Streaming Peter Gunn

My wife and I are Amazon Prime Members (did anybody find anything worth buying on Prime day? Me, neither). Amazon Prime Video certainly has an odd collection of old TV programs in its collection. Lately I’ve taken to watching some of them.

I never watched Peter Gunn when it was originally broadcast. I never watched it in reruns or syndication. Maybe I’d catch a few moments while channel-surfing but that was about it. Lately I’ve started watching it.

Peter Gunn, created and produced by Blake Edwards, ran from 1958 through 1961 and was unquestionably one of the coolest programs ever to appear on television. A good part of that is its music, composed by Henry Mancini. Before his Oscars, Grammies, and other awards Henry Mancini composed music for Blake Edwards’s television programs. If Peter Gunn was not his first credited score, it was darned close to it.

There’s a sort of musical formula to Peter Gunn episodes. They all open with a segment featuring little or no dialogue, solo jazz string bass, snare drum and brushes. If the segment goes on long enough, they’re joined by clarinets, then muted horns. Then the boogie-blues horn-heavy Peter Gunn theme breaks in. The underscoring throughout most of the episodes leans on a jazz combo with lead vibraphone. Very cool.

Something else notable about Peter Gunn: it had a few recurring parts for black actors and some featured appearances by black actors, a rarity in the 1950s. For example, the program’s second episode featured Leigh Whipper, a rather important person. It was his last television or movie appearance. He was in his late 70s at the time. Mr. Whipper was one of the first black members of Actor’s Equity (maybe the first) and originated the part of the Crab Man in Porgy and Bess. He had more than a dozen Broadway performances to his credit including in Of Mice and Men and The Shrike. He was noted for the great dignity and authenticity of his performances.