Nichols

This show was a really good one in many ways, although certainly an atypical Western with the hero (?) riding around on a motorcycle rather than a horse, due to the 1914 setting, very "late" for a Western, which tend usually to be set between 1866 and 1890. I remember some controversy about its cancellation at the time but didn't really watch it during its time on NBC. When I came to see it and love it was a decade later when I was in the Army stationed in Germany and it was shown every week from the beginning on Armed Forces Television. By then, Margot Kidder was famous as Lois Lane but I'll also always think of her as Nichols' girlfriend. In a lot of ways, Nichols was a lot like Maverick; both were much more attracted to getting rich with little effort than they were fighting. It was in the little TV magazine that they distributed at the PX (not really an authorized edition of "TV Guide" but made to resemble it as closely as possible without getting into copyright trouble) that I first learned the real story behind the cancellation. I really wonder what the next season with the more violent twin would have been like if they had really made it as planned. Of course, by the time this show was made the "Western era" of TV had been in decline for around a decade; someday I hope to be able to write that the "reality era" has been in decline for that long! While "Gunsmoke" and "Bonanza" were still running, they were both nearing their ends and it had been years since a new Western had really caught on; I think that this trend did a lot to hold "Nichols" back, and was the main reason that NBC executives doubted that it would ever find a large audience But to me, a good Western, unlike a show set in contemporary times, is somewhat timeless, as are other "period" shows; changing fashions and the like do nothing to make them look any more "dated" than they were supposed to be, and I think that watching this show, 10 years after it was produced, is really what brought this point home to me. Also, this show is an early pairing of Garner and Stuart Margolin, who is really one of the all-time great sidekicks, and not just in Westerns.

The first time I remember seeing James Garner was in this series. It was set in the late 1800s and he played a sort of smart-alec who inherited the name of the founder of the town but basically nothing else. The people of the town kind of looked down on him. He rode around town on a motorcycle, which in those days was like a moped in that it had pedals like a bicycle (in fact that's how you started it).

It was hilarious and I was very disappointed when it was canceled. When I saw Rockford, I thought "wow, that's the same guy that was in Nichols, I wonder if this show will be any good."

Margot Kidder was in this too. I hope someday I get to see reruns to see if it's as good as I remember.

I, too, considered "Nichols" to be James Garner's best TV work. It was witty and superbly written. Regarding the reason for the show's short run and surprising ending, I'm sure I remember reading that Garner did it himself; that he was upset with management sticking their noses in and so he wrote himself out of the series by having his character killed off in the opening scene. If you remember, he never carried a gun and always outwitted the bad guys with his quick mind and smooth talk. He was called to the saloon to keep a bad guy from shooting the place up and, as he stepped up to the door, got blown back into the street. Whatever the reason for canceling the show, I miss it and the excellence it represented. But, then again, if all TV was always that good I'd never get anything done.

I guess I'm one of the few who remembers this very funny show. The turn of the century Old West, with technology about to change the frontier forever, made for a very interesting setting, and the cast did a good job of getting into the period, pulling it off without being camp. Garner was great, Margot Kidder was delightful, and John Beck made a terrific villain. The show was of such high quality it's no wonder it lasted such a short time.

Garner played Garner as only Garner can. For this short lived series, he was a disreputable sheriff in one horse western town in the early 20th century. The great Margot Kidder played the saloon keeper, a sorta equivalent of Kitty on Gunsmoke. It was clear, however, that her saloon offered more than a drink and a song. Above all, Nichols was really funny.