The Wonderful World of Disney
Season 6
Walt Disney, one of Hollywood's most ambitious producers, was first approached to do television in 1950, when The Coca-Cola Company offered him a one-hour special. The one hour special, "One Hour in Wonderland," aired December 25, 1950 on NBC and garnered 90% of the television viewing audience. A second special, "The Walt Disney Christmas Special," aired December 25, 1951 on CBS. When Walt had drawn up plans for a theme park, known as Disneyland, he found a hard time obtaining funding; critics, including Walt's brother Roy, thought that it was unfeasible and that it would be a fiasco. At the same time, the ABC television network offered him a deal for a television anthology series. Walt wouldn't agree to it unless they put up partial financing for Disneyland (a term that had kept CBS and NBC from signing with him). ABC agreed, and also paid him $50,000 per program, an exorbitant sum for the time. The show, titled Disneyland, premiered on October 27, 1954 and was an immediate success. The program showcased original works from the Disney Studios. Cartoons, documentaries, educational shorts, all were shown to a captive worldwide audience. Variety was the key to its success, as it kept most of what it did fresh, multi-cultural and constantly changing its entertainment.
Where to Watch The Wonderful World of Disney • Season 6
26 Episodes
- The Birth of the Swamp FoxE4
The Birth of the Swamp FoxOne of producer Walt Disney's more blatant efforts to duplicate the success of his early TV miniseries Davy Crockett, the 8-part Swamp Fox featured another flamboyant frontiersman hero who wore coonskin-style headgear and whose adventures were introduced with a catchy, memorable theme song. Based on a book by Dr. Robert D. Bass, The Swamp Fox stars Leslie Nielsen as real-life American patriot Francis Marion, a wealthy landowner who during the Revolutionary War led a hardy band of guerilla fighters against the Redcoats and pro-British tories in his native South Carolina. The villain of the piece (at least in the first few episodes) was another actual historical figure, the ruthless Banastre Tarleton (John Sutton), an officer in the British Green Dragoons (Marion and Tarleton later served as the models for the hero and villain, respectively, of the 1999 Mel Gibson film Patriot). In the first episode, Marion is prevailed upon by his friends and neighbors to help free South Carolina from t