Saturday, October 17, 2020

Frank Buck, a guy that went to Asia in the 1910s -1920s to hunt and collect animals for circuses and zoos, which were taking off like mad at the time, wrote a book "Bring 'Em Back Alive" in 1932 and like Tarzan, impressed a lot of kids


In the 1980s, actor Bruce Boxleitner kicked off his tv show career (right after starring in Tron) playing Frank Buck in a fun show, Bring Em Back Alive, which was how I knew about Frank Buck.  Then Bruce got the lead in Scarecrow and Mrs King with former Charlies Angels star Kate Jackson. He then got the starring role in Babylon 5, and NCIS.

By the way, Boxleitner makes 60 million dollars a year for royalties from NCIS

The 80s had a few fun adventure shows, though few had a good enough budget to excel more then the rest, or better writing, etc etc, but Magnum PI 1980-88 motivated other producers to try and cash in with, Simon and Simon 81-89, Bring Em Back Alive 82-83, A Team, 1983-87, and others making 1980s tv a lot of fun. 

It had to be a lot more fun, now that MTV was pulling teens away from sitcoms, and video games were getting home consoles, and malls were becoming a draw for teens with nothing to do... tv shows had to get adventurous

A couple of years ago I posted about the Rolls Royce that was featured in the show https://justacarguy.blogspot.com/2016/03/built-for-maharaja-of-jodhpurs-hunting.html


Frank Buck (1884 – 1950) 

Beginning in the 1910s he made many expeditions into Asia to collect exotic animals, bringing over 100,000 live specimens back to the United States and elsewhere for zoos and circuses and earning a reputation as an adventurer. 

He co-authored seven books chronicling or based on his expeditions, beginning with 1930's Bring 'Em Back Alive, which became a bestseller. 

Between 1932 and 1943 he starred in seven adventure films based on his exploits.

He was also briefly a director of the San Diego Zoo, 

displayed wild animals at the 1933–34 Century of Progress exhibition and 1939 New York World's Fair, toured with Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, and co-authored an autobiography, 1941's All in a Lifetime.

5 comments:

  1. Thanks for a great evening.Best banners ever.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You are welcome, and than you!

      Delete
    2. Correction, and "thank you!"

      Delete
  2. I watched that show when I was a kid, too. I never realized that the actress who plays the female lead character also played Lacey Underall in Caddyshack.

    Was the picture quality as bad on our TVs in the '80s as this Youtube video? I know it wasn't great, but some of the old TV shows I've seen online recently look really bad. We probably still had a 19" black & white TV in 1982, so maybe it looked better on such a small screen.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. OMFG! She was! Whoa! I didn't know that!

      It was really bad quality... for some reason the quality was better up to the late 70s for a lot of shows, but the sitcoms in the early to mid 80s had terrible camera resolution.
      I've seen several 80s sitcoms with crappy picture quality (resolution) and there must have been some reason, like maybe there were so many more sitcoms, and they wouldn't buy new cameras for them, as they needed 3 or 4 cameras per show. Dramas didn't use as many cameras I bet.
      I guess the only way to get an answer about that is to talk to someone in 1980s tv production

      Delete