Stationsarzt Dr. Kildare

Before St. Elsewhere and ER, even before Marcus Welby, M.D., there was Dr. Kildare, the series that brought fame to Richard Chamberlain. During the early 1960's, Dr. Kildare dramatized the ramification of medical issues of the day. I believe that if not for Dr. Kildare, there might not have been an ER.

I used to watch this series and would not leave the house "for anything" the night the show was on. I remember my older sister asking me if I wanted to go bowling with a bunch of friends, I declined. I had this teenager's fanaticism for the series and a crush in a good way on Dr. Kildare, Richard Chamberlain (The Thorn Birds). I guess Dr. James Kildare was a big heart throb those days. I remember his boss Dr. Leonard Gillespie, Raymond Massey (All my Darling Daughters) calling him Jim. That was a nice series. I clearly remember when they did a love story where Yvette Mimieux was his girl friend and Richard Chamberlain sang: "True Love!" I bought his record and sang along like a crazy teen. I think she died of cancer, I guess, in that episode. I have no recollection of Mimieux being nurse Zoe Lawton (1965-66). My guess is because I was raised abroad and by the time I watched the series it was ending in the States. The last of the series probably never got translated. The series was about this intern and his relationship with his boss and his patients. It was today's ER with fewer interns. Just one! Dr. Kildare! He was enough! It was my favorite doctor series and I remember it, fondly!

Producer David Victor's tendency was to saddle his television scripts and programs with some neurotic character of the week; but the sheer narrative quality of the scripts , the direction and the acting of "Dr. Kildare" centering around the most attractive young Richard Chamberlain and the very able Raymond Massey surmounted all artistic obstacles. This very popular TV series debuted the same year as did "Ben Casey"; and while both shows' producers provided viewers with strong dramatic scripts and episodes, critics noted that "Dr. Kildare" looked clean, whereas "Ben Casey" seemed to be shot in tones of gray, in lower light, etc. For five years, the show remained relatively unchanged; in its last season, innovations of length and cast were tried, to save the series. A simple look at this 1960s transforming of the older MGM "Dr. Kildare" series reveals how immensely superior the television version was made to be. The list of directors who made "Dr. Kildare" a quality offering included Jack Arnold, John Brahm, Marc Daniels, Lawrence Dobkin, David Friedkin, Robert Gist, James Goldstone, Lamont Johnson, Alf Kjellin, James Komack, Robert Ellis Miller, John Newland, Boris Sagal, Richard Sarafian, Elliot Silverstein, Don Taylor, and Paul Wendkos--some of TV's best directors. Writers for the series included Theodore Apstein, William Bast, Douglas Benton, Jerry de Bono, Louis S. Peterson, Gene Rodenberry and Jim Thompson. In addition to young, untrained but promising Chamberlain and the veteran Massey the cast included at various times Ken Berry, Jud Taylor, Jean Inness, Robert Paget, Joan Patrick, Jo Helton, Lee Kurty, John Napier and Cynthia Stone among others. Fine talents such as Leslie Nielsen, Lee Meriwether, Hayden Rorke, Diane Baker and Donn Loren appeared numerous times. Guest stars were memorable from the series but the chief ornament of the show were its plots--a mysterious and dangerous virus, Massey's vacation, Dr. Kildare facing death for the first time, the results of a teenaged gang fight, and many more such episodes. Because Blair General was a big city hospital;, and because of the presence of an older practitioner, with a wealth of life and professional experience, the design of Dr. Kildare provided far more potential for interesting hour-long story lines than would any show's premise concerning any private medical practitioner. This was and is THE hour-long medical series for most Americans. It was a landmark series for many reasons, and has been much imitated.

I used to watch this show (along with Ben Casey show) which was on around the same era, and loved them. This was in the 1960's. I watched

Dr. Kildare every week starring Richard Chamberlain. It was a must for me. And Raymond Massey, as Dr. Gillespie was really the best actor in the series. I always thought Richard Chamberlain was a good actor and his career has gone well through the years. But as far as I am concerned, I liked him best as Dr Kildare. Why did they never bring out some episodes of Dr. Kildare on DVD or VHS?There must be lots of us still around who were young in the 60's who would buy them.

Ben Casey and Dr. Kildare were exact contemporaries, both doctor shows that began and ended in the same season and were the most talked about shows on TV when they debuted in 1961. People were always making comparisons between them and here is mine.

One difference is that Casey was a resident, a full fledged doctor on staff at a hospital and a very prominent neurosurgeon. Kildare was an intern, a beginning doctor still learning the profession. If Kildare had been at the same hospital as Casey, Ben would have been bossing him around and making his life miserable.

A bigger difference was what they represented. Kildare was a symbol of the early 1960's. We were a very proud and optimistic country at that time. We'd survived the depression, won the war, had the communists on the defensive and were beginning to explore space. Social changes were taking place as well. if we were going to be the Greatest Country in the World, how could we have poverty and injustice? We tended to look at our government and institutions as benevolent servants of the people. There were several shows from this period, (Naked City, The Defenders, Mr. Novak were others), where handsome young idealistic novices entered a profession to be guided by their wise, patient but firm elders in becoming instruments of the system. The big challenge was getting people to trust the system by not committing crimes, studying hard and taking their pills. And of course, it's hard to look at the young men in these shows, (Richard Chamberlain, James Franciscus, Paul Burke, Robert Reed), and not see our youthful, idealistic president of the time, John Kennedy.

Casey was a precursor of the late 1960's. To him, the system was a monolith that existed for its own purposes and on its own momentum. You had to wrestle with it and with the mediocrity around you to get things done. Casey had a mentor as well, but Dr. Zorba often appeared to be more of a matador than a mentor, trying to tame Ben Casey, as he always called him, with a red cape and a sharp needle to puncture his ego from time to time.

I'd rather wake up from surgery and see Dr. Kildare's smiling face. But I'd be more likely to survive if it was Ben Casey who had done the surgery.