1960's Science-Fiction

There is an interesting chain of events that led to science-fiction on television in the 1960's. The first is the christening of the USS Nautilus, the US Navy's first nuclear submarine, in 1954. The second would be the launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik in 1957. In 1958, Explorer I detected the Van Allen Radiation Belts. Sputnik, of course, led to President John F. Kennedy's statement in 1962 "We choose to go to the Moon in this decade..." Irwin Allen co-wrote and produced a movie, 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea' about a nuclear submarine and the Van Allen belts in 1961 (how does a submarine deal with the Van Allen belts? Watch the movie and find out--I'm not in the habit of publishing spoilers). Gene Roddenberry started shopping around a story for a TV series in the early 60's that was supposed to be a kind of a Horatio Hornblower in space. NBC paid for a pilot episode of Roddenberry's series in 1964. Also in 1964, either Irwin Allen talked ABC into, or ABC talked Irwin Allen into (I haven't been able to find out which, but I suspect ABC did the talking) doing a TV series based on his 1961 movie. NBC was not impressed with Roddenberry's pilot (it didn't help that it ran over budget--meanwhile, Irwin Allen had saved most of the props from the movie, {including the model of the submarine, and even some of the sets} making his TV series relatively inexpensive). CBS still commanded the bast ratings, overall, and was, therefore, the network to compete with. Roddenberry took his idea to both CBS and ABC as well, but they weren't any more impressed that NBC was. 'Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea' became a very successful TV series, however. So, CBS started talking to both Irwin Allen and Gene Roddenberry about doing a science-fiction TV series. They eventually decided that they liked Irwin Allen's 'space family Robinson' idea better (possibly because Irwin Allen was better known and more successful). So, in 1965, 'Lost in Space' premiered. Now that CBS has a space-based science-fiction series, NBC wants one, too, so they commissioned a second 'Star Trek' pilot from Roddenberry. Most of the original cast was unavailable for the second pilot, but Roddenberry did some heavy rewrites and character changes, and his show deuted in 1966. Meanwhile, if CBS is going to have an Irwin Allen science fiction series, based on the success of ABC's Irwin Allen series, then ABC wants another Irwin Allen science-fiction series. So, 'The Time Tunnel' also premiered in 1966. ABC also rolled out 'Batman' and 'The Green Hornet' in 1966 (although Batman premiered in January, making it part of the 1965-1966 season), both of which at least share some elements of the science-fiction genre. ABC scheduled 'Batman' opposite 'Lost in Space,' which turned out to be a wise decision. CBS, not liking the fact that 'Batman' was getting better ratings than 'Lost in Space,' started leaning on Irwin Allen to make 'Lost in Space' more like 'Batman' (which, IMHO, was not a wise decision). The really interesting part about all of this was that Lee Merriwether, who was one of the regulars on 'The Time Tunnel,' also played Catwoman in the Batman movie, and went on to a recurring role in the series, not as Catwoman, but as one of King Tut's cronies. Grace Lee Whitney, who played the captain's personal yeoman, Janice Rand, on 'Star Trek' also played on of King Tut's cronies in the same episodes of 'Batman' (Ironically, Lee Meriwether later made a guest appearance on Star trek, but one that Grace Lee Whitney was not in). Personally, I find it interesting that two actresses from science-fiction series on two different networks appeared together on the TV show that was killing the other network's science-fiction TV series...