Welcome to the Birth of the TV Movie!

When I came up with the idea for this book in early 2004, I knew there would be a few other fans of The ABC Movie of the Week, but I never reckoned on the power of baby boomer nostalgia. With very minor publicity and no marketing, this little book took off on its own and late in 2007 was designated an Editor's Choice selection and an iUniverse best seller: the company then made it a Star title, which meant a redo.
      As a result, most of the reviews have been added to or updated. In many cases, I added excerpts from interviews with MOTW stars. There’s another important difference: this edition has pictures, and the welcome participation of Jim Pierson of Dan Curtis Productions. He supplied the cover photo, a still shot—a frame from the actual film—of the Zuni fetish doll from Trilogy of Terror, one of the best-remembered films of the series, and more, including his support of the project. I cannot thank him enough.
      I found several films that eluded me the first time around, although one ardent fan assured me that, with one exception, the dates for missing movies in the 1st edition Appendix were exactly right, because he had kept his own detailed TV diary of the entire era (now that’s a couch potato!); it turns out those were in fact dates when the Movie of the Week was preempted, repeated, or replaced with other programming. I’ve noted which films or programming ran on every one of the formerly “missing” dates in the new Appendix.
      I’ve added more trivia to entries where possible (for example, the many big-screen clones of the Cloris Leachman thriller, Dying Room Only), and rewritten some of the text, but kept it all in the spirit of my original goal: to fondly salute (and sometimes tweak) these films that obviously left a strong imprint in the memories of many.
      In the first edition, there was a separate chapter on those MOTWs that were pilots for projected series. In this edition, all films have been placed in their proper season and pilots are marked with an asterisk (*). Film (pilot) sequels are listed under the original title. And, of course, there are now pictures included to help jog your memories even further.
      So, once again, here we go: It’s the late 1960s. The counterculture is in full swing, and you’re getting ready to be entertained by a new viewing choice: the movie made specifically for television.

— Michael Karol
November 2008 © 2008 by Michael Karol All rights reserved Pictures for entertainment
purposes only and are copyright their individual owners

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