Naked City

Plot

"There are eight million stories in The Naked City...This has been one of them." These words were intoned by producer Mark Hellinger at the conclusion of The Naked City, a 1947 detective film lensed in its entirety in New York City (quite an innovation in those Hollywood-dominated years). The same words were heard as the coda in each episode of the TV series Naked City, which like its movie predecessor was entirely shot in the Big Apple. Technically, there were two TV series bearing the title Naked City. The first, which aired on ABC from September 30, 1958 through September 29, 1959, was a weekly, half-hour endeavor, starring John McIntire as veteran NYPD lieutenant John Muldoon and James Franciscus as his youthful partner, Detective Jim Halloran. While Muldoon spent virtually every hour of his day tracking down the various robbers, muggers and two-bit hoodlums in his jurisdiction, Halloran divided his time between his job and his home life with wife Janet (Suzanne Storrs). In a startling plot development, Muldoon was killed in a car chase on the episode originally telecast March 17, 1959, whereupon another seasoned veteran, Lt. Mike Parker (Horace McMahon) took over as Halloran's partner. Also seen during Naked City's initial run was Harry Bellaver as patrolman Frank Arcaro. After a year-long hiatus, Naked City returned to the ABC schedule on October 12, 1960, this time as an hour-long series with several new cast members. Horace McMahon was back as Lt. Parker, as was Harry Bellaver as Frank Arcaro, who in the interim had been promoted to sergeant. New to the series was Paul Burke in the "young partner" slot as Detective Adam Flint, while Nancy Malone was seen as Flint's loyal, ever-patient girlfriend, Libby. Both incarnations of Naked City were outfitted with bluesy, evocative theme songs, with George Duning composing the theme of the 1958 version and Billy May and Milton Raskin handling the 1960 theme. And both were overflowing with familiar faces in their supporting casts, with such actors as Sandy Dennis, Dustin Hoffman, and Jon Voight making their earliest filmed TV appearances. The hour-long version of Naked City ended its ABC run on September 11, 1963. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

Cast

• John P. McIntyre - Lt. John Muldoon
• Horace McMahon - Lt. Mike Parker
• James Franciscus - Detective Jim Halloran
• Paul Burke - Detective Adam Flint
• Harry Bellaver - Patrolman/Sgt. Frank Arcaro

Suzanne Storrs - Janet Halloran; Nancy Malone - Libby

Credit

Herbert B. Leonard - Executive Producer, Billy May - Composer (Music Score), George Duning - Composer (Music Score), Milton Raskin - Composer (Music Score), Stirling Silliphant - Show Creator

Episodes

Naked City: Season 01 (1958)
The location-filmed cop drama Naked City was seen in a half-hour format during its inaugural season, which originally ran on ABC from 1958 to 1959. John McIntire stars in the earliest episodes as wizened veteran NYPD lieutenant Dan Muldoon, the role played by Barry Fitzgerald in the 1948 film version of The Naked City. Muldoon has a young, eager partner, Detective Jim Halloran, played by James Franciscus. Sitting at home and worrying about her hubby's well-being is Jim's lovely wife Janet, played by Suzanne Storrs. Rounding out the regulars is Harry Bellaver as a hard-working patrolman, who, like Muldoon, knows every inch of his Manhattan Island jurisdiction -- and also knows virtually every hood, punk and plug-ugly within a 20-mile radius. When John McIntire decided to leave the series halfway through the season, he was written out of the action in a spectacularly violent fashion. In "The Bumper," the episode originally telecast March 17, 1959, Muldoon is killed in a flaming explosion when his car is forced off the road and smacks into an oil truck. The next episode, "The Running of Bulls," introduces Horace McMahon as Jim Halloran's new partner, another seasoned veteran named Lt. Mike Parker. A number of familiar character actors are seen during season one of Naked City, among them Jack Klugman, Robert Alda, Ross Martin, Frank Sutton, Mark Rydell, George Maharis, Lawrence Tierney, Michael Ansara, and a young Diane Ladd. Several of the scripts were written by Stirling Silliphant, who developed the series along with producer Herbert B. Leonard. Naked City was dropped at the end of its inaugural season -- not because of poor ratings, but because the producers wanted to expand it into an hour-long format, and there was no room on the fall 1959 ABC schedule for such a expansion. It would be another year before the 60-minute Naked City finally burst onto the scene. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

