My Three Sons

My Three Sons
My Three Sons opening titles.
Format	Sitcom
Starring	Fred MacMurray William Demarest Don Grady Stanley Livingston Barry Livingston Tim Considine William Frawley Meredith MacRae Tina Cole Beverly Garland Dawn Lyn Ronne Troup Daniel, Joseph, and Michael Todd
Country of origin	United States
No. of seasons	12
No. of episodes	380
Production
Running time	30 minutes
Production company(s)	Don Fedderson Productions (1960-1972) Gregg-Don, Inc. (1960-1965) MCA Television (1960-1965)
Broadcast
Original channel	ABC (1960–1965) CBS (1965–1972)
Original run	September 29, 1960 – August 24, 1972

My Three Sons is a situation comedy about a Scots/Irish-American family (Douglas/ O'Casey), that ran from September 29, 1960, to August 24, 1972. My Three Sons chronicles the life of an aeronautical engineer and widower Steve Douglas, played by Fred MacMurray, and his three sons. The series was a cornerstone of the CBS lineup in the 1960s. With 380 episodes produced, it is second only to The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet as television's longest running (live-action) family sitcom. Disney producer Bill Walsh often mused on whether the concept of the show was inspired by the movie The Shaggy Dog as in his view they shared “The same dog, the same kids and Fred [MacMurray]” ^[1]

History

ABC years

The show began on ABC in black-and-white. The first season, consisting of thirty-six episodes, is particularly remarkable for having been directed in its entirety by Peter Tewksbury, who also produced and occasionally scripted the programs. These early episodes held to no specific generic type, so that any episode from one week to the next might be comedic or dramatic or, in one or two cases, surprisingly innovative. An early highlight is the fourth episode, "Countdown," written by David Duncan, which chronicles the Douglas family's attempts to wake up, prepare for the day, have breakfast and get out of the house by a common, agreed-upon time, all carefully synchronized to a televised rocket launch countdown -- to comical and often ironic effect. Tewksbury's episodes are also unusual for their fearless use of cross-talk (a way of having the voices of off screen characters heard in the background of the soundtrack, just under the voices of the main characters), in depicting the chaotic Douglas household, a full decade before Robert Altman was credited with innovating such aural realism in feature films such as M*A*S*H* (1970). Tewksbury returned to directing feature films after concluding the season because the producers could not handle his perfectionist attitude which was costing thousands of dollars in lost time and reshoots.

The succeeding director Richard Whorf took over the reins for one season and was in turn followed by former actor-turned director Gene Reynolds from 1962 to 1964. James V. Kern, an experienced Hollywood television director who had previously helmed the 'Hollywood' and 'Europe' episodes of I Love Lucy continued in this role for two years until his untimely death in late 1966, aged 57. Director James Sheldon was also contracted to finish off episodes that had been partly completed by Kern in order to complete that season. Fred De Cordova was the show's longest and most consistent director of the series (108 episodes) until he left in 1971 to produce The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson. Earl Bellamy rounded out the series as director of the show's final year.

CBS years

My Three Sons moved to the CBS television network for the 1965–66 season after ABC would not commit to the expense of producing the program in color. Along with the change in networks and the transition to color, other changes happened during 1965: William Frawley played "Bub" O'Casey, the boys' maternal grandfather, until he was declared too ill to work by Desilu Studios and the producers could no longer find insurance for him. They took a gamble on Frawley for half a season, until a suitable replacement could be found. He was replaced by William Demarest who played his brother Charley. According to the storyline, Bub fell in love with Ireland while the gang visited the Emerald Isle the previous season and went back to help his Aunt Kate celebrate her 104th birthday. Shortly after Bub left, Charley dropped by unannounced to pay a visit and ended up staying on as housekeeper. According to Frawley's biography Meet the Mertzes, he was never pleased with being written out of the show. Frawley died a short while later in March 1966 at age 79.

