Matinee Theater

1955

Seasons & Episodes

  • 3
  • 2
  • 1
7.7| NA| en| More Info
Released: 31 October 1955 Ended
Producted By: NBC
Country: United States of America
Budget: 0
Revenue: 0
Official Website:
Info

Matinee Theater is an American anthology series that aired on NBC during the Golden Age of Television, from 1955 to 1958. The series, which ran daily in the afternoon, was frequently live. It was produced by Albert McCleery, Darrell Ross, George Cahan and Frank Price with executive producer George Lowther. McCleery had previously produced the live series Cameo Theatre which introduced to television the concept of theater-in-the-round, TV plays staged with minimal sets. Jim Buckley of the Pewter Plough Playhouse recalled: When Al McCleery got back to the States, he originated a most ambitious theatrical TV series for NBC called Matinee Theater: to televise five different stage plays per week live, airing around noon in order to promote color TV to the American housewife as she labored over her ironing. Al was the producer. He hired five directors and five art directors. Richard Bennett, one of our first early presidents of the Pewter Plough Corporation, was one of the directors and I was one of the art directors and, as soon as we were through televising one play, we had lunch and then met to plan next week’s show. That was over 50 years ago, and I’m trying to think; I believe the TV art director is his own set decorator —yes, of course! It had to be, since one of McCleery’s chief claims to favor with the producers was his elimination of the setting per se and simply decorating the scene with a minimum of props. It took a bit of ingenuity.

Genre

Drama

Watch Online

Matinee Theater (1955) is currently not available on any services.

Cast

John Conte

Director

Production Companies

NBC

Matinee Theater Videos and Images

Matinee Theater Audience Reviews

LouHomey From my favorite movies..
Spidersecu Don't Believe the Hype
Humbersi The first must-see film of the year.
Catherina If you're interested in the topic at hand, you should just watch it and judge yourself because the reviews have gone very biased by people that didn't even watch it and just hate (or love) the creator. I liked it, it was well written, narrated, and directed and it was about a topic that interests me.
Rotwang27 When I was a teenager, I used to watch Matinée Theater almost every day during summer vacation on KPRC-TV in Houston Texas. The quality of the show was amazing, considering that NBC produced a live one hour drama every day, and it was in color! Like most families in the fifties, we couldn't afford a color TV set, but I could walk down to the local Joske's department store and see it on a color TV set. Even though I was only a kid, I could tell that these shows were outstanding, and they often featured well known stars. It is unfortunate that many of those live shows were not preserved, especially the early color productions.