Good bye Gilligan

[charlio lemieux]

September 06, 2005


LOS ANGELES (AP) - Bob Denver, whose portrayal of goofy first mate Gilligan on the 1960s television show Gilligan's Island, made him an iconic figure to generations of TV viewers, has died, his agent confirmed Tuesday. He was 70.

Denver died Friday at Wake Forest University Baptist Hospital in North Carolina of complications from treatment he was receiving for cancer, his agent, Mike Eisenstadt, told The Associated Press. Denver's death was first reported by Entertainment Tonight.

Denver had also undergone quadruple heart bypass surgery earlier this year.

Denver's wife, Dreama, and his children Patrick, Megan, Emily and Colin were with him when he died.

"He was my everything and I will love him forever," Dreama Denver said in a statement.

Denver's signature role was Gilligan. But he was already known to TV audiences for another iconic character, that of Maynard G. Krebs, the bearded beatnik friend of Dwayne Hickman's Dobie in the The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, which aired from 1959 to 1963.

Gilligan's Island lasted on CBS from 1964 to 1967, and it was revived in later seasons with three high-rated TV movies. It was a Robinson Crusoe story about seven disparate travellers who are marooned on a deserted Pacific Island after their small boat was wrecked in a storm.

The cast: Alan Hale Jr., as Skipper Jonas Grumby; Denver, as his klutzy assistant Gilligan; Jim Backus and Natalie Schafer, as rich snobs Thurston and Lovey Howell; Tina Louise, as bosomy movie star Ginger Grant; Russell Johnson, as egghead science professor Roy Hinkley Jr.; and Dawn Wells, as sweet-natured farm girl Mary Ann Summers.

TV critics hooted at Gilligan's Island as gag-ridden corn. Audiences adored its far-out comedy. Writer-creator Sherwood Schwartz insisted that the show had social meaning along with the laughs: "I knew that by assembling seven different people and forcing them to live together, the show would have great philosophical implications."


I used to watch Gilligan's Island almost every day. Anybody got any favorite episodes?

[Mel]

so long little buddy.

http://www.grudge-match.com/Images/gilligan.gif

[a4l]

There are too many funny episodes of Gilligan's Island to pick just one.

[charlio lemieux]

Ya there are some great ones. I keep thinking of the one where the Japanese mini-sub shows up, and the Captain doesn't know the war is over.

Haha just thought of how Gilligan looked when he got scared.

Has anyone ever seen the othe show the acticle mentioned?
The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis, which aired from 1959 to 1963.

[grim]

Wow. Did they close the Gilligan's Island virtual reality website?

http://programdev.com/gallery/albums/userpics/10001/normal_island.png

[charlio lemieux]

I don't rember her from the show.

Who did you like better Ginger or Mary Ann?

[slapshot™]

Anybody got any favorite episodes?

Ironically, last week, on the program Mythbusters they were trying to prove/disprove being able to pick up radio station signals via the fillings in teeth.

Watching that episode reminded me of a similar situation where the Professor was trying to figure out how Gilligan was picking up a radio station the very same way.

[charlio lemieux]

Hahaha yes. Did mythbusters make or break the myth.

[slapshot™]

Hahaha yes. Did mythbusters make or break the myth.

hahaha! I don't know....I fell asleep and missed the end of that episode!

[charlio lemieux]

hahaha! I don't know....I fell asleep and missed the end of that episode!


LMAO :laughing:

My mom's cousin once told us a joke that was about 10 minutes long. When he got to the punchline he stopped. Someone asked what the punch line was and this was the answer.
" I don't know. Lenore(wife) shut the TV off, and I was hoping one of you had heard the joke before."

[bluemeanie]

Apparently Apple is coming out with an iTooth that can download music from your home PC directly to your chompers. Get ready for Christmas early, parents.

[a4l]

I love the episode with the radioactive vegetable seeds. The carrot the size of the wheel barrow cracked me up.

[Amoroq]

I once saw a movie loosly based on Gilligins Island. I think it was called Ginger, Marryanne and Gilligin's BIG Buddy ;)

[bluemeanie]

I once saw a movie loosly based on Gilligins Island. I think it was called Ginger, Marryanne and Gilligin's BIG Buddy ;)

Sounds familiar... any screen shots?

[Rusty]

I watched it religously.

I feel sorry for him because once he got cast as Gilligan his career what little career stopped.

[KB in Kelowna]

Just how much lugage did the Howell's pack for a three hour tour?

[charlio lemieux]

Haha.
Ginger had some outfit's too.

[slapshot™]

Some tidbits of trivia from the Internet Movie Data Base (http://imdb.com/).


