Decoy | |
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Beverly Garland as Officer Casey Jones in a 1958 episode of Decoy |
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Also known as | Decoy Police Woman |
Genre | Crime drama |
Written by | Jerome Coopersmith Don Ettlinger Steven Gardner Abram S. Ginnes Leon Tokatyan |
Directed by | David Alexander Michael Gordon Stuart Rosenberg Teddy Sills Arthur H. Singer |
Starring | Beverly Garland |
Country of origin | United States |
Language(s) | English |
No. of seasons | 1 |
No. of episodes | 39 |
Production | |
Executive producer(s) | Everett Rosenthal |
Producer(s) | David Alexander Stuart Rosenberg Arthur H. Singer |
Cinematography | Maurice Hartzband |
Running time | 30 mins. |
Broadcast | |
Original channel | Syndication |
Picture format | Black-and-white |
Audio format | Monaural |
Original run | October 14, 1957 – July 7, 1958 |
Decoy (also titled Decoy Police Woman) is a groundbreaking American crime drama television series which was created for syndication and initially broadcast from October 14, 1957 to July 7, 1958, lasting for thirty nine 30-minute black-and-white episodes. It was the first American police series with a female protagonist.[1]
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The series starred Beverly Garland as Casey Jones, a female police officer who is often assigned to work undercover (hence becoming the "decoy" of the title). The cast changed each week with Garland the only main continuing character, although there were several recurring characters, mostly her commanding officer and immediate colleagues.
The series was inspired by Jack Webb's Dragnet and used a similar format to that series, with Jones being portrayed as a serious, by-the-book, yet sympathetic cop with no personal life outside of her job. In the episode "The Sound of Tears", she reveals that the man she loved was a police officer who was shot and killed by the man he was sent to bring in.
Decoy is of historical significance as it was the first American television series to focus on the work of a female police officer. The series also featured early performances by actors such as Larry Hagman, Peter Falk, Al Lewis and Martin Balsam. Each episode was dedicated to the Bureau of Policewomen of the New York Police Department.
Many episodes focused on females being victims of crime and most episodes ended with Garland breaking the fourth wall and speaking directly to the audience about the case just solved.
Notable guest stars include:
Now mostly in the public domain in the United States, about a dozen episodes of the series have so far seen limited release on DVD issues by several different companies.
Episode # | Episode Title | Airdate |
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1 | "Stranglehold" | October 14, 1957 |
2 | "The Little Red Clown" | October 21, 1957 |
3 | "The Phoner" | October 28, 1957 |
4 | "To Trap a Thief" | November 4, 1957 |
5 | "Dream Fix" | November 11, 1957 |
6 | "The Savage Payoff" | November 18, 1957 |
7 | "Deadly Corridor" | November 25, 1957 |
8 | "Escape into Danger" | December 2, 1957 |
9 | "The Glass Necklace" | December 9, 1957 |
10 | "The Scapegoat" | December 16, 1957 |
11 | "Two Days to Kill" | December 23, 1957 |
12 | "Queen of Diamonds" | December 30, 1957 |
13 | "My Brother's Killer" | January 6, 1958 |
14 | "Bullet of Hate" | January 13, 1958 |
15 | "Death Watch" | January 20, 1958 |
16 | "Odds Against the Jockey" | January 27, 1958 |
17 | "Dressed for the Kill" | February 3, 1958 |
18 | "An Eye for an Eye" | February 10, 1958 |
19 | "The Challenger" | February 17, 1958 |
20 | "Across the World" | February 24, 1958 |
21 | "The Showplace" | March 3, 1958 |
22 | "Reasonable Doubt" | March 10, 1958 |
23 | "Night of Fire" | March 17, 1958 |
24 | "Saturday was Lost" | March 24, 1958 |
25 | "High Swing" | March 31, 1958 |
26 | "Earthbound Satellite" | April 7, 1958 |
27 | "The Sound of Tears" | April 14, 1958 |
28 | "Ladies' Man" | April 21, 1958 |
29 | "Cry Revenge" | April 28, 1958 |
30 | "The Gentle Gunman" | May 5, 1958 |
31 | "Night Light" | May 12, 1958 |
32 | "Fiesta at Midnight" | May 19, 1958 |
33 | "The Lieutenant Had a Son" | May 26, 1958 |
34 | "Shadow of Van Gogh" | June 2, 1958 |
35 | "Tin Pan Payoff" | June 9, 1958 |
36 | "Blind Date" | June 16, 1958 |
37 | "The Comeback" | June 23, 1958 |
38 | "First Arrest" | June 30, 1958 |
39 | "The Lost Ones" | July 7, 1958 |