Atom Squad

Atom Squad
Genre	Science fiction
Written by	Paul Monash
Theme music composer	Miklós Rózsa
Opening theme	"Tumult and Commotion"
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	1
Production
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Running time	15 mins.
Original release
Network	NBC
Release	July 6, 1953 (1953-07-06) – January 22, 1954 (1954-01-22)

Atom Squad was an American science-fiction series that was broadcast live by the NBC network, July 6, 1953 to January 22, 1954, Monday-Friday, 5:00 to 5:15 PM EST.

Synopsis

The Atom Squad is a secret government agency which dealt with Cold War threats to US security involving radiation and nuclear weapons. The Atom Squad scientists, Steve Elliot and Dave Fielding, were played by Robert Courtleigh and Bob Hastings, their chief by Bram Nossem.

The Atom Squad's secret New York City headquarters lab looked very much like Captain Video's secret mountain headquarters control room. The program's opening sequence showed a man in a "radiation suit" lumbering very slowly toward the camera.

Production notes

Storylines were usually completed in five, or sometimes ten broadcasts. Paul Monash was the chief writer for the series and possibly its creator. The foes of the Atom Squad were usually mad scientists and evil Communist spies and saboteurs. However, the Squad ran into aliens from outer space in at least three different storylines.

Atom Squad originated from the studios of WPTZ in Philadelphia. The director was Joe Behar, and producers were Larry White and later Adrian Samish.

The theme music for the series was "Tumult and Commotion", an excerpt from Miklos Rozsa's orchestral work "Theme, Variations and Finale, Op. 13". The opening theme music (man in "radiation suit") was taken from original music by Serge Prokofieff for the Sergei Eisenstein film Alexander Nevsky.

Episode status

While Atom Squad kinescopes were probably made for West Coast rebroadcast, none are known to survive today. The series did not appear to have a sponsor and no tie-in toys or premiums are known to exist.

External links

• Atom Squad at IMDb
• Atom Squad Episode Guide
• Atom Squad on Space Hero Files