One Step Beyond (TV series)
Encyclopedia
One Step Beyond is an American
television series created by Merwin Gerard. The original series ran for three seasons on ABC
from 1959
to 1961
and remains syndicated
to this day. Because the copyright has lapsed on at least some of the episodes", several distribution companies have released episode packages using 16mm syndication prints rather than the 35mm originals, resulting in uneven audio and video.
John Kenneth Muir
's book An Analytical Guide to Television's One Step Beyond, 1959–1961 presents the history of this TV series including a synopsis and analysis of the episodes.
, the program was hosted by John Newland
, "your guide to the supernatural
" (also credited as "Our guide into the world of the unknown"). Newland presented tales that explored paranormal events and various situations that defied "logical" explanation. Unlike other anthology programmers, the ABC network series episodes were presented in the form of straightforward thirty-minute docudrama
s, all said to be based on true events. Initially, the program included the corporate name of sponsor Alcoa
as part of its full title.
One Step Beyond filled the time slot at 10 p.m. Tuesday vacated by the crime/police reality show, Confession
.
("The Long Call"); the existence of ghosts ("The Last Time"); and wildly improbable coincidence ("The Glider", "Death on the Mountain", etc.).
, Charles Bronson
, Yvette Mimieux
, Warren Beatty
, Christopher Lee
, Beverly Washburn
, Robert Blake
, Cloris Leachman
, Mike Connors
and Pernell Roberts
. A total of ninety-six episodes were filmed.
Then, for its re-release to television on the Sci-Fi Channel
in the 1990s, the opening and end titles were brought up to date with new theme music and graphics designed for the time, as if the show had continued into the 1990s.
Despite the public domain status on most episodes, the series is now copyrighted by Worldvision Enterprises (the successor to the original distributor, ABC Films), the series' syndicated distributor that is known today as CBS Television Distribution
.
("Music from 'One Step Beyond'") released by Decca Records
in 1959. The most well known tracks of the series were Weird (originally composed by Lubin for the score of an April 1955 Loretta Young Show episode, "Feeling No Pain"), usually played when the supernatural aspect of the episode was being discussed and Fear that became the musical theme of the series.
The Ventures
included a cover version of the show's main theme Fear on their highly acclaimed 1964 Dolton Records
release The Ventures in Space
. It was also covered by the Finnish surf-revival band Laika & the Cosmonauts
on their compilation album [ Gravity.] The second season of The Outer Limits
used a variation of Fear for the end titles.
The avant-garde metal band Fantômas
' song of the same name from the album The Director's Cut
was inspired by the show's opening theme.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
television series created by Merwin Gerard. The original series ran for three seasons on 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...
from 1959
1959 in television
The year 1959 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1959:For the American TV schedule, see: 1959-60 American network television schedule.-Events:...
to 1961
1961 in television
The year 1961 in television involved some significant events.Below is a list of television-related events in 1961.For the American TV schedule, see: 1961-62 American network television schedule.-Events:...
and remains syndicated
Television syndication
In broadcasting, syndication is the sale of the right to broadcast radio shows and television shows by multiple radio stations and television stations, without going through a broadcast network, though the process of syndication may conjure up structures like those of a network itself, by its very...
to this day. Because the copyright has lapsed on at least some of the episodes", several distribution companies have released episode packages using 16mm syndication prints rather than the 35mm originals, resulting in uneven audio and video.
John Kenneth Muir
John Kenneth Muir
John Kenneth Muir is an American literary critic. He has written twenty-one reference books in the fields of film and television, with a particular accent on the horror and science fiction genres....
's book An Analytical Guide to Television's One Step Beyond, 1959–1961 presents the history of this TV series including a synopsis and analysis of the episodes.
History
Created by Merwin Gerard and produced by the prolific producer Collier YoungCollier Young
Film producer and writer Collier Young worked on many films in the 1950s before becoming a television producer for such shows as NBC's Ironside and CBS's The Wild, Wild West as well as the supernatural series One Step Beyond .Young was married to actress and director Ida Lupino from 1948 to 1951,...
, the program was hosted by John Newland
John Newland
John Newland was an American director, actor, television producer, and screenwriter.-Early life and career:...
, "your guide to the supernatural
Supernatural
The supernatural or is that which is not subject to the laws of nature, or more figuratively, that which is said to exist above and beyond nature...
" (also credited as "Our guide into the world of the unknown"). Newland presented tales that explored paranormal events and various situations that defied "logical" explanation. Unlike other anthology programmers, the ABC network series episodes were presented in the form of straightforward thirty-minute docudrama
Docudrama
In film, television programming and staged theatre, docudrama is a documentary-style genre that features dramatized re-enactments of actual historical events. As a neologism, the term is often confused with docufiction....
s, all said to be based on true events. Initially, the program included the corporate name of sponsor Alcoa
Alcoa
Alcoa Inc. is the world's third largest producer of aluminum, behind Rio Tinto Alcan and Rusal. From its operational headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Alcoa conducts operations in 31 countries...
as part of its full title.
