The Powerful Saga of One Family’s Lives and Loves in the Old West!
Venture back to the days when the land was still untamed and the West was still wild with Season One of The Big Valley, the TV classic starring Barbara Stanwyck, Lee Majors, and Linda Evans.
The Barkleys are the wealthiest and most powerful family in California’s San Joaquin Valley in the 1870s, owning and controlling cattle herds, gold mines, citrus groves, and logging camps. Follow and share the family’s trials and tribulations as matriarch Victoria Barkley leads her brood through joys and heartache, adventure and danger, and laughter and pain in Season One of this seminal and timeless Western Soap! TV Westerns once ruled the primetime range, inspiring Jonathan Winters to joke at the time, “I like Westerns, I just don’t like 15 of them in a row.” The Big Valley came along near the end of the trail. Premiering in 1965, it ran for four seasons and earned an Emmy for “Miss Barbara Stanwyck,” who stars as widowed matriarch Victoria Barkley. Her brood is a breed apart: Jarrod (Richard Long), the eldest son, who returns to the sprawling Barkley home in the San Joaquin Valley to practice law; excitable Nick (Peter Breck), who is in charge of the family enterprises, youngest son Eugene (Charles Briles), an inconsequential character who would ride off into the sunset by season two; and “shameful” and “spoiled” daughter Audra (Linda Evans), who, in the first episode, is a real kitten with a whip. As a family saga, The Big Valley is more Bonanza than Dallas with one groundbreaking, soap opera twist: the arrival of Heath (Lee Majors), the self-proclaimed “bastard son” of deceased community pillar Tom Barkley. This first season’s most compelling dramatic arc is Heath’s struggle to be accepted by his brothers (particularly the hot-headed Nick) and determination to stake his claim to “a name, heritage… what’s mine.”
The Big Valley rounded up a stable of great character actors, several at the beginnings of their careers. The episode “By Force and Violence” alone offers Bruce Dern as an escaped convict whom Victoria compels at gunpoint to help rescue Heath, who is trapped under a disabled wagon, and L.Q. Jones and Harry (Dean) Stanton as the bounty hunters on his trail. Several of the episodes cover some of the same ground: an old family friend is revealed to be less than trustworthy; Audra falls for the wrong guy; someone’s got a grudge against the Barkleys. One of the season’s most memorable episodes is a tale of redemption, “The Guilt of Matt Bentell,” in which the man the Barkleys have hired to oversee their logging operations is the former warden of an apparently Abu Ghraib-like Civil War prison where Heath was incarcerated. Now that network television has put Westerns out to pasture, fans of the series and Western buffs who wouldn’t be caught dead in Deadwood can enjoy The Big Valley‘s more traditional pleasures, including breathtaking cinematography (no painted Ponderosa backdrops), great Western action (the fight scenes pack a real punch), and involving stories. –Donald Liebenson
Buy “Big Valley – Season 1″ For Only $11.86
April 28, 2008
#1
