Shark Bytes

It's true that the show did dip in the ratings after Pernell Roberts left, which is why Candy was brought in...after which the ratings soared again. How ironic that he was hired because Michael Landon wasn't threatened by his looks, yet David Canary was the MUCH better-looking of the two. He was a tough, manly cowboy and, unlike ML, didn't need to leave his underwear at home and wear skintight pants to prove it.

This show JTS when Jamie made his first appearance. He just didn't belong there. I have a hard time watching any episode he's in. True, nothing could have saved Bonanza after Dan Blocker died (though there were a few interesting episodes that last season, and the extremely good-looking Tim Matheson was a surprisingly good addition as Griff King), but the show had already died when Jamie was brought on board.

Jamie was around long before Dan Blocker died. And the show only lasted another 12 or 13 episodes after Hoss passed on. It had jumped the shark long before then.

I grew up watching this show, and it took a major jump when Hoss died. After that it went steadily down hill! Jamie was the last straw.

what was the neighboring ranch to the Ponderosa?

Pernell Roberts has never declared any such regrets that I ever heard. At least not publically. The guy hasn't given interviews since the 60's and even then they were few and far between. And as a result, all we know about his departure comes from either the Bonanza people or second hand sources. He thought he was too smart, too handsome, too good an actor, the show was beneath him, he wouldn't wear his rug, he was promised he'd be the star, he wouldn't call the old man Pa, he wanted an Indian wife for Adam. Who knows how much of this is really completely true and who knows what Roberts was really putting up with. When you only hear one side of the story, you can't really can't get at the truth. Personally, I think he's a very introverted, private guy who just couldn't handle the fame and attention the show brought him. But what do I know? And unless Roberts has some memoirs to be released after his death, (not likely) we'll never know the full truth. Case closed.

Pernell Roberts declared in later years that he regretted leaving the series. That was in print. Most agotistical actors who leave a hit series either proclaim regret years later like Jeff Conaway from Taxi, to Andy Griffith from the AG show, to Don Knotts, to Dick Van Dyke. They have producers dangle a couple of movies in front of them...they over rate their popularity and after 2 or 3 years, their career is all but gone. Just ask Shelly Long. She was despised by every cast member. Her career has bombed. Some other notables who quit hit series and had their careet disolve: Tony Musante leaving TOMA, McLean Stevenson leaving MASH, Valerie Harper leaving VALERIE, Wil Wheaton leaving STAR TREK, David Caruso leaving NYPD BLUE, Erica Eleniak leaving BAYWATCH, Herve Villachaize leaving FANTASY ISLAND, Redd Foxx leaving SANFORD AND SON, Howard Hessman leaving HEAD OF THE CLASS, Michael Moriarty leaving LAW AND ORDER, Dick York leaving BEWITCHED (health problems) Richard Thomas leaving the WALTONS, Frank Gorshin leaving BATMAN (over a few dollars) Bitty Shramm leaving MONK (where is she? on a milk carton?) Sharon Gless leaving CAGNEY AND LACEY. There are many more examples. but the point is, most of their careers did little or nothigng after they left a hit series. As a line in a movie goes: "What a large price to pay for a little show of temper." How many millions of dollars these people lost over the years. And the single worst example... the queen of stupidity, the nobel prize for assinine decision making goes to ( drum roll) Patricia Richardson from Home Improvement. A bland looking and bland actress who hit the jackpot, was offered $25 million dollars to do a final season. She was angry because the star of the show..the reason everyone tuned in, Tim Allen, was offered 50 million to do it. Her ego caused het to walk away from 25 million dollars for 6 months work. The average person in America makes $28,000 before taxes for 12 hard months. This biotch walked away from 25 million dollars. What a freaking moron.

I was always disappointed when Candy was on the show. Couldn't watch it at all.

I don't know much about the behind-the-scenes affairs regarding Bonanza, but from some of the posts I've read from viewers about Pernell Roberts, it sounds like he may have been let go in part because he was too demanding. What authority did he have that enabled him to be so demanding? I understand that, as a major actor in the show, he must have had some input into the role he was playing, but he wasn't one of the writers (or was he??), nor was he the director. He was an actor who, allegedly, receives a script once a week, learns his lines and performs them to the best of his ability. Who was he to keep insisting that Adam could no longer call his father 'Pa' or dictate to the show's authorities who Adam would and would not marry? Did he have this kind of power? He obviously wanted it, if he didn't. Hard to blame the execs for ridding themselves of a malcontent (was he a malcontent??). I know one thing, if I tried to demand things of my superiors at work, or dictated to them what I would and would not do, I wouldn't last very long there, either.

was this guy shades of Robert Reed on The Brady Bunch? A chronic malcontent?