Jayne Mansfield (http://imdb.com/name/nm0543790/) turned down the role of "Ginger"; Carroll O'Connor (http://imdb.com/name/nm0005279/) tested for the role of The Skipper; Dabney Coleman (http://imdb.com/name/nm0001056/) tested for the role of The Professor.
Raquel Welch (http://imdb.com/name/nm0000079/) auditioned for the role of Mary Anne.
Jerry Van Dyke (http://imdb.com/name/nm0886733/) turned down the role of Gilligan.
The first season had the cast using cups that were made from real coconuts. However, they found that the cups were porous and soaked through like they were sweating. Thus in the later seasons, the coconut cups were plastic replicas.
Natalie Schafer (http://imdb.com/name/nm0769791/)'s contract stipulated that there be no close-ups of her in the show. The reason was producers knew her real age, which was 13 years older than Jim Backus, who played her character's husband. It was not until years after the series ended that her co-stars found out her actual age.
The characters' full names:

The Skipper: Jonas Grumby
The Professor: Roy Hinkley
Mr. Howell: Thurston Howell III
Mrs. Howell: Eunice Howell
Ginger: Ginger Grant
Mary Ann: Mary Ann Summers
Gilligan's first name: the subject of some debate ever since the series first aired.

The original pilot was filmed in November 1963 but not aired until October of 1992. In it, the characters of the Professor and Ginger were player by a different actor and actress. There was no character of Mary Ann. There was a character called Bunny, who was a buxom blonde, and Ginger was a practical brunette. Ginger and Bunny were both secretaries. The music for the theme song was written by John Williams (http://imdb.com/name/nm0002354/) (then known as Johnny Williams). This music had a Latin sound and the lyrics were sung with a Spanish accent. In the pilot, it was a six-hour trip, not a three-hour tour.
The show was originally slated to return for the 1967-68 television season but cancelled at the last minute by CBS head William Paley (http://imdb.com/name/nm1013200/), to make room for the long-running "Gunsmoke" (http://imdb.com/title/tt0047736/) (1955).
The three-man folk singing group The Wellingtons (http://imdb.com/name/nm1267383/) sang the theme song for the first season, but were replaced by a similar sounding group, The Eligibles, for the following seasons. The Wellingtons (plus one) also portrayed 'The Mosquitoes' in a classic episode of the series.
The opening credits for the first season were shot shortly after the assassination of U.S. president John F. Kennedy (http://imdb.com/name/nm0448123/). A flag at half mast can be seen in the background.
The character of the Professor was supposedly a graduate from SMU, TCU and UCLA, Thurston Howell III went to Harvard. Howell would call an inferior a "Yale Man".
In the credits, Russell Johnson (http://imdb.com/name/nm0426157/) and Dawn Wells (http://imdb.com/name/nm0920171/) were relegated to being simply "The Rest". That changed in the second season when Bob Denver (http://imdb.com/name/nm0001134/) demanded that they be given an equal share in the credits, thus changing the lyrics to "The Professor and Mary Ann." Sherwood Schwartz (http://imdb.com/name/nm0777442/), who composed both themes, has said it didn't occur to him the Professor and Mary Ann would turn into prominent characters.
According to series creator Sherwood Schwartz (http://imdb.com/name/nm0777442/), Gilligan's full name was Willy Gilligan. Bob Denver (http://imdb.com/name/nm0001134/) says he never heard the name Willy Gilligan until long after the show was off the air.
The lagoon set was located at the CBS lot in Studio City, CA. If sequences there were filmed too early or too late in the day, microphones would record rush hour traffic noise from a nearby freeway.
Phil Silvers (http://imdb.com/name/nm0799014/) was cast as a producer in a episode partly because his production company was actually producing the show.
Creator Sherwood Schwartz (http://imdb.com/name/nm0777442/) said that he dreamed up the idea of the show because he wanted the castaways to represent a microcosm of society and he wanted to show how they worked together to help each other when in trouble.
As the show progressed, producers planned to introduce a new character - a pet dinosaur - but decided against it because of the cost of special effects. The character, however, was incorporated into the animated "Gilligan's Planet" (http://imdb.com/title/tt0083422/) (1982).
The premise required that the characters use various devices that had to be constructed from only the various materials found on a tropical island. Thus the props had to be specially made and the prop department enjoyed the challenge which was a change of pace from simply bringing in the standard props from storage. The bamboo foot pedal-powered car used in one episode was a particular favorite with the cast queuing up to try it out.
The name of Mary-Ann's hometown was Horner's Corners, Kansas.
The Skipper served in the Pacific during World War II.
Gilligan saved the Skipper's life once when they were in the Navy. A depth charge had broken loose from it's mount and was rolling across the deck. Gilligan pushed Skipper out of the way. Skipper would later say that Gilligan didn't save his life, he only prolonged it.
The ship's name, S. S. Minnow, was not named for the fish but rather for Newton Minow, head of the FCC in 1961. Minow was the one who called television "America's vast wasteland". Sherwood Schwartz (http://imdb.com/name/nm0777442/) did not care for Minow so he named the soon-to-be shipwrecked ship after him.
"The radio" seen in virtually every episode was a Packard-Bell AM Radio, Model AR-851. The small silver handle and telescoping antenna were added by the prop department (despite the fact that AM radios do not use telescoping antennas). The antenna was likely added to lend credence to the castaways' ability to pick up radio signals so far from civilization.
Alan Hale Jr. (http://imdb.com/name/nm0001308/) was on location in Utah filming a movie when he got a call to come back to Los Angeles to do a screen test for "Gilligan's Island" (http://imdb.com/title/tt0057751/) (1964). Hale rode a horse to the highway, hitchhiked to Las Vegas and flew to L.A. to test with Bob Denver (http://imdb.com/name/nm0001134/).