I Don’t Like Westerns Except For Daniel Boone,Gunsmoke,The Lone Ranger,Wagon Train,Davy Crockett,Jesse James,Zorro,The Rifleman,The Big Valley,Hopalong Cassidy,The Roy Rogers Show,The Virginian,The Travels Of Jamie McPheeters,Here Come The Brides And Alias Smith And Jones I Used To Watch The Big Valley Occasionally With My Mom And Dad We Didn’t Watch Big Valley Often Wendy Martindale Don’t Like Westerns And I Don’t Like Them Either Except For Daniel Boone,Gunsmoke,The Lone Ranger,Wagon Train,Davy Crockett,Jesse James,Zorro,The Rifleman,The Big Valley,Hopalong Cassidy,The Roy Rogers Show,The Travels Of Jamie McPheeters,The Virginian,Here Come The Brides And Alias Smith And Jones I Watched The Big Valley In Reruns On KTNT Now KSTW TV Channel 11 Then In The Late 70′s I Watched It On KPTV Channel 12 Out Of Portland,Oregon On Cable TV Puget Sound I Watched It On KOMO-TV Channel 4 In The Early 1980′s On Thursdays At 3 PM When I Was In Tenth Grade When I Got Home From School At Age 15 During The 1981-82 School Year As A Teenager I Watched It In 1983 On KCPQ-TV Channel 13 John Hudnall Didn’t Like Big Valley I Watched It On CBN Cable I Watched It On PAX TV I Watched It On Hallmark Now It Is On Encore’s Westerns Channel I Bought The First Season DVD’s Of The Big Valley On July 6,2006 This Month I Like The Barkleys Linda Cumberbatch Did Used To Watch The Big Valley Occasionally She Thinks It’s All Right I Used To Watch It Occasionally
April 28, 2008
#2
I Used To Watch This Show Occasionally I Didn’t Watch It Often My Name Is Dellie Hutchinson I Was Born On December 12,1965 Five Days Later Friday December 17,1965 I Watched The Big Valley Episode The Brawlers In Color On ABC And KOMO-TV Channel 4 At 9 PM On Friday Nights The Big Valley Premiered Friday Night September 17,1965 At 9:00 PM It Came On Right After The Donna Reed Show It Competed In Seattle With Convoy On NBC And KING 5 And Mr.Roberts And The Friday Night Movie On CBS Affilliate KIRO 7 At 10:00 PM I Watched The Man From U.N.C.L.E. On Friday Nights And In Color 20th Century-Fox Television Bought Out Four Star Entertainment Did You Know Four Star Entertainment The Studio That Did The Rifleman And The Big Valley Asorbed Into 20th Century-Fox 20th Century-Fox Bought Out Four Star Entertainment In March 1991 20th Century-Fox Television Has The Four Star Library Four Star Library Became 20th Century-Fox’s Permanently When Four Star Was Bought Out By 20th Century-Fox The Studio Should Release The Second Season Of The Big Valley The Complete Second Season
April 28, 2008
#3
I’m not a big fan of westerns, and I was a bit too young (not by much) for the golden age of TV westerns. Amazingly, this seems to be the only one of the great westerns of the sixties to be realeased on DVDs as seasonal sets.
So, remembering that The Big Valley was one of the “big westerns” of that time period, and reading of the big name actors in the series, I went ahead and ordered the set.
I’d never watched this show before, and I was surprised at just how amazingly good this show looks. It’s downright beautiful. We had to wait 40 years to see at home exactly what this show really looked like. Back in 1965, color TV was a new thing, and they had very round picture tubes with whacky color (always a little green or purple) and general fuzziness.
I was also amazed at how much I don’t like the characters. The Barclay family is a smug lawyer, two blustering blowhard cowboys who are quickly joined by a third (Lee Majors), a beautiful strong headed young woman, and their wise tough-as-nails mother. How will these rich swaggering pompous big-heads survive the perils of owning a huge ranch with servants and lots of guns in 1870′s California?
Seriously, this is a good value for the money. Big Valley is a grand, gorgeous full-color orchestrated classic, and you just can’t beat 30 episodes for less than thirty dollars. This is a piece of television history, so even if westerns isn’t your favorite genre, why not give it a try?
