How Frank Cannon, Floyd Lawson and Roy Stoner made Gunsmoke a Success

The late Los Angeles Times columnist Cecil Smith wrote “Gunsmoke was the dramatization of the American epic legend of the west. Our own Iliad and Odyssey, created from standard elements of the dime novel and the pulp western …. It was ever the stuff of legend.” Truer words have never been written. The TV western series, Gunsmoke ran for nine years on radio and twenty years on television. It broadcasted an astounding 1,046 episodes (633 on TV & 413 on radio) making it the longest running series in the 20^th century.

The radio show, premiering  in 1952, was considered among the first of the “adult” westerns,  to depict the old west the way it really was: brutal, harsh and unforgiving. Set in Dodge City, Kansas after the Civil War, the series told the story of U.S. Marshal Matt Dillon, Doc Adams, Kitty Russell and Chester Proudfoot (later Goode on TV). These people were not your typical heroes. It was hinted in the episode, “Hack Prine” that  Dillon rode with less than honest men and had developed a reputation as a fast gun before becoming a marshal. Doc Adams was born Calvin Moore, but changed his name to Adams after he killed a man in a fair duel but had to leave Virginia to avoid being hung. Kitty Russell was a bar girl (prostitute) who later became owner of the brothel located in the Long Branch saloon (and on TV eventually the owner of the saloon itself).

The radio cast (pictured here) consisted of (from left to right) Howard McNair (Doc), William Conrad (Dillon), Georgia Ellis (Kitty)  and Parley Baer (Chester). However, these veteran voice actors were considered “wrong” for the launch of the TV series in 1955 because they didn’t look the parts they sounded.

William Conrad was unfit for the TV role of Matt Dillon because he was short and fat. But he was a brilliant actor and director who would gained fame on TV later as Frank Cannon on Cannon and as the lead in Jake and the Fat Man. However,  my first exposure to him was as the narrator on the Jay Ward Rocky & Bullwinkle cartoon show.

Howard McNair, who originated the role of Doc Adams, would gain everlasting fame in television as Floyd Lawson, the barber, on The Andy Griffith Show. Parley Baer (Chester) would later join McNair on the  The Andy Griffith Show in the role of Mayor Roy Stoner. Sadly, Georgia Ellis would find little work outside of radio, but her portrayal of  Kitty Russell as the “tough prostitute with the heart of gold” (although not explicitly stated) was one that Amanda Blake as the TV Kitty Russell would work to perfection.

The TV cast of James Arness (Dillon), Dennis Weaver (Chester Goode),  Milburn Stone (Doc  Adams; and Amanda Blake (Kitty Russell) worked on program that had its roots well established by a radio cast that brought realism and human drama into American homes every week. Without the personas the radio cast pictured above created, Gunsmoke doesn’t last 20 years on television. In short, the most successful television program of the 20th century owes its success to the character development done by those who were thought to be wrong for the part: Frank Cannon, Floyd Lawson the barber and Mayor Roy Stoner. You can check out the performances of the Gunsmoke radio cast for free on BOTAR.