Sunday, May 20, 2007

Buck Rogers in the 25th Century: a look back, (Part 2 of 3)

Given its cheap budget, a lot of the actors that came on to the show were forgettable, but there were a few big names, and before they were famous folks as well.

Here’s a list of some of the people that showed up on this show.

Frank Gorshin: The guy that played the Riddler.

Jamie Lee Curtis: Yep, the same one. This was early in her career; she gets rescued by Buck Rogers

Gary Coleman: Different Strokes couldn’t keep this little guy away from the show. You have to remember Coleman was a big draw at the time, so having him on the show brought younger viewer.

Dennis Haysbert: When he wasn’t playing baseball in Major League or being the President, he played a recurring role on Buck Rogers. He showed up on the second season mostly in different positions.

Jerry Orbach: From L&O

Mark Lenard: Spock’s father had a guest shot on the show too.

And now a few more clips.

Buck Rogers does a Kirk fight scene: This one is really bad. Buck Rogers goes back to his place with two women and spends some time with them. He realizes they're not there for sex, but they're ordered to capture him. The fighting is bad, check out the bad FX too.

Buck Rogers' mind drifts into a montage: Man, this clip makes me wish the old Battlestar got another season, because this show is bad.

The TV show intro: This is different from the TV movie. I like the movie intro better.

Update: Becca has some promo pics from the show. Be careful, there are some pictures of Buck Rogers shirtless.

9 comments:

Mayren said...

isn't this the show that had the cool androgynous robot named Twiggy but sounded like Twinki?
The robot had a cute/annoying speech imediment?

Semaj said...

Yeah, that's the one. The voice of the robot was done by Mel Blanc for a season and a half. He was the man behind the Bugs Bunny and other loony toons voices.

Mayren said...

ya - i love Mel Blanc. making looney toones for Adults and X years later they become kids cartoons... loverly

Semaj said...

Here's a cool story about his role in Buck. After the end of the 1st season, Mel left over a dispute with the producers. they replaced him with another actor. The fans were so upset that had a writing campaign to get Mel back. He came back toward the end of the show's run.

Becca said...

I'm glad you are spreading the terrific horribleness of these Buck pictures. Join me in destroying the world's sanity through seeing Gil Gerrard's naked chest. Ewwwwwwwwww!

Semaj said...

Lol, Gil must've thought he was the shit back in the day.

You have to love that he mugged for the camera more than Shatner.

MC said...

I just found out something else really freaky. I was playing GTA:SA and I listen to Bounce FM all the time, and Odyssey by Johnny Harris came on... and I just had to know when it was recorded... and I discovered the following story:

"That track came from an episode of the television series I was scoring at the time, called “Buck Rogers in the 25th Century”. It was picked up by K.C. and the Sunshine Band’s record company. They saw the episode and they liked that piece. It was supposed to be a space type rock band. It really was quite stupid, I suppose (Laughter). It looked silly. Anyway, the director said, “We need some music for these people”, meaning the space type rock band. In the original scene, they were just messing around, supposed to be playing music. I had to score it so that the music sort of went along with their arm movements. Well anyway, I talked to KC and his partner and they asked for the 24-track master. The people at Universal were very nice about it, and they made a copy of it. The band added a few things like handclaps, a few shouts and another drum, in their own Miami studios. Then it was released as a 12-inch club record. It was a big hit in the Miami disco clubs and so on."

Semaj said...

That's freaking crazy. I'm guessing its in that dance number clip. so it's in GTA as well? nice

MC said...

Here is the music in another context.

 
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