The Deputy

At best I could only give "The Deputy" (1959-1961) an average, 5-star rating - 'Cause I found that this TV series was pretty mediocre viewing (for the most part).

About the only time that I thought that "The Deputy" actually showed any real promise was when actor, Henry Fonda was not physically present in the story.

Yeah. I thought that Fonda (as Marshal Simon Fry) was about as drab and dreary as you could ever possibly imagine an actor to be (in a pivotal role).

In fact - I'd actually go so far as to say that Fonda's stale and tired performance pretty much ruined my enjoyment of this TV Western in a really big way. Yep. It sure did.

There's a sleigh of hand in the very title of this show. Note that the name of the show is "The Deputy". This conveniently allowed Fonda to not have to be a major player in all the episodes. Fonda appears in some episodes throughout the show but more likely than not you'll see him only at the beginning and end (usually this is explained by Fonda's Simon Fry character being "out of town")...and I've even seen a few episodes where Fonda doesn't appear at all! Really, the show's more about Allen Case than Fonda, but the Fonda name was there to draw viewers. Other than Fonda's needing money, I doubt there was any reason he'd do TV...particularly in a stock Western like this one. Don't get me wrong: the show's pleasant in a Revue Studios crank-em-out-cookie-cutter way (guess who produced the show?) and the jazz guitar that's going on in the background (sounds like Barney Kessel! cool!) is nice, but the plots are pretty clichéd and you've been there before. I wouldn't call it on the level of Wagon Train, Laramie, Gunsmoke, or The Rifleman, but it's a pleasant show. Just don't expect to see a lot of Fonda in it.

Overall, the Deputy is a pretty good Western Show.

Fonda pops in & out at the Show's beginning & end; and the formulaic Story wraps up neatly in the show's half hour .

It's nice to see Hollywood Actors star in many of the Episodes. One episode I watched featured James Colburn.

My biggest negative critique is the jazzy anachronistic Music; more suitable for the Show Peter Gunn and the pool scenes of The Beverly Hillbillies, than a Western.

Besides that, watching a few Episodes isn't too bad a way to kill an hour.

The Deputy had a fatal gimmick to start with when it debuted on television in 1959. It's star was to be movie legend Henry Fonda who played a US Marshal. But note the title of the series, the one who carried the show for the most part was his deputy in one particular town in his jurisdiction, Allen Case.

Case was a storekeeper in the town so the deputy's job was a part-time gig. He was not a violent man, only resorting to firearms when he absolutely had to. For action fans this was a big no no.

But in plain fact it was Fonda's name that lured viewers to the show and he only appeared in maybe a third of the episodes and in some only brief appearances. So people tuned in for Fonda and didn't get him.

This was a busy period in Henry Fonda's life, he was working in three different mediums, stage, screen, and television. My guess is that he didn't have the time to devote to a weekly television series and opted for this format. After two seasons The Deputy was canceled.

It was an average television western, but the next time Fonda did a regular TV series it was as a full time star.

"The Deputy" is another of those assembly-line half-hour Revue Studio westerns that were pretty popular during the late fifties and early sixties. This one stood out from the rest for several reasons: It was co-created by, of all people, the future Mr. Relevant Sitcom King himself, Norman Lear.

The sprightly jazz theme by Jack Marshall, of "The Munsters" fame.

And of course, the main drawing attraction of Academy Award winner Henry Fonda, who incidentally, despite being top billed, basically just makes a few cameos during some of the episodes, and not even showing up at all in a few of them. The "Deputy" of the show, the reluctant Clay McCord, is portrayed by the late stage actor Allen Case, with Read Morgan joining in later in the run as the eye-patch wearing Sarge Tasker.

Basically, the premise of the show is that Clay McCord, a storekeeper who's quiet by nature, is suckered into becoming the deputy of Fonda's Marshal Simon Fry, based on McCord's ability to handle a weapon. That's basically the show in a nutshell, since the plots are the cookie-cutter type you'd come to expect from Revue. After viewing a couple episodes (which last aired a few years ago on TV Land), you can understand why Norman Lear made the jump to revolutionizing the sitcom. Can you imagine Archie Bunker or George Jefferson in the Old West? My rating: ***** stars out of 10

"The Deputy" is a Top Gun Production from Revue Studios, Hollywood. 76 episodes were filmed between 1959 and 1961.