165 Alias Smith and Jones

First  watched : Uncertain

This  one  first  moved  over  from  BBC2  to  BBC1   at  the  end  of  April  1974  but  I  might  have  caught  it  earlier.  I  do  remember  that  long  before  I  actually  saw  an  episode  of  this  I  was  familiar  with  Ben  Murphy    who  was  never  out  of  the  teen  magazines  my  sister  and  I  were  buying  from  1973  onwards.

There  was  a  not  exactly  good  reason  why  co-star  Pete  Duel  wasn't  featuring. He  had  committed  suicide   ( probably  my  first  introduction  to  the  concept  ) on  New  Year's  Eve  1971. Inevitably  there's  been  silly  speculation  around  it  but  the  facts  seem  pretty  clear. He was  a  pretty  moody  guy  with  a  long  standing  alcohol  problem, couldn't  enjoy  himself  on  set  ( he  and  Murphy  didn't  speak  off  camera )  and  was  getting  depressed  over  the  show's  falling  ratings. After  a  couple  of  drinks  that  evening  he  went  into  his  living  room  and  shot  himself.

The  show  was  based  on  Butch  Cassidy  and  the  Sundance  Kid   ( Murphy  was  cast  for  his  resemblane  to  Paul  Newman  ) with   Smith  and  Jones  the  aliases  of  Hannibal  Heyes  ( Duel ) and  Kid  Curry   ( Murphy )  who  were  outlaws  on  the  run  but  really  just  trying  to  stay  out  of  trouble  until  it  became  politically  possible  for  them  to  be  pardoned. The  drama  came  from  their  interaction  with  the  guest  stars  in  which  ever  town  they  visited - a  formula  also  used  in  The  Incredible  Hulk  and  The  A-Team  to  name  but  two.

Duel's  death  has  cast  a  long  shadow  over  the  series  and  you  rarely  hear  anyone  mention  it  these  days  ( although  it  was  re-run  as  recently  as  1997 ) . Astoundingly,  Universal  contacted  the series ' narrator  Roger  Davis  the  same  day  instructing  him  to  take  over  the  role  and  they  were  re-shooting  scenes  with  the  rest  of  the  cast  before  h'd  even  been  buried.  It  was  more  bad  publicity  for  an  already  struggling  series  and  poor  Davis  had  no  chance. The  show  was  cancelled  at  the  beginning  of  1973.

Murphy  re-surfaced  in  the  short-lived  Gemini  Man    in  1976  and  has  continued  working   down  to  the  present  day  in  TV  but  has  never  recaptured  the  high  profile  he  had  with  this.