Dusty's Trail

Dusty's Trail
Genre	Comedy/Western
Created by	Elroy Schwartz Sherwood Schwartz
Written by	John Fenton Murray Austin Kalish Irma Kalish Larry Rhine Al Schwartz Elroy Schwartz Sherwood Schwartz
Directed by	Jack Arnold Earl Bellamy Bruce Bilson Russ Mayberry Leslie H. Martinson Richard Michaels Oscar Rudolph
Starring	Bob Denver Forrest Tucker Ivor Francis Jeannine Riley Lori Saunders Lynn Wood William Cort
Theme music composer	Ross Schwartz Sherwood Schwartz
Composer(s)	Frank De Vol Jack Pleis
Country of origin	United States
Language(s)	English
No. of seasons	1
No. of episodes	26
Production
Executive producer(s)	Sherwood Schwartz
Producer(s)	Elroy Schwartz
Cinematography	Alan Stensvold
Camera setup	Single-camera
Running time	22–24 minutes
Production company(s)	Metromedia Producers Corporation Redwood Productions Writer First Productions
Distributor	20th Century Fox Television
Broadcast
Original channel	Syndication
Audio format	Monaural
Original run	September 11, 1973 (1973-09-11) – March 12, 1974 (1974-03-12)

Dusty's Trail is an American Western/comedy series that aired in syndication from September 1973 to March 1974. The series is set in the 19th century about a small group of travelers separated from their wagon train who become lost. Dusty's Trail stars Bob Denver as "Dusty" Boots, the assistant to the leader of a wagon train, and Forrest Tucker as Mr. Callahan, his irascible boss.

Summary

The series portrays passengers of a wagon and a stagecoach that have become separated from the main wagon train on its way to California in the 19th century. The people in this group are the wagonmaster (Mr. Callahan) and his shotgun lookout (Dusty), a wealthy Eastern banker and his wife (Mr. and Mrs. Brookhaven), a saloon-girl dancer (Lulu), a book-smarts man (Andy), and a farmer's daughter (Betsy). The show follows the adventures of these range rovers, while they attempt to find the main wagon train. According to the theme song, "... Dusty's the reason for their plight, thanks to Dusty- nothing's right".

Reception

The show was created for Denver by Sherwood Schwartz, who had previously created its progenitor, Gilligan's Island. According to U.S. television researchers Tim Brooks and Earle Marsh, the reason for the show's failure was that it was too derivative of Gilligan's Island. (The show had seven regular characters, each of whom corresponded directly to a Gilligan character.) Normally, retreading an old format should not mean an early demise of a series, unless the show being emulated is a rerun icon like Gilligan's Island. Despite its exceptionally short run, it has found new life in weekly reruns on the America One network. In 1976, four episodes of the series were tied together and released as The Wackiest Wagon Train in the West.

Denver professed on several occasions that Dusty's Trail was his favorite show to perform. "At that time I was just over the animus at how CBS threw us in the dumper (Gilligan's Island). Herb Edelman and I did Good Guys, but sour critics said it should have been just called 'Guys'. Gilligan repeats were on the tube more than Cronkite, and its royalties about kaput. I told myself to just enjoy the ride, and if it (Dusty's Trail) hit paydirt, super, if not, then it wasn't in the cards. It was my best year in front of a camera".

DVD release

On October 12, 2004, Brentwood Home Video released 17 episodes of the series on Region 1 DVD in the United States.

External links

• Dusty's Trail at the Internet Movie Database
• Dusty's Trail at TV.com
• Dusty's Trail at epguides.com