Vic Mizzy
Disaster tale directed by Jerry Jameson

I LOVE YOU, GOODBYE - Billy Goldenberg
Dissatisfied wife Hope Lange leaves husband Earl Holliman; directed by Sam O'Steen

IN TANDEM - Don Ellis
Story of two truckers (Claude Akins and Frank Converse) became the TV series Movin' On

INDICT AND CONVICT - Jerry Goldsmith
Courtroom drama with a plot similar to Presumed Innocent; with George Grizzard and William Shatner, directed by Boris Sagal

IT COULDN'T HAPPEN TO A NICER GUY - Fred Karlin
Comedy about a married man (Paul Sorvino) who gets raped by a beautiful woman; imagine the hilarity! (I didn't make this up; this is actually the premise of the movie)

IT'S GOOD TO BE ALIVE - Michel Legrand
Paul Winfield as Brooklyn Dodger Roy Campanella, co-starring Louis Gossett Jr. and Ruby Dee; you don't suppose they hired Legrand for this one because of Brian's Song, do you? Directed by Michael Landon

JUDGE DEE AND THE MONSTERY MURDERS - Leonard Rosenman
Khigh Dhiegh (Hawaii Five-O's villainous Wo Fat) plays a crime-solving 7th century Chinese judge, co-starring all of Hollywood's favorite Asian actors: Mako, Soon-Tek Oh, James Hong, Keye Luke. (I guess James Shigeta was unavailable). Script by Nicholas Meyer (!), directed by Jeremy Paul Kagan

KILLDOZER - Gil Melle
Based on a Theodore Sturgeon story; a bulldozer is possessed by an alien force on a remote island and goes on a rampage. The first killer vehicle movie made in the wake of Duel

KILLER BEES - David Shire
Wealthy Gloria Swanson has a strange power over the bees in her vineyard. Directed by Curtis Harrington, written by the Corringtons (The Omega Man, Battle For the Planet of the Apes)

KING LEAR - Charles Gross
Made for PBS; James Earl Jones as Lear, Rosalind Cash as Goneril, Raul Julia as Edmund

THE LAST ANGRY MAN - Gil Melle
Remake of the Paul Muni movie, with Pat Hingle as a Brooklyn doctor during the Depression

LITTLE HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE - David Rose
Pilot movie for the long-running Michael Landon series, directed by Landon

LUCAS TANNER - David Shire
Pilot movie for the series with David Hartman as a teacher; directed by Richard Donner, co-written by Jerry McNeely (father of composer Joel)

THE MARK OF ZORRO - Dominic Frontiere
Remake of the Tyrone Power classic, with Frank Langella in the lead

MEN OF THE DRAGON - Elmer Bernstein
An attempt to do Enter the Dragon style action for TV

THE MIGRANTS - Billy Goldenberg
1973/1974 Emmy nominee Music Composition For a Special Program; Grapes of Wrath style drama, with Cloris Leachman, Ron Howard, Sissy Spacek and Cindy Williams; written by Lanford Wilson from a Tennessee Williams story, directed by Tom Gries

THE MISSILES OF OCTOBER - Laurence Rosenthal
Acclaimed docudrama on the Cuban Missile Crisis, with William Devane as JFK, Martin Sheen as RFK, Ralph Bellamy as Adlai Stevenson, Howard Da Silva as Khrushchev

MOUSEY - Ron Grainer
Thriller with Kirk Douglas a meek high school teacher plotting revenge against ex-wife Jean Seberg

MRS. SUNDANCE - Patrick Williams
One of several TV attempts to cash in on the success of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, this time with Elizabeth Montgomery in the Katharine Ross role; Patrick Williams later went on to score the prequel feature Butch and Sundance: The Early Days

MURDER OR MERCY - Patrick Williams
Lawyer Bradford Dillman defends doctor Melvyn Douglas for the mercy killing of his wife; written by Douglas Day Stewart (An Officer and a Gentleman)

NAKIA - Leonard Rosenman
Pilot movie for the short-lived series with Robert Forster as an American Indian sheriff

NICKY'S WORLD - Charles Gross
Drama of a Greek family in New York, with Olympia Dukakis

NIGHT GAMES - Lalo Schifrin
Barry Newman reprising his role as attorney Petrocelli from Sidney J. Furie's 1970 film The Lawyer; became a series, Petrocelli

