Streaming video is now available!
Streaming video is now available for episodes 33 through 38, and episode 41. Episode 38 has just been added to the section, and more pages will be added.
1966-67: Taking shape
Crimefighting emphasized in second season
The FBI began its second season with a change or two. Lynn Loring was most assuredly out of the picture as Barbara Erskine. More significantly, the episode began and ended with narration by Marvin Miller. Narration was already used by QM Productions’s “flagship” production, The Fugitive, which also aired on ABC. The narration provided a much-needed framing device for the episode.
The second season had both good episode, as well as some notable clunkers, especially “The Contaminator.” William Reynolds, who played SAC Tom Colby, would make his second appearance on the series, in episode # 41, “Anatomy Of A Prison Break.” He already displayed a distictive appearance that would finally earn him his role as SAC Tom Colby in September 1967.
ABC was in third place in the ratings in 1965. The FBI was one of many series introduced that fall, and one of the rare ones to survive. Because of this, the network instituted a “Second Season” in January 1966, with Batman as the headlining series. The Avengers would be introduced to viewers on 28 March 1966. By this time, the series was well on its way to airing 31 original episodes, the most of any season.
In the end credits, Efrem Zimbalist Jr. drove a 1967 Ford Mustang convertible
Marvin Miller joins the cast!
Television audiences in the 1950s knew Marvin Miller as Michael Anthony, the man who handed out $1 million checks in the CBS-TV series The Millionaire. One guest on that 1955-60 series was a young actor named William Reynolds. By 1966, Mr. Miller had put his patrician baritone voice to use not only in voice-overs, but also in many other recorded venues. Though uncredited in The FBI, Mr. Miller provided the authoritative narration that opened and closed episode until the show’s end in April 1974.
Section Alert
Please be advised that this portion of the site is far from complete. As of this writing—16 May 2008—pages for episodes 32 to 39, 41, 42, 46, 47, 50, and 58 through 60 are up. We ask that you be patient and bear with us. Thank you!