April 28, 2008
#4
When I Was Five Months Old I Watched The Big Valley On Friday Nights At 9:00 PM On ABC And KOMO-TV Channel 4 In Color I Watched It Occasionally Linda Cumberbatch The Administrator Watched The Big Valley Occasionally You Know Wendy Martindale Watched The Big Valley Occasionally And So Did Evie MacCuaig Did I Did See It In Reruns I Watched It Mostly In Reruns On CBS Affilliate KIRO-TV Channel 7 The CBS Affilliate In Seattle,Washington I Watched The Second Half After Dark Shadows CBS Affilliate KIRO-TV Channel 7 Aired Wagon Train Before The Big Valley It Was On CBS Affilliate KIRO-TV Channel 7 From 1969 To 1977 Then It Was On KOMO-TV Channel 4 The ABC Affilliate In Seattle I Watched It At 3 PM January 14,1982 On Thursdays While I Was 16 Years Old A Month After My 16th Birthday December 12,1981 I Watched It In 1983 On KMO-TV Channel 13 Then On CBN Cable Network Then PAX TV From January 8,1998 Thru January 4,2003 Then It Was On Hallmark From 2003 To 2005 Now It’s On Encore Westerns Channel I Got First Season On DVD July 6,2006 At Fred Meyer I Would Watch It Very Soon
April 29, 2008
#5
I Really Don’t Like Them Westerns Except For Daniel Boone,Gunsmoke,The Lone Ranger,Wagon Train,Davy Crockett,Jesse James,Zorro,The Rifleman,The Big Valley,The Roy Rogers Show,Bonanza,The Travels Of Jamie McPheeters,The Life And Legend Of Wyatt Earp And The Guns Of Will Sonnett I Like The Big Valley It Aired On Friday Nights At 9 PM After The Donna Reed Show At 8:30 PM The Big Valley Had Premiered On Friday September 17,1965 They’re Were No VCR’s Or No DVD’s In Those Days At 7:30 PM On Friday Nights You Would Prefer Honey West On ABC And It Was In Black & White Or Daniel Boone In Color On NBC Or Lost In Space In Color On CBS At 8:00 PM You Would Prefer Tammy In Color On ABC Or The Second Half Of Daniel Boone In Color On NBC Or The Second Half Of Lost In Space In Color On CBS At 8:30 PM You Would Prefer The Donna Reed Show Which It Was In Black & White On ABC Or Convoy Also In Black & White On NBC Or Hogan’s Heroes The WWII Sitcom In Color On CBS At 9:00 PM You Would Prefer The Big Valley In Color On ABC Or Gomer Pyle,U.S.M.C. In Color On CBS At 9:30 PM You Would Prefer Mister Roberts The WWII Sitcom In Color On NBC Or The Smothers Brothers Show A Sitcom In Color On CBS At 10:00 PM You Would Prefer The WWII Law Drama Court Martial On ABC In Color Aaron Spelling’s First Series As An Independent Producer With Danny Thomas And Sheldon Leonard The First Series From Thomas-Leonard-Spelling Productions Aaron Spelling Would Go To Produce The Mod Squad,Charlie’s Angels And Dynasty Naming A Few At 10:00 PM You Would Prefer That Or The Man From U.N.C.L.E. The Hit TV Spy Series In Color On NBC Or The Steve Lawrence Show In Color On CBS I Watched The Big Valley Occasionally I Like The Barkleys I Think The Barkleys Were All Right The Big Valley Made Stars Of Richard Long (Nanny And The Professor),Peter Breck (It’s A Living),Lee Majors (The Six Million Dollar Man) And Linda Evans (Dynasty) According To TV Party The Big Valley Was G Rated The Kids Watched It In Reruns I Watched It In Reruns On CBS Affilliate KIRO-TV Channel 7 At 4:00 PM Then I Watched It On KOMO-TV Channel 4 The ABC Affilliate In Seattle At 3 PM When I Got Home From School On Thursdays Then At 4:00 PM Police Story Came On After The Big Valley I Watched The Big Valley At 3:00 PM John Hudnall Did Not Like The Big Valley He Told My Mom He Didn’t Like The Big Valley Chuck Huberty Didn’t Like Big Valley Bob Sexton Didn’t Like Big Valley John Hudnall Didn’t Like Big Valley Don Crump My Driver’s Ed Teacher Did Not Like The Big Valley Al Didn’t Like The Big Valley Mr.Purvis Didn’t Like Big Valley Gene Engstrom Didn’t Like Big Valley I Got The DVD’s Of It