 | Faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive. Able to leap tall buildings at a single bound. Look! Up in the sky! It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Superman! Yes it's Superman, strange visitor from another planet who came to Earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. Superman, who can change the course of mighty rivers, bend steel in his bare hands, and who, disguised as Clark Kent, mild-mannered reporter for a great metropolitan newspaper, fights a never-ending battle for Truth! Justice! and the American Way! |
| This web site is a tribute to George Reeves who played Superman on the hit TV series which aired from 1951 to 1958. I loved this show and have to admit that I have seen every single episode, many more than once. Although there wasn't a big selection of TV programs to watch in the 1950's, the adventures of Superman show was an all time favorite viewed by millions and very much ahead of other shows in quality and technology. Below is a list of all 104 episodes in order of occurence. How many do you remember? |
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Trivia ...
The announcer who read, "Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound" was Willard Bill Kennedy (1908-1997) who appeared in the second season episode "Crime Wave" in 1953. During the early developing years of black & white TV Superman's costume was actually brown (for red) and grey (for blue) for the first two seasons because it provided a better and starker contrast for the black & white filming. In 1955, the show began to be filmed in color and Superman's costume became the same color as the original comic strip series red and blue. In the Superman episode of the Big Squeeze (1953) - a somewhat unknown actor named Hugh Beaumont got his famous TV start credentials when he played an ex-convict and later became the famous suit, shirt & tie sporting father in the Leave it to Beaver series as Ward Cleaver. Even playing the ex-convict role Ward was still portrayed as the perfect father to his TV son Tim. Go figure. All episodes were filmed out of sequence because of a very limited budget. Certain scenes in locations were all being done at once like Perry White's office, Clark's office, Clark's apartment or a common shared office or room in different episodes. This is the reason why the actors always seemed to wear the same clothes all the time in a lot of episodes. Even the spring boarded fly out of the Daily Planet 10th floor window scenes and the back alley fly offs after Clark just transformed into his Superman costume were filmed at the same time and used in several of the same episodes to save money. George Reeves was suspended by cables when he appeared to be flying during the first two seasons. In later seasons, as technology advanced he was positioned on a molded platform which conformed exactly to his body shape, and wore his costume over all of that. Landing scenes were accomplished by having George jump off of a ladder with the accompanying trademark air "er-zip" sound effect. Initially, the cast regulars were paid a whopping $200 per episode which was pretty superior wages for the time. They pulled together and had to beg the producer after the show became popular to give them a $50 raise (that's a 25% increase), which they received, but the producer didn't speak to any of them for a couple of weeks afterwards. The first 26 episodes were actually filmed in 1951, but did not appear on television until 2 years later in 1953, when Kellogg's Cereals agreed to sponsor the show. |
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Cast List
George Reeves ... Superman/Clark Kent
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| All the (104) TV Episodes in order ... | |
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Very 1st Pilot 1951 ... 1. Superman and the Mole Men (67 min)Dec 51 1st Season 1952-1953 syndicated B & W ... 2. Superman on Earth
1953 ... 17. Mystery in Wax
Second season 1953-1954 ... 26. Five Minutes to Doom 18 Sep 53
1954 ... 41. The Clown Who Cried
3rd season 1955 (in color) ... 52. Stamp Day for Superman
4th season 1956 ... 66. Joey
5th season 1957 ... 79. Peril in Paris
6th and final season 1958 ... 92. The Last Knight
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Cool spirit encounter with George Reeves |
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The Superman WebRing This site is a member of the best Superman websites on the Internet! |
    
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