PAUL ET VIRGINIE - Georges Delerue

THE PHANTOM OF HOLLYWOOD - Leonard Rosenman
Phantom of the Opera-style story set on a Hollywood backlot, with Jack Cassidy, Broderick Crawford, Jackie Coogan, John Ireland, Peter Lawford

PLANET EARTH - Harry Sukman
Gene Roddenberry's reworking of his own Genesis II sci-fi pilot (also scored by Sukman), with John Saxon replacing Alex Cord; it was given a third reworking in 1975, with Saxon but with a different character name and without Roddenberry, as Strange New World

PUNCH AND JODY - Fred Karlin

QB VII - Jerry Goldsmith
Score CD on Intrada; 1974/1975 Emmy winner Music Composition - Special (for parts 1 & 2); an "ABC Novel For Television," based on Leon Uris' semi-autobigraphical book, with Ben Gazzara as a Holocaust survivor sued by doctor Anthony Hopkins for libel over Hopkins' work in a concentration camp; co-starring Lee Remick, Leslie Caron, Juliet Mills, Dan O'Herlihy, Robert Stephens, Anthony Quayle, Milo O'Shea, John Gielgud, Edith Evans, Jack Hawkins, Joseph Wiseman, Sam Jaffe. Teleplay by Edward Anhalt, directed by Tom Gries

THE QUESTOR TAPES - Gil Melle
Gene Roddenberry pilot with Robert Foxworth as an android and Mike Farrell as his human scientist sidekick; Melle went on to rework one of the minor themes into the Kolchak: the Night Stalker main title

THE RANGERS - Lee Holdridge

REFLECTIONS OF MURDER - Billy Goldenberg
American set remake of Diabolique, with Tuesday Weld, Joan Hackett and Sam Waterston, directed by John Badham

SHOULDER TO SHOULDER - Stanley Myers
British mini-series about the suffragette movement

SIDEKICKS - David Shire
Comedy Western with Larry Hagman, Louis Gossett Jr., Blythe Danner

SKYWAY TO DEATH - Lee Holdridge
Passengers trapped on an aerial tram; directed by Gordon Hessler

SMILE, JENNY, YOU'RE DEAD - Billy Goldenberg
Second pilot movie for David Janssen's Harry O private eye show

THE STRANGER WITHIN - Charles Fox
Barbara Eden gets knocked up by an alien; written by Richard Matheson, based on his story

TELL ME WHERE IT HURTS - David Shire
Unhappy housewife Maureen Stapleton starts a women's group

TERROR ON THE 40th FLOOR - Vic Mizzy
1:50 of score on the Percepto promo CD Vic Mizzy: Suites and Themes; People at an office Christmas party are trapped by a fire; directed by Jerry Jameson

THURSDAY'S GAME - Billy Goldenberg
Comedy with Gene Wilder and Bob Newhart as poker buddies who fail to tell their wives that their regular Thursday game has been cancelled; written by James L. Brooks

A TREE GROWS IN BROOKLYN - Jerry Goldsmith
Remake of the 1945 film (and Betty Smith novel) about a New York family in 1912; with Cliff Robertson, Diane Baker, and ubiquitous early 70s child actress Pamelyn Ferdin

UNWED FATHER - Jerry Fielding
Teenager Joseph Bottoms fights for custody of his girlfriend's child; directed by Jeremy Paul Kagan

THE VIRGINIA HILL STORY - David Shire
Dyan Cannon as Bugsy Siegel's girlfriend, with Harvey Keitel as Bugsy (Keitel was Oscar nominated for his supporting role in the movie Bugsy); co-written and directed by Joel Schumacher

THE WIDOWING OF MRS. HOLROYD - Arthur B. Rubinstein
PBS version of the D.H. Lawrence play

WINTER KILL - Jerry Goldsmith
Score CD on Film Score Monthly; Andy Griffith as a small town sheriff, an uncredited spinoff of the James Garner film They Only Kill Their Masters

1973/1974 Emmy nominees:

MUSIC COMPOSITION

For a series or a single program of a series (in the first year of music's use only):

Bruce Broughton - Hawaii Five-O (The $100,000 Nickel)
Don B. Ray - Hawaii Five-O (Nightmare in Blue)
Morton Stevens - Hawaii Five-O (Hookman)