One Step Beyond filled the time slot at 10 p.m. Tuesday vacated by the crime/police reality show, Confession
Confession (TV series)
Confession is a short-lived ABC crime/police reality show which aired from June 19, 1958, to January 13, 1959, with interviewer Jack Wyatt questioning criminals from assorted backgrounds. The program was carried by videotape from WFAA-TV, the network affiliate in Dallas, Texas, the first station to...
.
Topics
Among its varied tales, One Step Beyond dealt with premonition of death ("The Lincoln Assassination") and disaster ("Tidal Wave", "Night of April 14th"); astral projectionAstral projection
Astral projection is an interpretation of out-of-body experience that assumes the existence of an "astral body" separate from the physical body and capable of traveling outside it...
("The Long Call"); the existence of ghosts ("The Last Time"); and wildly improbable coincidence ("The Glider", "Death on the Mountain", etc.).
Appearing actors
Many not-yet famous actors appeared in these productions, including Elizabeth MontgomeryElizabeth Montgomery
Elizabeth Victoria Montgomery was an American film and television actress whose career spanned five decades. She is perhaps best remembered for her roles as Samantha Stephens in Bewitched, as Ellen Harrod in A Case of Rape and as Lizzie Borden in The Legend of Lizzie Borden.-Early life:Born in Los...
, Charles Bronson
Charles Bronson
Charles Bronson , born Charles Dennis Buchinsky was an American actor, best-known for such films as Once Upon a Time in the West, The Magnificent Seven, The Dirty Dozen, The Great Escape, Rider on the Rain, The Mechanic, and the popular Death Wish series...
, Yvette Mimieux
Yvette Mimieux
Yvette Carmen Mimieux is a retired American movie and television actress.-Early life and career:Yvette Mimieux was born in Los Angeles, California, to a French father and Mexican mother, Carmen Montemayor...
, Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty
Warren Beatty born March 30, 1937) is an American actor, producer, screenwriter and director. He has received a total of fourteen Academy Award nominations, winning one for Best Director in 1982. He has also won four Golden Globe Awards including the Cecil B. DeMille Award.-Early life and...
, Christopher Lee
Christopher Lee
Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee, CBE, CStJ is an English actor and musician. Lee initially portrayed villains and became famous for his role as Count Dracula in a string of Hammer Horror films...
, Beverly Washburn
Beverly Washburn
Beverly Washburn is an American actress who appeared as a young girl in NBC's The Loretta Young Show and as an older teenager in Loretta Young's 1962-1963 CBS family drama, The New Loretta Young Show...
, Robert Blake
Robert Blake (actor)
Robert Blake is an American actor who starred in the film In Cold Blood and the U.S. television series Baretta. In 2005, he was tried and acquitted for the 2001 murder of his wife, but on November 18, 2005, Blake was found liable in a California civil court for her wrongful death.-Early...
, Cloris Leachman
Cloris Leachman
Cloris Leachman is an American actress of stage, film and television. She has won eight Primetime Emmy Awards—more than any other performer—and one Daytime Emmy Award...
, Mike Connors
Mike Connors
Mike Connors is an American actor best known for playing detective Joe Mannix in the CBS television series, Mannix. Before that, he had played a crime-fighting investigator, wielding a .38 handgun hidden in his back, in another CBS series, Tightrope.-Early life:Connors was born Krekor Ohanian in...
and Pernell Roberts
Pernell Roberts
Pernell Elvin Roberts, Jr. was an American stage, movie and television actor, as well as a singer. In addition to guest starring in over 60 television series, he was widely known for his roles as Ben Cartwright's eldest son, Adam Cartwright, on the western series Bonanza, a role he played from...
. A total of ninety-six episodes were filmed.
Reruns
Following its first run cancellation in 1961, the series continued to be shown throughout the United States in syndication until the early 1980s. It was then re-made by Gerard and Young, this time for first-run syndication in 1978, as The Next Step Beyond, once again hosted by Newland (who also directed most of the episodes). It ran for one season.Then, for its re-release to television on the Sci-Fi Channel
Syfy
Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a...
in the 1990s, the opening and end titles were brought up to date with new theme music and graphics designed for the time, as if the show had continued into the 1990s.
Despite the public domain status on most episodes, the series is now copyrighted by Worldvision Enterprises (the successor to the original distributor, ABC Films), the series' syndicated distributor that is known today as CBS Television Distribution
CBS Television Distribution
CBS Television Distribution is a global television distribution company, formed from the merger of CBS Corporation's two domestic television distribution arms CBS Paramount Domestic Television and King World Productions, including its home entertainment arm CBS Home Entertainment...
.
Music
Harry Lubin composed the music for the series with a soundtrack albumSoundtrack album
A soundtrack album is any album that incorporates music directly recorded from the soundtrack of a particular feature film or television program. In some cases, not all the tracks from the movie are included in the album; however there are rare cases of songs in the trailers that do not appear in...
