The Roaring 20's

I too fondly remember the Roaring 20's and had a serious pre-teen crush on Dorothy Provine for many years. As far as I know, the series is not available on video disc or tape. So far the only way I have found to obtain copies (few and far between)of this great series was from sellers on Ebay, who had videotaped the series from re-runs in their local area. It appears that the tapes I purchased were 4th or 5th generation tapes and thus the quality was not as great as I would have liked, but nevertheless, all the copies I purchased, except one, were watchable, and brought back some great memories. Compared to the TV standards of today, these old series are somewhat lacking in story lines and excitement, but Miss Provine's singing is just as entertaining today as it was in the 1960's. That being said, if this great old series did become available for purchase, I would probably be first in line at the checkout counter.

The Roaring Twenties as a television series had a two year run on television and was marketed to take advantage of a brief spurt of nostalgia for the era of the flapper. Donald May and Rex Reason were reporters in the Twenties Chicago with Mike Road as a police lieutenant. Between all of them they managed to solve a crime and get a news story every week. Helping them out was Dorothy Provine who as a speakeasy entertainer was in a position to hear a lot of interesting information.

Dorothy also sang a number or two straight out of the Roaring Twenties song book. She was pretty enough to entice younger viewers and their parents and grandparents got to hear the music of their youth. Though the show was set in the Twenties, in style it was not too different from those other Warner Brothers private eye shows of the time, 77 Sunset Strip, Surfside Six, Hawaiian Eye, Bourbon Street Beat, etc.

If you look at the episode list you won't see any names of some of the real gangster names of the times. That was left to the Untouchables. It also left plenty of room for the writer's imagination.

The episode I remember best was one with Claude Akins, a gangster reunited with his son and his new found responsibilities as a father persuade him to give up the life of a wiseguy. Not totally though, because after a trip to Comiskey Park to see the Yankees and Babe Ruth play the White Sox, they then went to Arlington Park to see Earl Sande, the Babe Ruth of jockeys ride a couple of winners home. And earn some money for Akins.

It was a good show, I do wish TV Land Channel would pick it up.

The most memorable feature of this show for me as a boy of eight years old was the sex appeal of Dorothy Provine. I'd watch the show to get a glimpse of Miss Provine doing one of her flapper numbers and in my puzzled pre-adolescent mind wonder why her appearance always evoked such unusual and seemingly strange thoughts and sensations. Of course, this did not escape the notice of my parents, who were relentless in their teasing ("Oh, she's your girlfriend, now we know..."). Anyway, aside from that, the show featured plenty of action and intrigue in the riotous and often chaotic period preceding the Depression years. Looking back, it was a time of almost innocence after the experience of the first World War, which tragically turned out to be a precursor to a much bloodier and sobering experience a generation later. The passage of time has given a luster and burnish to those years which obviously paints over the harsher reality of violence and hardship. Still, it was a fun hour of escapism in the early years of network TV.

Once and for all, forget the other series speaking of the same period, thirties or late twenties. Yes, in this show ROARING TWENTIES, you also have from time to time gangsters and machine guns, but not necessarily. You also have dramas and comedies as well, without any gun shots or femmes fatales...But always a very good cabaret and burlesque atmosphere, so close to the one you had in those days. It's mostly an atmosphere show, with pretty good performances: acting and directing. Robert Altman gave the best episodes of the whole show, such as stories in DANCE MARATHON and PRAIRIE FLOWER episodes. Tremendous pieces of work, believe me. So, don't Watch this series with the same expectations as you could have after seeing UNTOUCHABLES or any other series speaking of the thirties. That's all I wanted to say about this unfortunately rare and underrated show.

As the Western genre began to decline, the main beneficiary was the private eye genre. Warner Bros. Already spawned a hit with "77 Sunset Strip" which premiered in 1958. That success led to Warner Bros. Taking that template, putting together a similar ensemble cast, and setting the new shows in places like Miami, Hawaii, and New Orleans...much like recent shows like CSI and NCIS did with their respective franchises.

In 1959, two new series premiered, with a theme of law enforcement taking action against Depression-era gangsters. NBC's little-known "The Lawless Years", which lasted for a season and a half, was based on the memoirs of New York police detective Barney Ruditsky. Over on ABC, the memoirs of Eliot Ness became "The Untouchables".

So Warner Bros. Took the setting of these two gangster shows and applied their formula of two or three male leads and a singer, with the result being "The Roaring 20s". Unlike WB's other private-eye shows which had one character for comic relief, popular trends from the era provided a break from the crimefighting. (A 1961 ABC show from 20th Century Fox, "Margie", was a sitcom about an adolescent girl in the 20s.)

But I give that history to set up the review. The strength of "The Roaring 20s" was jointly in the writing and the characters, but also in its ability to capture the fun spirit of that era to avoid the noirish feel of "The Untouchables". We will probably not see it on DVD due to the weekly musical numbers provided by Dorothy Provine, another strength of the show.