Who played Maverick in the 1950 television series?

Answer 1

That depends on which Maverick you are asking about. There were several:

James Garner - known later for his "Rockford Files" series - started the series as Bret Maverick (a character later played by Mel Gibson in the 1994 movie "Maverick") When it was realized that production time was longer than the network would be happy with, the idea to add another Maverick came to be and so was hired:

Jack Kelly - known for his role in several films including the sci-fi classic "Forbidden Planet" - as Bret's equally skilled and charming brother Bart Maverick. For the first three seasons, Garner and Kelly alternated as leads weekly and on some episodes appeared together. Garner filed a lawsuit against Warner Brothers at the end of the third season (although one episode filmed for season 3 ended up being shown in season 4) which resulted in his leaving the show and being replaced by:

Roger Moore - known later for his series "The Saint" and of course as James Bond - as cousin Beau Maverick. Having 'shamed' the family by receiving a metal for heroism in the Civil War (totally by accident) Beau was sent to England for a few years where he picked up a 'slight' English accent. (No effort to cover Moore's natural accent was even attempted) But near the end of season 4, Moore also left the show due to his dislike of the scripts. That led to the next Maverick:

Robert Colbert - known later for his sci-fi series "The Time Tunnel" - as Brent Maverick, the youngest of the Maverick brothers. He was removed after only two episodes leaving Jack Kelly's Bart Maverick to be the only Maverick during the final season although re-runs of Garner episodes were added to fill out the time.

All totaled the number of episodes played by each actor were:

Jack Kelly - 75

James Garner - 52

Roger Moore - 15

Robert Colbert - 2

As a side bit of trivia, there were a three other Mavericks in the series.

Beauregard "Pappy" Maverick - the often mentioned father of Bret/Bart/Brent, played by Garner under heavy make-up in season 3

Bentley Maverick - brother of Pappy and assumed father of Moore's Cousin Beau, played by Kelly under heavy make-up in season 3

Micca Maverick - not seen, but another brother of Pappy's and the reason Bret and Bart inherate a stage line in season 4's "The Maverick Line" (filmed for season 3.)