Sept. 12, 1964 - Although “The Lieutenant” gave its final performance on NBC last week, the Marines will be back again on Sept. 25 when “Gomer Pyle” arrives on CBS. The comedy, dealing with a naive hillbilly who has difficulty on the first episode completing an obstacle course, will have an appropriate counterpart on ABC, which will offer, beginning Monday night, “No Time for Sergeants” (pictured), a series also dealing with a naive hillbilly — in the Air Force.
“Gomer never complains, he never has any grudges. In fact, his buddies can’t quite figure him out,” says producer Aaron Ruben. “Gomer was originally a goofy character — a gas station attendant on ‘The Andy Griffith Show.’ Now, he’s in the Marines learning how to be a man.”
“No Time for Sergeants” is based on the successful stage play and movie, which starred Andy Griffith as Will Stockdale, the folksy Southerner who went into the armed services willingly and treated sergeants and officers like friends.
As part of the endless trend of developing T.V. shows from movies, “Sergeants” is being produced by Warner Brothers, just as Twentieth Century Fox has prepared “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea” and “Twelve O’Clock High.”
Irwin Allen, who wrote, directed, and produced the film version of “Voyage” for Fox three years ago, says: “I didn’t sit down and think, ‘Let’s do a military show.’ Instead I thought, ‘Here’s a popular movie. Thousands of people paid to see it in theaters, now why shouldn’t it go on TV as a serial — why shouldn’t it be popular?”
Like “Combat,” ABC’s hour-long hold-over from last season, both “Voyage” and “Twelve O’Clock” are attempts to convey the problems of men involved in serious military or military-related assignments. The heroes of “Voyage,” an adventure into science fiction aboard an atomic submarine, are former Navy men who remain underwater on important missions. Tomorrow night, they will prevent the flooding of half of the earth.
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