Broadside (TV series)

The series centered on the women of the Navy (WAVES) on "a supply base somewhere in the South Pacific, 1944," who found themselves transferred to the island of Ranakai to run the motorpool in an otherwise all-male environment. Lt. Anne Morgan (Kathleen Nolan) was in command of the man-crazy, wisecracking Selma Kowalski (Sheila James), the alternately chipper and worried Molly McGuire (Lois Roberts), the slow-witted blonde and former exotic dancer Roberta Love (Joan Staley), and the unit's only male recruit, Marion Botnik (Jimmy Boyd), assigned to the WAVES due to a clerical error.

Their nemesis was the rarefied Commander Roger Adrian (Edward Andrews), who regarded the war as a major intrusion on his idyllic, luxurious lifestyle; he felt that the WAVES experiment would attract official government supervision, endangering his private paradise. Adrian and his easily flustered junior officer Lt. Beasley (George Furth) constantly conspired to get rid of the WAVES, while executive officer Lt. Max Trotter (Dick Sargent) and streetwise sailor Nicky D'Angelo (Don Edmonds) sided with the girls in their counter-attacks on Adrian. Completing the ensemble was Adrian's fussy personal chef Bernard (Richard Jury).

Edward Andrews (as "Eddie Andrews") had appeared in producer Edward Montagne's military sitcom The Phil Silvers Show (Sergeant Bilko). Montagne remembered him and co-starred him in Broadside. "The amusing thing is that Ed Montagne first offered me the Captain Binghamton role in his McHale's Navy and I turned him down," said Andrews in 1965. "After seeing what a wonderful job Joe Flynn is doing with the role, I keep kicking myself for what was apparently a stupid decision. [Broadside] is roughly a distaff version of McHale's Navy. One reason I grabbed onto this series is that finally, I hope, I'll get an identity with exposure every week in the same role."^[3]

Broadside boasted clever scripts and good direction by the McHale's Navy staff, and enthusiastic performances by the ensemble cast. As it was a rule that vehicles on set could only be operated by union members, the cast playing drivers got honorary Teamsters’ cards.^{[citation needed]}

The Broadside series was sponsored by Consolidated Cigar, makers of Dutch Masters and Muriel cigars.^[4] It was ABC's only fully sponsored show on Sunday evenings: "[The network] is wide open on Sunday nights except for the new distaff version of McHale's Navy, Broadside."^[5]

Comic character actor George Furth, who had been under exclusive contract to the studio since 1962,^[6] quickly settled into his featured role as Edward Andrews's comic foil. The writers picked up on their teamwork, scripting several comic set pieces for them.

During this period, another example of fortunate casting presented itself. Edward Montagne had produced movie short subjects starring comedian Arnold Stang in the early 1950s. Montagne recruited Stang to join the series and offered him co-star billing. Stang was then co-starring with the national touring company of the Broadway hit A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and left the show on October 3, 1964 to join Montagne. "I was originally scheduled to be in the show when it went on the air last fall," recalled Stang in 1965, "but I was tied up with the road show of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. I couldn't get out of the commitment until now."^[7] Stang appeared midway through the Broadside run, having missed the first 22 episodes, and he replaced both Richard Jury and Don Edmonds in the ensemble cast. He co-starred in the remaining 10 episodes as outspoken master chef Stanley Stubbs, reunited with his high-school classmate Selma of the WAVES motorpool.

The ratings improved considerably with Stang aboard, but too late to save the series, which had already been canceled. Stang felt responsible: "By helping that show I messed it up for the entire cast. The ratings began to climb and they told us we'd probably be on next season. So everybody waited for the renewal, and when it didn't come the pilot season was over and they were all through for the year."^[8] Arnold Stang did not appear in the last two episodes of the network run; ABC had pre-empted the show twice, and these shelved episodes with departed co-star Don Edmonds were burned off to finish the run.

Studio space was then at a premium at Revue, Universal's TV division, with production at an all-time high: "Revue is lensing its many series not only on its own 410 acres, but at Paramount Sunset studios where additional space was rented because of the heavy production load. Every one of the company's 32 sound stages is busy, as are six backlot locations."^[9] The executives felt that the tropical exteriors being used by Broadside and McHale's Navy—and nothing else—were taking up too much space on the backlot. Broadside was canceled, and the setting for McHale's Navy was changed to Italy, which could be shot on the studio's more frequently used sets with European facades.

The first-run episodes ended on May 2, 1965, with reruns broadcast in the same time slot through September 12, 1965.^[10]

Broadside, with its relatively limited supply of 32 episodes, has seldom been seen in syndication, although Universal offered it to local stations shortly after its network run.

• Kathleen Nolan as Lieutenant Anne Morgan
• Edward Andrews as Commander Roger Adrian
• Dick Sargent as Lieutenant Maxwell Trotter
• Jimmy Boyd as Marion Botnik
• Sheila James as Selma Kowalski
• Lois Roberts as Molly McGuire
• Joan Staley as Roberta Love
• Don Edmonds as Nicky D'Angelo
• George Furth as Lt. Beasley
• Arnold Stang as Seaman 1st Class Stanley Stubbs