Quark

Buck Henry's 1978 Series "Quark" was one of those shows that will always be remembered by its' few fans as the one that got away. Most people don't really remember it since they were watching something else on Friday nights but those of who do know that Buck Henry should have had another "Get Smart" on his hands and didn't. The satire was VERY dry and a lot of the gags missed with those few viewers who weren't sci-fi fans. I don't blame NBS for cancelling the show I just wish there was a Sci-Fi channel back then because they would have immediately snatched it up. Richard Benjamin at least got a lot of exposure and this helped his career despite it being cancelled so soon.

QUARK was a spoof on the STAR WARS craze and had a limited run in 1978. It's run was brief but it was ahead of it's time. The crew lead by a man named Quark got into weekly intergalactic adventures aboard a space faring garbage scow. The show was funny but it's fate was decided and it was never renewed. The show I believe was on a friday night and it made the ratings battle too hard for QUARK to compete with. However the show was created by BUCK HENRY who had done such things as CATCH 22, and GET SMART and THE GRADUATE. Buck Henry is known for high quality work. The audience henry was dealing with was not prepared for this kind of humor. The spoofing of the science fiction craze just didn't float in 1978.

I was a preteen when this show aired and I loved it, but I was savvy enough to realize that most people wouldn't get it. I wasn't surprised at the cancellation. As an adult, I couldn't find ANYONE else who remembered it, even my husband who is a huge SciFi Fan. I finally found a copy of a small film clip in the Television Museum in L.A. Based on the condition of that clip, I fear that there may not be surviving episodes, but I would LOVE a DVD of whatever episodes still exist. I know a great many of my friends who would enjoy it now, even though they missed it then. Perhaps with so much communication through the internet, there will be enough interest generated to get a DVD released, preferably before the turn of the NEXT century!

I was very sorry when "Quark" was taken off the air. The writing was brilliant, and ahead of its time. This is no wonder, with Buck Henry in charge. After all, Henry is the man that brought us "Get Smart", among others.

Richard Benjamin was very good as the idealistic galactic sanitation worker, Adam Quark, and Tim Thomerson, often seen as a heavy, was hilarious as "Gene/Jean", the male-female crewperson. Patricia and Cyb Barnstable carried on ably as the brainless blonds, Bettys I and II, arguing the question of which was the clone and which was the original. Bobby Porter as "Andy the Android", Conrad Janis as "Otto Palindrome", and Alan Caillou as "The Head" were very good in their roles. My favorite was Richard Kelton as "Ficus Panderata", the highly evolved plant man, a Vegaton. I would swear that his was the character in mind when they created the character of Data for Star Trek:TNG.

This show was witty, bright, and more than a bit sarcastic and cheesy. I have read in another comment that a winter storm that knocked out power in the Midwest was responsible for the demise of "Quark", but in my never-to-be-humble opinion, it was that the majority of viewers simply couldn't deal with the fact that it was so different from anything else on TV at that time.

Considering some of the stuff out on DVD today, I don't see why Rhino can't put "Quark" out for us, "Quark"'s small, loyal fan following.

Long available only from bootleggers, this series which played on TV very, VERY briefly (two months in the summer of 1977) and became a cult item among sci-fi and Get Smart fans is now finally out on DVD.

The look is cheap and cheesy and the humor is almost cringe-inducing at this point, so it hardly needs mentioning that the series has not aged well. Nonetheless, fans who remember the series and fringe-dwelling thrill seekers are advised to give this curious 70s reliquary a look. Basically, it's a lower budget Star Trek spoof with Get Smart level humor, courtesy of Buck Henry. Some gags still work, others just make you gag, but the cast is likable, especially Richard Benjamin as the eponymous Quark and his barely-clad twin female sidekicks, the Bettys. Like Get Smart there are several running jokes - each of the Bettys claim the other is the clone, while Gene/Jean the transmute flip-flops from gung-ho to girlie at random moments - but the show never ran long enough to wear them out, so some are still pretty funny.

A viewer seeking something a little different may find the series entertaining, but low expectations are a must.