For a special program:

Billy Goldenberg - The Migrants
Fred Karlin - The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
Laurence Rosenthal - Portrait: A Man Whose Name Was John

BEST SONG OR THEME

Billy Goldenberg - Kojak
Fred Karlin - The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman ("The Love That Lights Our Way")
Marty Paich, David Paich - Ironside (Once More For Joey - "Light the Way")

MUSIC COMPOSITION - DOCUMENTARY

Billy Goldenberg - National Geographic Society (Journey to the Outer Limits)
Lyn Murray - Primal Man (Struggle For Survival)
Walter Scharf - The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau (Beneath the Frozen World)

THE ABDUCTION OF SAINT ANNE - George Duning
Cop Robert Wagner and bishop E.G. Marshall investigate the allegedly miraculous powers of 17-year old Kathleen Quinlan

THE ART OF CRIME - Gil Melle
Ron Leibman as a Gypsy antique dealer/private eye, co-starring David Hedison, Jill Clayburgh, Jose Ferrer; co-written by Martin Cruz Smith from his novel Gypsy in Amber

BABE - Jerry Goldsmith
Score CD on Film Score Monthly; 1975/1976 Emmy winner Music Composition For a Special; tear-jerker sports biopic with Susan Clark as Babe Didrikson, Alex Karras as her husband

BEYOND THE BERMUDA TRIANGLE - Harry Sukman
If it's 1975, it must be the Bermuda Triangle; businessman Fred MacMurray investigates the disappearance of a loved one

THE BLUE KNIGHT - Henry Mancini
George Kennedy takes over the role of Joseph Wambaugh's beat cop Bumper Morgan from William Holden; became a series. Directed by J. Lee Thompson

CAGE WITHOUT A KEY - Jerry Fielding
17-year old Susan Dey is forced to take part in a robbery, then gets sent to prison

CONSPIRACY OF TERROR - Neal Hefti
Husband-and-wife detectives Michael Constantine and Barbara Rhoades investigate Satanists

CRIME CLUB - Gil Melle
A group of investigators try to solve a series of ice-pick murders; sounds like an unsold pilot to me. Another TV movie with the same title and a similar premise was done two years earlier (scored by George Romanis). Directed by Jeannot Szwarc

CROSSFIRE - Patrick Williams
James Farentino as a cop who gives up his reputation to go undercover with the mob; similar to the later Wiseguy series

A CRY FOR HELP - Gil Melle
Talk radio host Robert Culp tries to save a suicidal teenage girl; directed by Daryl Duke (The Silent Partner)

THE DEADLY TOWER - Don Ellis
Kurt Russell as Charles Whitman, who famously climbed a tower at Texas University with a sniper's rifle; directed by Jerry Jameson

DEATH BE NOT PROUD - Fred Karlin
True-life tearjerker with Arthur Hill and Jane Alexander as the parents of teenager Robby Benson, dying from a brain tumor

DEATH IN DEEP WATER - Laurie Johnson

DEATH SCREAM - Gil Melle
Fictionalization of the famous Kitty Genovese case, where a woman was murdered in plain sight of an apartment building and none of the neighbors tried to help; written by Stirling Silliphant

DELANCEY STREET: THE CRISIS WITHIN - Lalo Schifrin
Story of the self-help group Delancey Street Foundation; co-starring Mark Hamill, directed by James Frawley (The Muppet Movie)

DIAL A DEADLY NUMBER - Laurie Johnson

THE DREAM MAKERS - Fred Karlin
Payola at a record label; directed by Boris Sagal

ELLERY QUEEN - Elmer Bernstein
Pilot movie for the series, with Jim Hutton as Ellery, David Wayne as Inspector Queen, and John Hillerman as Simon Brimmer. Suspects include Ray Milland and Kim Hunter. Adapted by Levinson & Link from the Queen novel The Fourth Side of the Triangle; Bernstein's main theme is a classic.

