Television was usually the springboard for many an illustrious movie career. Clint Eastwood, (Rawhide), Steve McQueen (Wanted Dead or Alive) and James Garner (Maverick), are three Hollywood heavyweights that got their start on the small screen. However, it was also a place where aging movie stars tended to retreat to when their box office clout had begun to fade. Rock Hudson, (McMillan and Wife), Ronald Reagan/Robert Taylor, (Death Valley Days), Buddy Ebsen, (The Beverley Hillbillies/Barnaby Jones. In fact, Ebsen made the transition so successfully, that today he is best remembered as a TV star than as a movie song and dance man.
Well in 1971, Glenn Ford joined that list of illustrious names, with his contemporary Western/Cop show Cade's County. Although always a bankable safe lead in many movies from the 1940's through to the 1960's, it's fair to say that Ford was never really a MEGAstar on the scale of Cable, Grant, Cooper or Astaire, but he did have one quality that no one could deny, he was always likeable on screen and his audiences would, most of the time, leave the theatre satisfied with the finished product.
By the end of the 1960's with censorship all but abolished and a new style of grittier, realistic filmmakers at the Hollywood tiller-pin steering the world of movie making towards a darker landscape that had never really been frequented by people like Glenn Ford, actors of his 'vintage' needed a place to go. Some were lucky enough to make that change to this new seedier style of film. Ford's own best friend William Holden for instance had just made The Wild Bunch, probably the most violent western ever made at that point in time.
Whilst sadly only lasting one Season, Cade's County certainly played to Ford's strengths by amalgamating the two main genres that he had excelled in over his long career, Westerns and Crime. TV was a logical step for Ford. At 55, he was getting too long in the tooth ti be convincing as a romantic lead and TV at that time was still the bastion of family values and to his audiences,, Ford had always epitomised the all American good guy, (with only a few noticeable exceptions over the years), and his name at the top of the credits of a TV show was bound to be ratings winner.....wasn't it? Well, no.
For some reason Cade's County wasn't the smash hit that people were expecting and I think I can understand why. Although totally enjoyable, The show wasn't anything overly special that audiences couldn't already get from other cop shows of the time. The script's were formulaic, the stories too fleeting to garner any real sympathy with one off characters that weren't part of the nucleus of the main core cast.
What makes Cade's County great is Glenn Ford and Ford alone, but Ford's star quality as good as it always was, was never enough to carry a TV show. He was one cog in the machine, an essential one certainly, but still useless without the cogs that make the machine complete.
Ford is joined by long time friend and frequent collaborator Edgar Buchanan, Ford's own son Peter appears in numerous episodes as a junior deputy and the fantastic plethora of guest stars make it a joy to watch too. Some had been working on and off with Ford for decades such as Edmond O'Brien, Russ Tamblyn, Broderick Crawford. Others were just those great characters you loved to see on your screen such as John Payne, Bobby Darin, William Shatner. No expense seemed to have been spared to make Cade's County a hit, but sadly it never was, but even after over 50 years, it's still worth checking out. I'm not aware of any official release of the series on Video or DVD, but there are episodes dotted about on YouTube if you care to find them, and I highly recommend you do.
Enjoy!
