''Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer'' is the first syndicated television series based on Spillane's

hard-boiled Hardboiled (or hard-boiled) fiction is a literary genre that shares some of its characters and settings with crime fiction (especially detective fiction and noir fiction). The genre's typical protagonist is a detective who battles the violence o ...

private detective Mike Hammer, played by

Darren McGavin Darren McGavin (born William Lyle Richardson; May 7, 1922 – February 25, 2006) was an American actor. McGavin began his career working as a set painter for Columbia Pictures. In 1954, he originated roles in Broadway productions of '' My Three ...

. The series was produced from 1957 to 1959, and had a run of 76 episodes over two seasons. Episodes were filmed in black and white and filled a half-hour time slot. As a syndicated television series, original air dates and the order of episodes vary by geographic location – for example, in New York City. The series debuted January 28, 1958, on

WCBS-TV WCBS-TV (channel 2), branded CBS New York, is a television station in New York City, serving as the flagship of the CBS network. It is owned and operated by the network's CBS News and Stations division alongside Riverhead, New York–lic ...

, and the first episode aired was "Letter Edged in Blackmail".

Cast

Main

as Mike Hammer *

Bart Burns George Joseph Burns (born March 13, 1918 – July 17, 2007) was an American character actor. He is known mostly for playing Pat Chambers on the 1959 '' Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer'' television show and for numerous appearances on American ...

as Captain Pat Chambers

Recurring

Vito Scotti Vito Giusto Scozzari (January 26, 1918 – June 5, 1996), also known as Vito Scotti, was an American character actor who played both dramatic and comedy roles on Broadway theatre, Broadway, in films, and later on television, primarily from th ...

as Geta * Johnny Seven as Carl Pate *

Dale Van Sickel Dale Harris Van Sickel (November 29, 1907 – January 25, 1977) was an American college football, basketball and baseball player during the 1920s, who later became a Hollywood motion picture actor and stunt performer for over forty years. Van ...

as Blackie Davis *

James Westerfield James A. Westerfield (March 22, 1913 – September 20, 1971) was an American character actor of stage, film, and television. Early life Westerfield was born in Nashville, Tennessee, to candy-maker Brasher Omier Westerfield and his wife Do ...

as Bill 'Murph' Murphy *

Patricia Huston Patricia Huston (August 10, 1929 – September 25, 1995)Pat Lou Baker in the U.S., Social Security Applications and Claim Index, 1936–2007, retrieved froAncestry.com was an American stage, film, and television actress. She had a notable actin ...

as Mary Otto *

Walter Reed Walter Reed (September 13, 1851 – November 23, 1902) was a United States Army, U.S. Army physician who in 1901 led the team that confirmed the theory of Cuban doctor Carlos Finlay that yellow fever is transmitted by a particular mosquito ...

as Fred Rankin

Production and casting

played the title role. McGavin would go on to play another hard-boiled private detective in the short-lived 1968 series ''The Outsider''. He is perhaps best known as Carl Kolchak in the television series '' Kolchak: The Night Stalker'' and the curmudgeonly father in ''

A Christmas Story ''A Christmas Story'' is a 1983 Christmas comedy film directed by Bob Clark and based on the 1966 book '' In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash'' by Jean Shepherd, with some elements from his 1971 book ''Wanda Hickey's Night of Golden Memories ...

''.

played Captain Pat Chambers, Hammer's main ally in the Police department.

Episodes

Season 1 (1958)

Season 2 (1959)

Home media

On September 20, 2011, A&E Home Video released ''Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer: The Complete Series'' on DVD in Region 1 for the first time. The 12-disc set featured all 78 episodes of the series.

Reception

Public and critical reaction to the show was mixed. While ''

TV Guide TV Guide is an American digital media In mass communication, digital media is any media (communication), communication media that operates in conjunction with various encoded machine-readable data formats. Digital content can be created, vi ...

'' referred to it as "easily the worst series on TV", McGavin said that the show was "instantly successful". Some reviewers were critical of the show for its use of excessive and gratuitous violence. However, McGavin made a point of playing the role of Hammer with a hint of

tongue-in-cheek Tongue-in-cheek is an idiom that describes a humorous or sarcastic statement expressed in a serious manner. History The phrase originally expressed contempt, but by 1842 had acquired its modern meaning. Early users of the phrase include Sir Walte ...

satire – against the wishes of

Universal Studios Universal Studios may refer to: * Universal Studios, Inc., an American media and entertainment conglomerate ** Universal Pictures, an American film studio ** Universal Studios Lot, a film and television studio complex * Various theme parks operat ...

executives. Unlike the series that appeared in the 1980s, Mickey Spillane had minimal involvement in the production of the 1950s program. "I just took the money and went home," Spillane said of the show. "Believe me, I had bigger fish to fry, namely, that darn elusive Batmanfish."

References

External links

* {{Mike Hammer 1950s American crime television series 1958 American television series debuts 1959 American television series endings American detective television series Black-and-white American television shows First-run syndicated television programs in the United States Television series by Universal Television Mike Hammer (character) television series