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In the latter half of the 1960s, actor, producer and director Jack Webb reanimated his retired alter-ego Sergeant Joe Friday to safeguard a City of Los Angeles facing previously unknown dangers wrought by the rapid social change of the flower child era. Premiering on NBC on January 12, 1967, Webb’s Technicolor revival of Dragnet engaged complex issues far removed from the stock burglaries and fedora-wearing felons of the previous incarnations of his popular radio and black-and-white TV series. The build-up to the Summer of Love found Webb repositioning Sgt. Friday as both a law enforcement officer and amateur sociologist — charged with defending the establishment and decoding the youth movement for culture-shocked squares caught in an ever-expanding generation gap.
Viewed today, these simultaneously propagandistic and earnest dramas made by future Television Academy Hall of Fame inductee Jack Webb play as highly entertaining, funhouse-mirror time capsules of Los Angeles in the 1960s. Inspired by actual police files, the fact-laced tales also employ a strong dose of grit in the hardboiled traditions of noir.
Join us for a trio of psychedelic freak-out Technicolor Dragnet cases — with surprise, mood-setting, time-and-space-bending musical interludes screened between episodes.
—John H. Mitchell Television Curator Mark Quigley
Dragnet 1967: “The Big LSD”
U.S., 1/12/1967
Sgt. Joe Friday and Officer Bill Gannon (Harry Morgan) are horrified to encounter a psychotic youth (Michael Burns) with a bizarrely painted face. Upon investigation, his alarming behavior is revealed to be caused by LSD, a potent new hallucinogenic drug increasingly popular among the teens that gather on the Sunset Strip. As counterculture youths extol the enlightening benefits of LSD, Friday’s gut-wrenching fears about the drug are illuminated in true noir fashion.
DCP, b&w, 25 min. NBC. Mark VII Productions in association with Universal Television. Producer: Jack Webb. Director: Jack Webb. Writer: John Randolph. With: Jack Webb, Harry Morgan, Michael Burns. Use of Dragnet 1967 courtesy of NBCUniversal; special thanks to Mark Halperin.
Dragnet 1968: “The Big Prophet”
U.S., 1/11/1968
Officers Friday (Jack Webb) and Gannon (Harry Morgan) confront Brother William (Liam Sullivan), a self-described guru (seemingly modeled on Timothy Leary) suspected of selling LSD to minors. In a claustrophobic, psychedelic shrine of bead curtains, multi-colored lights and far-out posters, the officers engage the cultish leader in a bitter debate over the virtues and existential perils of mind-altering substances.
DCP, b&w, 25 min. NBC. Mark VII Productions in association with Universal Television. Producer: Jack Webb. Director: Jack Webb. Writer: David H. Vowell. With: Jack Webb, Harry Morgan, Liam Sullivan. Use of Dragnet 1968 courtesy of NBCUniversal; special thanks to Mark Halperin.
Dragnet 1968: “The Big High”
U.S., 11/2/1967
In the most darkly memorable episode of the entire long-running Dragnet franchise, Officers Friday (Jack Webb) and Gannon (Harry Morgan) investigate a young couple (Brenda Scott, Tim Donnelly) suspected of experimenting with marijuana. Dismissing the officers’ concerns as out of touch, a fateful pot party shatters the couple’s world, shaking seasoned cops Gannon and Friday to their hardened cores.
DCP, b&w, 25 min. NBC. Mark VII Productions in association with Universal Television. Producer: Jack Webb. Director: Jack Webb. Writer: David H. Vowell. With: Jack Webb, Brenda Scott, Tim Donnelly. Use of Dragnet 1968 courtesy of NBCUniversal; special thanks to Mark Halperin.