Tim Considine, who had worked with MacMurray on The Shaggy Dog, played oldest son Mike and did not renew his contract after a falling-out with Executive Producer Don Fedderson over his wish to direct but not co-star in the series (he did direct one of the last black and white episodes). According to Considine, (Pat Sajak Show, August 1989), he was devoted to car racing, which his contract forbade. The character was written out with Meredith MacRae, who had played his fiancee and (in his last episode) new wife. (The "Mike Douglas Kiss-Off" is a reference to a character whose departure is explained - such as a marriage, or college - but whose name is never again referenced. For the last seven years of the series, Mike Douglas seemingly vanishes from existence, even while relatives marry, graduate, have children, et cetera).

To keep the show's title plausible, the show's head writer George Tibbles fashioned a three-part story arc where youngest brother Richard (better known as Chip - and played by Stanley Livingston) had an orphaned friend named Ernie Thompson (played by his real-life brother Barry Livingston) who was awaiting adoption because his foster parents were to be transferred to the Orient. When Steve offers to adopt Ernie, he faces antagonism from Uncle Charley who can foresee nothing but more work with another boy. Ultimately, Charley comes to the rescue when the adoption agency's criterion that there must be a woman in the home causes a stall in negotiations. (In the storyline, the judge determined that the intent of the law is to make sure a full-time caregiver would be present; with Uncle Charley meeting that role, he assents to a legal fiction declaring him "housemother" to the Douglases.)

While the three sons were always central to the storyline, several major changes and events happened by the late 1960s. In 1967, the family moved from the fictitious town of Bryant Park in the midwest to California, settling in Los Angeles. Robbie (Don Grady) married his classmate/girlfriend Katie Miller (Tina Cole). The following season the newlyweds discovered Katie was pregnant and she gave birth to triplets; three sons of course (named Robert, Steven and Charles). Although originally played by sets of uncredited twins, as babies the boys were portrayed uncredited by Guy, Gunnar and Garth Swanson. The most recognized and familiar triplets in the show's last two seasons were played by Michael, Daniel and Joseph Todd. Two years later, Steven re-married, taking widowed teacher Barbara Harper (Beverly Garland) as his wife; she had a 5-year-old daughter, Dorothy aka Dodie (Dawn Lyn), so Steven now had a stepdaughter. Also, the last 1 1/2 years of the series featured fewer appearances of both Don Grady and Stanley Livingston, Grady's character was written out of the show at the end of the eleventh season which allowed for his wife Katie and their triplet sons to remain within the Douglas household the following season (with Robbie supposedly working on a bridge construction in Peru), while Chip and his teen wife Polly (who eloped after Polly's strict father initially refused to accept the marriage) had moved into their own apartment. With a large cast of regulars, storylines were centered around different family members from episode to episode. At this point the program's narrative focus was that of blended families.

Cast

Main cast

• Fred MacMurray, Steven "Steve" Douglas
• Tim Considine, Michael "Mike" Douglas (1960–1965)
• Don Grady, Robert "Robbie" Douglas (1960–1971)
• Stanley Livingston, Richard "Chip" Douglas
• Barry Livingston, Ernest "Ernie" Thompson/Douglas (1963–1972)
• William Frawley, Michael Francis "Bub" O'Casey (1960–1965)
• Meredith MacRae, Sally Ann Morrison Douglas (1963–1965)
• William Demarest, Uncle Charley O'Casey, Bub's brother (1965–1972)
• Tina Cole, Katie Miller Douglas (1967–1972)
• Beverly Garland, Barbara Harper Douglas (1969–1972)
• Dawn Lyn, Dodie Harper Douglas (1969–1972)
• Ronne Troup, Polly Williams Douglas (1970–1972)
• Michael, Daniel and Joseph Todd, Robbie, Stevie and Charley Douglas (respectively, 1970–1972)

Recurring cast

• Cynthia Pepper (born 1940) played Jean Pearson, a girlfriend of Mike Douglas', in the initial season. The following year, she starred in her own 26-week series, Margie, which followed My Three Sons on the Thursday ABC schedule. The character Margie was a teenager in the Roaring Twenties.

