USA
/ NBC / x15m-e / July 5,
1954-December 30, 1955
NBC's
ex-head of daytime programming
Adrian Samish produced this live
serial from Philadelphia for the
network.
It examined the tumultuous
marriage of the Jameses, a pair
of young lovers, and their
relationships with others,
chiefly Chris and Amy, another
married couple, and Lauries
family, including her parents
Paul and Doris. Weak-willed Zach
had difficulties at home and at
work at a jet engine plant,
where his nemesis was scheming
Wallace Grant. Wallace eagerly
seized the chance to aggravate
Zach when he caught wind of an
affair between the latter and
Petey. This news upset Laurie,
and in early 1955 she and
Zach separated.
Laurie moved from the fictional
town of Harrison when she
accepted a job offer from
Washington, D.C. While Zach
confided his sad situation to
sympathetic friend and co-worker
Quentin Andrews, Laurie began
seeing David, an attorney, in
the nation's capital, but
circumstances eventually brought
her back to Harrison
and her husband. Tony Morgan, a
newcomer, had a fling with Petey
and was planning to leave with
her until she turned up
murdered. Zach, who collapsed in
her apartment, became investigator Bruce McKee's prime
suspect. Laurie was sure of her
husband's innocence, and with
the help of David they searched
the apartment and found proof
that exonerated him, generating
suspicions that Grant may have
been the real killer. Meanwhile,
tragedy struck Amy in late 1954
when her pilot husband Chris
died in a test flight, leaving
Grant to make a move on the
widow.
She put the kibosh on his attempt
and moved out of town briefly,
then returned and married Bruce
McKee before the show ended,
even though he had to cope with
the possibility that a recently
arrived girl in Harrison named
Jenny might be his biological
daughter.
As for the newly reunited Laurie
and Zach, she went to work at a
dress shop, and he came back to
the jet engine plant following
Andrews's recommendation. Zach's
father Matthew arrived in town
and started working at the plant
too while wooing Leona.
Yet
Matthews world was shattered
dramatically in the last major
story line as conniving Jack
Doyle broke into the plant and
wounded him fatally. Zach
survived the onslaught and saw
Doyle arrested, and on the
show's last episode could at
least be hopeful that he and
Laurie might be heading for a
less eventful new year.
Cast
Peggy Allenby.... Doris Kennedy
Tod Andrews.... Zack James #1
Jay Barney.... Bruce McKee
Patricia Barry .... Laurie James
Frederic Downs.... Quentin
Andrews
Val Dufour.... Zack James #2
John Dutra.... Mike Kennedy
Paul McGrath .... Matthew James
Henrietta Moore.... Peggy Gordon
Rosemary Prinz.... Amy
Melville Ruick.... Paul Kennedy
Howard Smith .... Judge Kennedy
Frankie Thomas .... Chris
Joe Warren .... Phil Gordon