ERIC - Dave Grusin
John Savage as a terminally ill teen; Patricia Neal, Claude Akins and Mark Hamill as his family

FEAR ON TRIAL - Arthur B. Rubinstein
William Devane as TV personality John Henry Faulk, and George C. Scott as attorney Louis Nizer who defended him against the McCarthy era blacklist; directed by Lamont Johnson

THE FIRST 36 HOURS OF DR. DURANT - Leonard Rosenman
The first day (and a half) of a doctor just out of medical school; written by Stirling Silliphant

FOSTER AND LAURIE - Lalo Schifrin
Dorian Harewood and Perry King as a black/white police team killed by black revolutionaries

FRIENDLY PERSUASION - John Cacavas
Reworking of the Gary Cooper film, with Richard Kiley, Shirley Knight and Michael O'Keefe as a Quaker family during the Civil War; directed by Joseph Sargent

A GIRL NAMED SOONER - Jerry Goldsmith
Score CD on Film Score Monthly; Lee Remick and Richard Crenna try to adopt a backwoods girl. Directed by Delbert Mann

GUILTY OR INNOCENT: THE SAM SHEPPARD MURDER CASE - Lalo Schifrin
George Peppard as the doctor accused of murdering his wife (the case which inspired the Fugitive TV series)

HEY, I'M ALIVE! - Frank DeVol
Ed Asner and Sally Struthers stranded in the Yukon by a plane crash

A HOME OF OUR OWN - Laurence Rosenthal
Priest Jason Miller founds a home for abandoned children in Mexico

HUSTLING - Jerry Fielding
Journalist Lee Remick investigates the lives of prostitutes (including Jill Clayburgh); teleplay by Fay Kanin, directed by Joseph Sargent

I WILL FIGHT NO MORE FOREVER - Gerald Fried
Western docudrama about the Nez Perce Indian tribe

IL LUNGO VIAGGIO - Luis Bacalov

THE IMPOSTOR - Gil Melle

KATE MCSHANE - John Cacavas
Pilot movie for the series, with Anne Meara as a mystery solving lawyer

THE LAST DAY - Carmine Coppola
Western with Richard Widmark vs. bank robbers

THE LEGEND OF LIZZIE BORDEN - Billy Goldenberg
Elizabeth Montgomery as Lizzie; directed by Paul Wendkos

THE LEGEND OF VALENTINO - Charles Fox
Franco Nero as Valentino; co-starring Suzanne Pleshette, Judd Hirsch, Lesley Ann Warren, Milton Berle, Yvette Mimieux. Written and directed by Melville Shavelson

LES COMPAGNONS D'ELEUSIS - Georges Delerue

THE LIVES OF JENNY DOLAN - Patrick Williams
Shirley Jones as a newspaper reporter

THE LOG OF THE BLACK PEARL - Laurence Rosenthal
The search for a sunken Nazi treasure, with Ralph Bellamy and Anne Archer

LOVE AMONG THE RUINS - John Barry
Barrister Laurence Olivier defends actress/ex-lover Katharine Hepburn in a breach of promise suit; too bad they couldn't get any good actors. Written by James Costigan, directed by George Cukor

MATT HELM - Jerry Fielding
Pilot movie for the TV series, which bore even less relation to Donald Hamilton's wonderful, gritty spy novels than the Dean Martin movies did; this time, Helm is a spy-turned-California-private-eye played by Tony Franciosa

MICHEL STROGOFF - Vladimir Cosma
Mini-series from the Jules Verne novel

THE MISSING ARE DEADLY - Gil Melle
Scientists Leonard Nimoy and Ed Nelson try to track down a plague-ridden lab rat

MOBILE TWO - Nelson Riddle
Jack Webb production with Jackie Cooper as a TV reporter

MOSES THE LAWGIVER - Ennio Morricone
2-disc score CD from RCA in Italy; European mini-series with Burt Lancaster as Moses; co-written by Anthony Burgess, special effects by Mario Bava

MURDER ON FLIGHT 502 - Laurence Rosenthal
Terrorist hijacking, with Ralph Bellamy, Robert Stack, Sonny Bono, Farrah Fawcett, Brooke Adams, Walter Pidgeon

MY FATHER'S HOUSE - Charles Fox
Ailing exec Cliff Robertson remembers his childhood with dad Robert Preston; co-written by David Seltzer

NACHTDIENST - Wojciech Kilar

THE NAKED CIVIL SERVANT - Carl Davis
John Hurt in the acclaimed British biopic of Quentin Crisp

ONE OF OUR OWN - Jerry Fielding
Pilot movie for the series Doctors Hospital, with George Peppard; directed by Richard C. Sarafian