Peace.

They did try to set Adam up with a wife and stepdaughter - the infamous Laura Dayton episdoes - but it didn't really gel. She just wasn't the kind of character Adam would have had any interest in, and Pernell Roberts made that very clear in his scenes with her. Zero chemistry, although he was great with the little girl. He wanted Adam to marry a black or Native American woman. Like that was ever going to happen in 1964 on prime time TV! Dortort had also brought in Guy Williams as Ben's nephew to replace Roberts, which freaked Michael Landon out to no end. His co-workers then convinced Pernell to stay another season, and Williams was promptly married off to Adam's intended, neatly getting them both off the Ponderosa at the same time.

You can't really blame Pernell Roberts for leaving, IMHO. Adam was an educated, cultured, good looking guy heading into his late 30's. What was he supposed to do, hang around the ranch with Pa and the boys without any womenfolk around until he turned fat and gray? (or bald, as the case may be). I fault the producers of the show for the loss of Adam. They should have come up with a workable solution for the character, rather than let him walk.

And, although I know he had a lot of success later and was allowed to write and produce some episodes, I think Michael Landon also stayed way too long. But after the unofficial blacklisting of Roberts, he was probably afraid to leave for fear of ending up in the same rudderless boat.

I had stopped watching the show by the time the ugly red-headed kid showed up, but you'll note that Candy was not much of a looker either. Word has it that these..ahem...non-handsome fellows were cast specifically because their looks were not threatening to Michael Landon. In fact, Pernell Roberts stayed on the show for a year or two longer than he had wanted to because his co-stars, especially Landon, begged him to stay on. Which is interesting, because, judging from the fan mail at the time, Adam was the most popular Cartwright. But maybe Landon felt Pernell had a separate constituency from his. Or maybe it was just a devil-you-know sort of thing.

Put me in the "Pernell leaving" bucket, though. Even when he wasn't giving his all, he was the best of the actors and his the show really suffered from the loss of his dark, sullen presence.

While I agree that Bonanza wasn't the same without Pernell Roberts, I disagree that his departure made the show jump the shark. There were many fine episodes after Roberts left. Bonanza was certainly at its best when all three sons were involved and, in my opinion, Roberts' absence wasn't felt any more heavily than would Dan Blocker's or Michael Landon's had they departed. If any one of those three had left first, the show would have gone downhill slightly without actually having JTS. Just my opinion, of course.

No, to me Bonanza jumped big time when Jamie became a regular. It began the steady slide to sharkdom when Candy became a regular but didn't really JTS for me until that Jamie kid showed up. I don't think he was necessarily a bad actor or an obnoxious character, it's just that his arrival coincided with right around the time the writing and acting began to go downhill. Besides the obvious anachronisms (Little Joe's hair and sideburns, every girl being beautiful with plenty of make-up, etc), you could see Dan Blocker mailing in his weekly performance. He seemed to become disinterested in many of the shows and his acting suffered as a result, "Dadburn it, Pa..."

Put me down as a vote for Bonanza jumping the shark when Jamie reared his ugly head.

Peace.

Pernell, Pernell, Pernell.

It's hard to believe the show continued on for 8 more years without him, but most people think the show pretty much ended when he left. I wonder if the old fella ever pops over to TV Land to reminisce - and regret the road not taken. By the time he landed the Trapper John role, he was too far past his prime to matter much. Shame, really. He coulda been a contenda. He was - and I'm sure still is - a very talented, interesting fellow.

I can't watch the post-Pernell episodes either. Adam was the only interesting Cartwright. He had a little bit of an attitude - always with a smirk and a wink. The show was way too hokey and boring without him.

Yeah, I know the Pernell Roberts saga has been flogged to death but I remember some details of how his departure was handled by the writers. The last season or two Roberts appeared less and less. One of the few times he was in an episode the last season it was mentioned that Adam had returned from Harvard for a visit. In the 1966 season, when asked about Adam's wherabouts Ben Cartwright replied that Adam was "at sea". Some of all this dovetails with what another poster wrote about Roberts' request to work fewer episodes.