Dirty Sally is a short-lived comedy-drama

Comedy-drama

Comedy-drama is a genre of theatre, film and television programs which combines humorous and serious content.-Theatre:Traditional western theatre, beginning with the ancient Greeks, was divided into comedy and tragedy...

 Western

Western (genre)

The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...

 series which ran on CBS

CBS

CBS Broadcasting Inc. is a major US commercial broadcasting television network, which started as a radio network. The name is derived from the initials of the network's former name, Columbia Broadcasting System. The network is sometimes referred to as the "Eye Network" in reference to the shape of...

 from January 11 until April 5, 1974. The program was a spin-off

Spin-off (media)

In media, a spin-off is a radio program, television program, video game, or any narrative work, derived from one or more already existing works, that focuses, in particular, in more detail on one aspect of that original work...

 of a two-part 1971 episode of Gunsmoke

Gunsmoke

Gunsmoke is an American radio and television Western drama series created by director Norman MacDonnell and writer John Meston. The stories take place in and around Dodge City, Kansas, during the settlement of the American West....

in which Sally nursed a young gunfighter back to health.

Synopsis

The series starred Jeanette Nolan

Jeanette Nolan

Jeanette Nolan was an American radio, film and television actress. Nolan was nominated for four Emmy Awards.-Early life:...

 as Sally Fergus, a cantankerous, tobacco

Tobacco

Tobacco is an agricultural product processed from the leaves of plants in the genus Nicotiana. It can be consumed, used as a pesticide and, in the form of nicotine tartrate, used in some medicines...

-chewing, rough-talking, and hard-drinking 62-year-old on her way west to pan for gold

Placer mining

Placer mining is the mining of alluvial deposits for minerals. This may be done by open-pit or by various surface excavating equipment or tunneling equipment....

. Dack Rambo

Dack Rambo

Norman Jay Rambeau , professionally known as Dack Rambo, was an American actor, most notable for appearing as Walter Brennan's grandson Jeff in the ABC series The Guns of Will Sonnett, as Steve Jacobi in All My Children, as cousin Jack Ewing on CBS's Dallas, and as Grant Harrison on the NBC soap...

 co-starred as Cyrus Pike, the young man who accompanies Sally to California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

. He was fleeing partners in crime. The plot centers on the two being detained in their trip west because of Sally’s frequent meddling into the lives of people that they encounter on the trail.

In the series, the two head for California, as Nolan begins to view Rambo as the son that she never had. Sally is something of a western junk collector loathed by many townspeople but liked by the main characters of Gunsmoke, who view her as the last frontierswoman.

Dirty Sally aired at 8:30 p.m. Eastern time on Fridays opposite ABC

American Broadcasting Company

The American Broadcasting Company is an American commercial broadcasting television network. Created in 1943 from the former NBC Blue radio network, ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Company and is part of Disney-ABC Television Group. Its first broadcast on television was in 1948...

’s The Odd Couple

The Odd Couple

The Odd Couple is a 1965 Broadway play by Neil Simon, followed by a successful film and television series, as well as other derivative works and spin offs, many featuring one or more of the same actors. The plot concerns two mismatched roommates, one neat and uptight, the other more easygoing and...

. It preceded The CBS Friday Night Movies, and followed the equally short-lived military

Military

A military is an organization authorized by its greater society to use lethal force, usually including use of weapons, in defending its country by combating actual or perceived threats. The military may have additional functions of use to its greater society, such as advancing a political agenda e.g...

 comedy Roll Out

Roll Out

Roll Out is an American sitcom that aired Friday evenings on CBS during the 1973-1974 television season. Starring nightclub comedian Stu Gilliam and Hilly Hicks, and featuring Ed Begley, Jr...

, which occupied that time slot for the first twelve weeks of the 1973-1974 season. Planet of the Apes

Planet of the Apes (TV series)

Planet of the Apes was a short-lived American science fiction television series that aired on Friday evenings at 8:00 PM Eastern/7:00 PM Central on CBS in 1974. The series starred Roddy McDowall, Ron Harper, and James Naughton, Mark Lenard and Booth Colman...

moved into that same time in the 1974-1975 season. Dirty Sally was quickly cancelled, though Nolan was nominated for a Best Lead Actress in a Drama Series Primetime Emmy Award

Primetime Emmy Award

The Primetime Emmy Awards are awards presented by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences in recognition of excellence in American primetime television programming...

. The series continued in repeats until August 9.

Production notes

Guest stars on Dirty Sally included Scott Brady

Scott Brady

Scott Brady was an American film and television actor.Born as Gerard Kenneth Tierney, he was the younger brother of fellow actor Lawrence Tierney. Brady served in the Navy during World War II, where he was a boxing champ...

, Gene Evans

Gene Evans

Gene Evans was an American actor.He was born in Holbrook, Arizona, but reared in Colton, California. His acting career began while he was serving in World War II. He performed with a theatrical troupe of GIs in Europe. Evans made his film debut in 1947 and appeared in dozens of movies and...

, Jackie Coogan

Jackie Coogan

John Leslie Coogan , known professionally as Jackie Coogan, was an American actor who began his movie career as a child actor in silent films. Many years later, he became known as Uncle Fester on 1960s sitcom The Addams Family...

, Maudie Prickett

Maudie Prickett

Maudie Prickett was an American film and television character actress.Born in Portland, Oregon, Prickett often portrayed maids, busybodies, spinsters, and nosy neighbors...

, Robert Totten

Robert Totten

Robert C. Totten was an American television director, writer, and actor, best known for his work on the CBS series Gunsmoke. He directed twenty-seven Gunsmoke episodes between 1966 and 1971 and guest starred in eight episodes between 1967 and 1973...

, Vincent Van Patten

Vincent Van Patten

Vincent Van Patten is an American actor and former tour professional tennis player.-Personal life:Van Patten was born in Bellerose, New York. He is the youngest son of actor Dick Van Patten and his wife, Pat, née Poole, a former June Taylor dancer. He is of Dutch and Italian descent...

, and John McIntire

John McIntire

John McIntire was an American character actor.-Career:The craggy-faced film actor was born in Spokane in eastern Washington State but reared in Montana, growing up around ranchers and cowboys, an experience that would later inspire his performances in dozens of westerns.A graduate of USC, McIntire...

, Nolan’s husband.

John Mantley

John Mantley

John Truman Mantley was a Canadian theatrical actor, writer, director, screenwriter and producer of the long-running television series, Gunsmoke, and was Mary Pickford's cousin.-Family:Mantley had a sister, eleven years older than himself, who taught dancing well into her eighties...

 was the executive producer; Leonard Katzman, the producer and writer. Actor Denver Pyle

Denver Pyle

Denver Dell Pyle was an American film and television actor. He is best remembered for playing Uncle Jesse in The Dukes of Hazzard .-Early life:...

 was one of the directors, along with Irving J. Moore, Philip Leacock

Philip Leacock

Philip David Charles Leacock was an English television and film director and producer. His brother was documentary filmmaker Richard Leacock.-Career:...

, and Vincent McEveety

Vincent McEveety

Vincent Michael McEveety is an American director and producer.- Career :TelevisionVince McEveety has directed numerous Emmy Award winning television series, including The Untouchables, Gunsmoke, six Star Trek , Magnum, P.I., How the...

. Pyle also did some of the writing and was a guest star. The series was produced by the CBS Television Network.