Unsolved Mysteries
| Unsolved Mysteries | |
|---|---|
| File:Unsolved Mysteries.gif Unsolved Mysteries Logo | |
| Starring | Robert Stack |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| No. of episodes | 553 [1] (plus 7 Specials) |
| Production | |
| Running time | 60 minutes |
| Original release | |
| Network | NBC |
| Release | January 20, 1987 – September 20, 2002 |
Unsolved Mysteries is an American TV show that was hosted and narrated by Robert Stack. It was regularly broadcast from 1987-1997 and sporadically broadcast from 1997 up until 2002.
Somewhat like a documentary, Unsolved Mysteries, as its title indicated, was devoted primarily to the reenactments of unresolved real-life crimes or paranormal phenomena.
Very popular during its early years on the air, Unsolved Mysteries is sometimes credited as one of the first television programs to endorse the documentation of real-life crime scene investigating, which resulted in a thriving genre represented by programs like CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.
Format
Unsolved Mysteries featured segments filmed in documentary style, with actors portraying the victims, perpetrators and witnesses. In most cases, however, victim's family members and police officials were also featured in interview segments that were interspersed throughout the dramatization. Before an episode begins, the following message was related to the audience: "This program is about unsolved mysteries. Whenever possible, the actual family members and police officials have participated in recreating the events. What you are about to see is not a news broadcast." Each episode of Unsolved Mysteries usually featured three or four segments, each involving a different story. Stack offered voice over narration for each segment, and appeared onscreen to begin and end segments, and to offer segues.
Viewers were invited to telephone, write a letter, or, in later episodes, use the internet to contact the program if they had information that might help solve a crime. The toll free number, 1-800-876-5353 (U.S.), and website (shown below) are still active today although the show is long out of production.
Unsolved Mysteries segments, all of which involved actual events, generally fell into one of four categories:
- criminal activity — accounts of abductions, suspicious deaths, murders, robberies and other miscellaneous unsolved cases, where either the suspects were unknown or could not be located. According to the show, about 40% of these episodes resulted in the capture of a suspect or suspects.
- lost loves — accounts of individuals trying to reunite with someone from their past; often involving adoptions or people separated by circumstances.
- unexplained history — "alternative" theories of history (among them the theories that outlaws such as Billy the Kid and Butch Cassidy did not die as history recorded it, that the Russian Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanov survived the 1918 regicide that killed her entire family, that the assassination of Louisiana senator Huey Long may have been an accident, and that the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr was in fact a conspiracy ).
- paranormal matters - accounts of miracles, alleged UFO/alien encounters (including examination of the Roswell UFO Incident and the Phoenix UFO Incident, or scientific questions about life on Mars) ghosts, Bigfoot, other inexplicable phenomena.
Viewers were given updates on success stories, where criminals were brought to justice and loved ones reunited.
The show also featured, in many of its later episodes, journalist Keely Shaye Smith and television host Lu Hanessian as correspondents in the show's telecenter, where they provided information on updated stories, and actress Virginia Madsen as Robert Stack's co-host.
The show is also famous for its eerie theme song, which makes striking use of a Phrygian mode.
Broadcast History
The show aired on NBC from 1987 – 1997. When it first appeared on television, Unsolved Mysteries was a smash hit. Part of this popularity might be credited to older viewers who recognized host Robert Stack as Eliot Ness from the popular 1960's television hit The Untouchables, and Stack's Unsolved Mysteries persona seemed to echo his portrayal of Ness: he was garbed in a trenchcoat and depicted wandering through foggy landscapes.
In 1992, NBC aired a short-lived spin-off series called Final Appeal.
By 1997, however, the show started to lose the popularity it once had, and from 1997 – 1999 it ran as The New Unsolved Mysteries on CBS. Despite the network switch, the ratings continued to fall. Unsolved Mysteries slowly faded, but in 2001, the program regained some popularity with a somewhat new audience, when it was revived on the Lifetime cable television network, where new episodes aired sporadically until 2002. Old episodes still runs in syndication on several television networks (notably Lifetime) in the U.S., Canada, and Australia; but as of August 14, 2006, Unsolved Mysteries is not being aired on Lifetime.
Some viewers blamed the decline of Unsolved Mysteries on the addition of co-hosts Keely Shaye Smith and Virginia Madsen, while others blamed the show's late-era "makeover", which involved the changes to theme song and putting its telephone center on camera. Ratings also declined when the program moved from its original Wednesday evening to Friday evening (which is less popular for television viewing. Also many point to the inception of Fox's America's Most Wanted series as being somewhat detrimental to the popularity of Unsolved Mysteries. See: Friday night death slot) beginning in the Fall 1994 season. Despite these changes, Unsolved Mysteries still remains a favorite amongst its audiences.
DVD
Six 4-disc DVD sets have been released, each with a different theme.
- UFOs (September 7, 2004)
- Ghosts (September 14, 2004)
- Miracles (October 26, 2004)
- Psychics (January 25, 2005)
- Bizarre Murders (January 25, 2005)
- Strange Legends (February 15, 2005)
The sets were rereleased on June 21, 2005 with a lower suggested retail price. On March 21, 2006, a compilation set called The Best of Unsolved Mysteries was released, which contained selected segments from each of the earlier DVD sets along with some new content. A special boxed set featuring the first six sets along with the new content from the Best of collection was also produced.
Trivia
- Early in his career, actor Matthew McConaughey appeared as a murder victim in an Unsolved Mysteries re-enactment; this segment is collected on the "Bizarre Murders" DVD set.
- Stack appeared as himself in the comedy film Baseketball, in a parody of his Unsolved Mysteries persona; he also appears in the dramatic film Mumford, where his role as Unsolved Mysteries host plays a small but important part in the plot.
- A parody of Unsolved Mysteries, called Mysterious Mysteries of Strange Mystery, appears in Invader Zim.
- During some shows, callers give tips to the "telecenter" even though no phone number is ever given on the program, only an address.