• Meridian
• The Other Face of Goodness
• Lady Bug, Lady Bug
• Susquehanna 4-7598
• And a Merry Christmas to the Force on Patrol
• The Explosive Heart
• Nickel Ride
• Line of Duty
• Sidewalk Fisherman
• The Violent Circle
• Stakeout
• No More Rumbles
• Belvedere Tower
• The Bird Guard
• The Manhole
• Even Crows Sing Good
• Burst of Passion
• Goodbye, My Lady Love
• The Shield
• One to Get Lost
• Hey, Teach!
• Ticker Tape
• Fire Island
• Ten Cent Dreams
• The Bumper
• A Running of Bulls
• Fallen Star
• Beyond Truth
• Baker's Dozen
• The Rebirth
• Four Sweet Corners
• The Sandman
• Turn of Events
• A Little Piece of the Action
• The Bloodhounds
• The Scorpion Sting
• Saw My Baby There
• The Canvas Bullet
• A Wood of Thorns

Naked City: Season 02 (1960)
Off the air since its cancellation in the fall of 1959, the location-filmed cop drama Naked City returned to ABC's prime-time schedule on October 12, 1960. Originally a half-hour weekly, the series had been expanded to a full hour, and was seen on Wednesdays opposite a dramatic anthology on CBS and an antiseptic sitcom on NBC. Carried over from the half-hour version are Horace McMahon as veteran New York City cop Lt. Mike Parker, and Harry Bellaver as Frank Arcaro, who during the series' year-long hiatus had been promoted from patrolman to sergeant. New to the cast is Paul Burke as Parker's young partner Detective Adam Flint, and Nancy Malone as Flint's girlfriend Libby. Also new is the series' theme song "Somewhere in the Night," written by Billy May and Milton Raskin. Still filmed in its entirety in New York City, and as often as possible on authentic locations rather than inside studio walls, the new Naked City features a number of well-known actors in the supporting casts, among them Eli Wallach, Suzanne Pleshette, Leslie Nielsen, Claude Rains, Telly Savalas, Jack Lord, Dick York, Bruce Dern, Keir Dullea, Robert Duvall, Dennis Hopper, Roddy McDowall, Ed Asner, Peter Falk, Hume Cronyn, a good-looking youngster named Robert Redford, and, in his first major TV appearance, Dustin Hoffman (in the episode "Sweet Prince of Delaney Street)." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

• A Death of Princes
• The Pedigree Sheet
• A Succession of Heartbeats
• Down the Long Night
• To Walk in Silence
• Killer with a Kiss
• Debt of Honor
• The Human Trap
• The Man Who Bit a Diamond in Half
• Bullets Cost Too Much
• Murder Is a Face I Know
• Landscape with Dead Figures
• A Hole in the City
• The Well-Dressed Termite
• The Day It Rained Mink
• Button in the Haystack
• Shoes for Vinnie Winford
• The Deadly Guinea Pig
• Vengeance Is a Wheel
• The Fault in Our Stars
• Tombstone for a Derelict
• A Memory of Crying
• New York to L.A.
• A Very Cautious Boy
• Economy of Death
• C3H5(NO3)3
• Make-Believe Man
• To Dream Without Sleep
• A Kettle of Precious Fish
• Sweet Prince of Delancey Street
• The Day the Island Almost Sank
• Take and Put

Naked City: Season 03 (1961)
Scoring a significant success in its new hour-long format, the gritty cop drama Naked City entered its third season on ABC. Though the narrator still insists at the end of each episode that "there are eight million stories in the naked city," the season's quota of episodes is limited to 32 -- more than enough to show off stars Horace McMahon (as Lt. Mike Parker), Paul Burke (as Detective Adam Flint), and Harry Bellaver (as Sgt. Frank Arcaro) to their best advantage. As in previous seasons, the series is lensed in its entirety in New York City, taking full advantage not only of that city's talent pool but also the cream of the Hollywood crop. Among the well-known actors showing up in guest roles during Naked City's second season are Lee J. Cobb, Nina Foch, David Janssen, Jack Klugman, Glynis Johns, Mickey Rooney, William Shatner, Peter Fonda, Martin Sheen, Rip Torn, Tuesday Weld, Robert Duvall, George C. Scott, James Coburn, and Carroll O'Connor. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