• Peter Brooks, Hank Ferguson (1960-63)
• Cheryl Holdridge, Judy Doucette (1960-1964)
• Mimi Gibson, Carol (1966-1968)
• Lesley-Marie Colburn, Frieda (1964-1965)
• Marcia Mae Jones, Mary (1964-1968)
• Susan Gordon, Eloise (1962-1967)
• Marta Kristen, Linda Travis (1960-1964)
• Ricky Allen, Sudsy Pfeiffer (1961–1967)
• Hank Jones, Pete (1964–1966)
• John Howard, Dave Welch (1965–1967)

Musical connections

The series' cast had several music connections. MacMurray began his career as a saxophone player during the 1930s, and sometimes played it on the series, as well as clarinet. Actress Tina Cole (Katie) was born into the King Family, a popular 1950s-60s group. Ronne Troup (Polly) was the daughter of musician/composer Bobby Troup (Emergency!), who wrote the song "Route 66," and Dawn Lyn is the younger sister of popular 1970s idol Leif Garrett. Don Grady (Robbie) composed and produced music, having created successful Las Vegas venues for Phantom of the Opera star Michael Crawford, and pop star David Cassidy. Grady also played drums in the 60s pop group Yellow Balloon.

Production schedule

The series was initially filmed at Desilu Studios in Hollywood and at the start of the 1967-68 season, the cast and crew up-anchored and began filming the series at the CBS Studio Center in Studio City, California. The reasons behind this move were because actress-comedienne Lucille Ball had sold her studios to the Gulf & Western conglomerate, who owned Paramount Pictures and Don Fedderson Productions, who produced Sons (along with Family Affair starring Brian Keith) had to quickly make other arrangements for filming. The move also necessitated moves in the show's storyline as well.

Fred MacMurray was the only actor to appear in every episode of the series. Reportedly, MacMurray's contract stipulated that he work only 65 days per year. His scenes for each season were produced in two blocks of filming. He would report to the Desilu-Gower lot in late May and work thirty-five days (five days per week, weekends off), then take off for 10 weeks. He would then return to complete his remaining 30 days of shooting and was finished altogether around Thanksgiving. MacMurray's ten-week hiatus in the middle of each season's production schedule freed up the actor to follow other pursuits, while the filming of scenes with the other cast members continued. In short, all episodes were filmed out of sequence. This sometimes produced noticeable continuity problems onscreen, especially as the boys grew and changed styles. William Frawley, for one, never felt comfortable with this filming method, having grown accustomed to filming I Love Lucy in sequence.^{[citation needed]}

Distribution

My Three Sons was created by George Tibbles and produced by Don Fedderson Productions throughout the show's run, with MCA Television co-distributing the series during its 1960-65 ABC run. When the series moved to CBS in 1965, the latter network assumed full production responsibilies (in association with Fedderson Productions) until the end of the series in 1972. CBS now holds the series' copyright. CBS Paramount Television presently owns distribution rights to the entire series (including the more widely seen and aforementioned 1965-72 CBS episodes).

Nick at Nite aired My Three Sons from 1985-1991, the episode package they aired were the Seasons 1-5 & Season 12 package. The Seasons 6-11 episodes were aired on TV Land in the late 1990s.

In 2000, TV Land started airing the black & white episodes again, using the same syndication episode rights that were on Nick-at-Nite during the 1980s.

As of late 2004, Paramount/Viacom removed the color episodes for US-Domestic syndication. Currently, only 148 episodes are being distributing for syndication in the US-Domestic market.

In 2009, FamilyNet began airing the program as a lead-in for its Happy Days and Family Ties program block.

DVD releases

CBS DVD/Paramount Home Entertainment released My Three Sons: Season 1, Volume 1 on DVD in Region 1, with Season 1, Volume 2 following soon after.^[2] However, both releases have been reworked to eliminate licensed musical and sound assets. The Second Season: Volume One will be released on February 23, 2010. [1]

My Three Sons on the Nielsen Ratings

• Season 1 1960-1961= #13
• Season 2 1961-1962= #11
• Season 3 1962-1963= #Not in the Top 20
• Season 4 1963-1964= #Not in the Top 20
• Season 5 1964-1965= #13
• Season 6 1965-1966= #15
• Season 7 1966-1967= #Not in the Top 20
• Season 8 1967-1968= #Not in the Top 20
• Season 9 1968-1969= #14
• Season 10 1969-1970= #15
• Season 11 1970-1971= #19
• Season 12 1971-1972= #Not in the Top 20

References

External links

• My Three Sons at the Internet Movie Database
• My Three Sons at TV.com
• My Three Sons at the Museum of Broadcast Communications