PAUL GAUGUIN - Georges Delerue
Score suite on a Prometheus CD, paired with Cent-Mille Dollars Au Soleil

POURQUOI LA ROBE D'ANNA NE VENT PAS REDESCENDRE - Georges Delerue

PROMISE HIM ANYTHING - Nelson Riddle
Romantic comedy with Frederic Forrest and Meg Foster

QUEEN OF THE STARDUST BALLROOM - Billy Goldenberg
1974/1975 Emmy nominees Music Composition - Special, Special Music Material. Romantic musical drama about a widow (Maureen Stapleton) and a mailman (Charles Durning) who meet and fall in love at the eponymous ballroom; directed by Sam O'Steen. Was later expanded into the Broadway musical Ballroom starring Dorothy Loudon and Vincent Gardenia, directed by Michael Bennett (cast album on Sony)

THE RUNAWAY BARGE - Nelson Riddle
Action adventure on the Mississippi, with Tim Matheson and Nick Nolte; directed by Boris Sagal

THE SEAGULL - Arthur B. Rubinstein
PBS version of the Chekhov play, with Blythe Danner, Frank Langella, Lee Grant, Olympia Dukakis, Kevin McCarthy

SEARCH FOR THE GODS - Billy Goldenberg
Kurt Russell searches for a medallion that will prove all that "Chariots of the Gods" stuff

THE SILENCE - Maurice Jarre
Richard Thomas is a West Point cadet given the silent treatment when accused of violating the honor code

SKY HEIST - Leonard Rosenman
Frank Gorshin and Stefanie Powers plot to steal ten million in gold

STARSKY AND HUTCH - Lalo Schifrin
Pilot movie for the series

STOWAWAY TO THE MOON - Patrick Williams
A little boy stows away on a moon rocket

THE TRIAL OF CHAPLAIN JENSEN - Dave Grusin
James Franciscus as a Navy chaplain court-martialed for adultery

TRZECIA GRANICA - Wojciech Kilar

THE TURNING POINT OF JIM MALLOY - Johnny Mandel
John Savage as a small-town reporter in the 40s, based on John O'Hara stories; became the short-lived series Gibbsville

THE UFO INCIDENT - Billy Goldenberg
Docudrama with James Earl Jones and Estelle Parsons as a couple who claim to have been abducted by aliens

WHAT'S NEXT? - Carl Davis

WHO IS THE BLACK DAHLIA? - Dominic Frontiere
Lucie Arnaz is the famous murder victim, Efrem Zimbalist Jr. the cop investigating the case

WINNER TAKE ALL - David Shire
Shirley Jones as a housewife addicted to gambling

WON'T WRITE HOME MOM, I'M DEAD - Laurie Johnson

1974/1975 Emmy nominees:

MUSIC COMPOSITION - SERIES

Billy Goldenberg - Benjamin Franklin (The Rebel)
Patrick Williams - The Streets of San Francisco (One Last Shot)

MUSIC COMPOSITION - SPECIAL

Billy Goldenberg, Alan & Marilyn Bergman - Ballroom
Jerry Goldsmith - QB VII Parts 1 & 2

SPECIAL MUSICAL MATERIAL
For a song (which must have both music and lyrics), a theme for a series, or special material for a variety program providing the first usage of this material was written expressly for television (no winner was announced in this category):

Alan & Marilyn Bergman, Billy Goldenberg - Queen of the Stardust Ballroom
Earl Brown, Billy Barnes - Cher
Cy Coleman, Bob Wells - Shirley MacLaine: If They Could See Me Now
Jose Feliciano, Janna Merlyn Feliciano - Chico and the Man (theme)
Morton Stevens - Police Woman (theme)

SUBJECT: TV Movies list

What a great list. I remember many of those TV movies. Great stuff compared to what passes as a TV-movie today.

However, I miss seeing one item on the list, City Beneath the Sea, from 1970. It was produced and directed by Irwin Allen as a pilot for a series that was never made. I do believe that it was released theatrically in Europe, but officially, it's a TV-movie.

FROM: "Jeff Bond"

SUBJECT: Best '70s TV Movie Title

Satan's School For Girls? Close, but the best '70s TV movie title is clearly Devil Dog: The Hound of Hell.

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