From 1955 to 1957, ZIV-TV presented a fascinating weekly anthology, Science Fiction Theatre, a semi-documentary television series that explored the what if’s of modern science. Placing an emphasis on science before fiction, television viewers were treated to a variety of complex challenges from mental telepathy, robots, man-eating ants, killer trees, man's first flight into space and time travel.
Hosted by Truman Bradley, a radio/TV announcer and 1940s film actor, each episode featured stories which had an extrapolated scientific or pseudo-scientific emphasis based on actual scientific data available at the time. Typically, the stories related to the life or work of scientists, engineers, inventors, and explorers, also featured the intervention of extraterrestrials in human affairs. With but few exceptions, most of the stories were original concepts based on articles from recent issues of Scientific American. (Issues of that magazine can also be seen on Truman Bradley's desk in a number of episodes.)
A few years ago I had access to the studio's production files and wrote a book documenting the history of the program, with such detail as the dates of production for each episode, salary cost for all of the actors, trivia to spot in the episodes, and more. Enclosed are a number of behind-the-scenes photographs for your amusement.
 |
| Beverly Garland preparing for her scene. |
 |
| Bonita Granville taking a break between scenes. |
 |
| Truman Bradley sans jacket and tie. |
 |
Preparing to make the baby elephant (same
elephant used for an episode of The Cisco Kid)
into a woolly mammoth. |
 |
| Joan Sinclair in "Living Lights." |
 |
Gene Barry made a guest appearance, also
under contract to ZIV-TV for the title role
of the weekly western, Bat Masterson. |
 |
| Edmund Gwenn |
 |
| A great behind-the-scenes photo. |
 |
| Basil Rathbone |
 |
| Maxwell Smith, special effects supervisor for the series. |
 |
| "The Strange People of Pecos" |
 |
Warren Stevens in the wheelchair.
|
 |
| Victor Jory |
 |
| "Target: Hurricane" |