• Take Off Your Hat When a Funeral Passes
• Requiem for a Sunday Afternoon
• Ooftus Goofus
• Bridge Party
• Dead on the Field of Honor
• The Corpse Ran Down Mulberry Street
• The Fingers of Henri Tourelle
• A Wednesday Night Story
• The Tragic Success of Alfred Tiloff
• Which Is Joseph Creeley?
• Show Me the Way to Go Home
• The Hot Minerva
• The Face of the Enemy
• Portrait of a Painter
• The Night the Saints Lost Their Halos
• The Contract
• One of the Most Important Men in the Whole World
• A Case Study of Two Savages
• Let Me Die Before I Wake
• To Walk Like a Lion
• Today the Man Who Kills Ants Is Coming
• A Run for the Money
• The One Marked Hot Gives Cold
• Without Stick or Sword
• Lament for a Dead Indian
• The Sweet Smiling Face of Truth
• ...And If Any Are Frozen, Warm Them...
• Strike a Statue
• The Multiplicity of Herbert Konish
• The King of Venus Will Take Care of You
• The Rydecker Case
• Memory of a Red Trolley Car
• Goodbye Mama, Hello Auntie Maud

Naked City: Season 04 (1962)
Back on the job during the fourth and final season of the gritty New York-filmed cop drama Naked City are series regulars Horace McMahon as Lt. Mike Parker, Paul Burke as Detective Adam Flint, Harry Bellaver as Sgt. Frank Arcaro, and, from time to time, Nancy Malone as Adam's girlfriend, Libby. Of course, the location-filmed episodes are fully stocked with familiar supporting actors: this year's crop includes Diahann Carroll (who earned an Emmy nomination for her performance), Burgess Meredith, Aldo Ray, Robert Duvall, Ed Begley, Jack Klugman, Carroll O'Connor, Jean Stapleton, Walter Matthau, George Segal, Piper Laurie, Steven Hill, and in their first major TV roles, Sandy Dennis and Alex Cord, the latter billed under his real name, Alex Viespi. More so than any other dramatic series of the period, Naked City capitalized on a then-popular trend, that of bestowing long, lyrical and somewhat pretentious titles on its individual episodes. Prime examples during the series' terminal season include "Idylls of a Running Back," "Kill Me While I'm Young So I Can Die Happy," "Torment Him Much and Hold Him Long," "Robin Hood and Clarence Darrow, They Went Out With Bow and Arrow," "Beyond This Place There Be Dragons," and the delectable "No Naked Ladies in Front of Giovanni's House!." ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

• Hold for Gloria Christmas
• A Horse Has a Big Head - Let HIM Worry
• Dust Devil on a Quiet Street
• The Virtues of Madame Douvay
• King Stanislaus and the Knights of the Round Table
• Spectre of the Rose Street Gang
• Don't Knock It 'Til You've Tried It
• Her Life in Moving Pictures
• Idylls of a Running Back
• Daughter, Am I in My Father's House?
• And By the Sweat of Thy Brow...
• Kill Me While I'm Young So I Can Die Happy
• Five Cranks for Winter, Ten Cranks for Spring
• Go Fight City Hall
• Torment Him Much and Hold Him Long
• Make It Fifty Dollars and Add Love to Nona
• Robin Hood and Clarence Darrow, They Went Out with Bow and Arrow
• The Apple Falls Not Far From the Tree
• Beyond This Place There Be Dragons
• Man Without a Skin
• Prime of Life
• Bringing Far Places Together
• The Highest of Prizes
• Alive and Still a Second Liutenant
• Stop the Parade! A Baby Is Crying!
• On the Battlefront Every Minute Is Important
• Howard Running Bear Is a Turtle
• No Naked Ladies in Front of Giovanni's House
• Carrier
• Color Schemes Like Never Before
• The S.S. American Dream
• One, Two, Three, Rita Rakahowski
• Golden Lads and Girls
• Barefoot on a Bed of Coals