("Music from 'One Step Beyond'") released by Decca Records
Decca Records
Decca Records began as a British record label established in 1929 by Edward Lewis. Its U.S. label was established in late 1934; however, owing to World War II, the link with the British company was broken for several decades....
in 1959. The most well known tracks of the series were Weird (originally composed by Lubin for the score of an April 1955 Loretta Young Show episode, "Feeling No Pain"), usually played when the supernatural aspect of the episode was being discussed and Fear that became the musical theme of the series.
The Ventures
The Ventures
The Ventures is an American instrumental rock band formed in 1958 in Tacoma, Washington. Founded by Don Wilson and Bob Bogle, the group in its various incarnations has had an enduring impact on the development of music worldwide. With over 100 million records sold, the group is the best-selling...
included a cover version of the show's main theme Fear on their highly acclaimed 1964 Dolton Records
Dolton Records
Dolton Records was a record label based in Seattle that was originally known as Dolphin Records. It was owned by Bob Reisdorf and Bonnie Guitar. Success for the label came early with "Come Softly to Me" by The Fleetwoods, the first single to be released on that label...
release The Ventures in Space
The Ventures in Space
The Ventures in Space is an album by the guitar-based instrumental group The Ventures. It is notable for pioneering the space surf variant of surf rock. Information on the slip cover states that all the unique, unworldly sounds featured in the album's tracks were made with musical instruments,...
. It was also covered by the Finnish surf-revival band Laika & the Cosmonauts
Laika & the Cosmonauts
Laika & the Cosmonauts were a Finnish rock band. They had the same lineup from the time they formed in 1987 until they stopped recording in 2008. Their sound is usually described as Surf Rock, but a Boston Globe review noted that the band's sound is "far beyond the limitations of any specific...
on their compilation album [ Gravity.] The second season of The Outer Limits
The Outer Limits (1963 TV series)
The Outer Limits is an American television series that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1965. The series is similar in style to the earlier The Twilight Zone, but with a greater emphasis on science fiction, rather than fantasy stories...
used a variation of Fear for the end titles.
The avant-garde metal band Fantômas
Fantômas (band)
Fantômas is an avant-garde metal supergroup formed in 1998 in California, United States. The band is named after Fantômas, a supervillain featured in a series of crime novels popular in France before World War I and in film, most notably in the 60s French movie series.-History:Fantômas began just...
' song of the same name from the album The Director's Cut
The Director's Cut
The Director's Cut is an album by Mike Patton's supergroup Fantômas. All the songs are more or less recognizable cover versions of popular movie themes. This album has many more occasions of Patton using traditional vocals than Fantomas's other albums....
was inspired by the show's opening theme.
Season 1: 1959
22 episodes| Episode # | Title | Director | Writer(s) | Original AirDate | One Step Beyond episodes. A complete list of episodes, with links to cast lists and synopses, is available at TV.com. Official DVD releaseCBS Home Entertainment (distributed by ParamountParamount Pictures Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still... ) released what they called The Official First Season on DVD on September 15, 2009. One Step Beyond is the first pre-1973 in-house production of ABC to get a DVD release from CBS/Paramount. Other shows once distributed by ABC Films (which became Worldvision Enterprises) were either released by CBS/Paramount because the company owns the libraries of the actual producers of the shows (such as The Fugitive The Fugitive (TV series) The Fugitive is an American drama series produced by QM Productions and United Artists Television that aired on ABC from 1963 to 1967. David Janssen stars as Richard Kimble, a doctor from the fictional town of Stafford, Indiana, who is falsely convicted of his wife's murder and given the death... or The Mod Squad The Mod Squad The Mod Squad is a television series that ran on ABC from September 24, 1968, until August 23, 1973. This series starred Michael Cole, Peggy Lipton, Clarence Williams III, and Tige Andrews... ), or were released by different companies because ancillary rights are owned by other entities (such as George of the Jungle George of the Jungle George of the Jungle was an American animated series produced by Jay Ward and Bill Scott, who created The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. The character George was inspired by the legend of Tarzan. It ran for 17 episodes on Saturday mornings from September 9 to December 30, 1967, on the American TV... ). In any event, this new release contains all the first season episodes in new prints (most of them edited from their original network airings, as CBS says in a disclaimer) with all the original music as broadcast. While it includes the generic syndicated opening, among the extras are the original main title sequence (with sponsor tags by Alcoa), an expanded version of the series pilot, and the aforementioned revised main title sequence created for a Sci-Fi Channel Syfy Syfy , formerly known as the Sci-Fi Channel and SCI FI, is an American cable television channel featuring science fiction, supernatural, fantasy, reality, paranormal, wrestling, and horror programming. Launched on September 24, 1992, it is part of the entertainment conglomerate NBCUniversal, a... run in the 1990s. There is also a 4 disk set released by Mill Creek Entertainment Mill Creek Entertainment Mill Creek Entertainment is a home entertainment company that manufactures movie and television DVD compilation box sets at "value" prices. Nashville's Amity Entertainment is an affiliate to Mill Creek... titled "The Very Best of One Step Beyond". It contains 50 episodes, and is of very bad quality. Some of the discs flicker and pixilate, and many of the discs freeze up in mid-episode. External links
See also
The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
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