MovieChat Forums > Green Acres (1965) Discussion > " keep Manhattan"

" keep Manhattan"

posted 5 months ago by MAGolding (1240)
2 replies | jump to latest

The theme song of Green Acres (1965-1971) begins:

Green Acres is the place to be.
Farm livin' is the life for me.
Land spreadin' out so far and wide
Keep Manhattan, just give
me that countryside.

And today I was thinking about a tv pilot - I'll Take Manhattan - I saw in the late 1960s, when Green Acres was on the air. It involved an Indian leader trying to regain Manhattan for his people after centuries.

In this web site:

https://www.itsabouttv.com/2018/04/this-week-in-tv-guide-april-29-1967.html

One of the comments one of the comments at the bottom lists:

Sunday, April 30:
- I'll take Manhattan is a "Failure Theatre" pilot, about a lawyer (Dwayne Hickman) who convinces an ancient Indian chief (Ben Blue) to put in a legal claim on Manhattan Island. Hilarity ensues (it says here).

The IMDB has an entry about this pilot from April 30 1967 but gives the title as We'll Take Manhattan":

An inexperienced lawyer attempts to help a 140 year-old Native American and his tribe regain their property in downtown Manhattan.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0451972/

I remember this pilot because the opening or closing credits had a cartoon depicted the Dutch purchase of Manhattan, by Peter Minuit, the 3rd governor of New Netherlands. But the Dutch leader is depicted with a pegleg, like Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch leader of New Netherlands.

Anyway, thinking about this show early on Sept 25, 2024 I wondered whether the title, whichever version is correct, could have been suggested by the theme song of Green Acres (1965-1971) "...keep Manhattan...".

[–] Seperatrix (1349) 5 months ago

That's a nice bit of sleuthing on your part.

After reading your post, it makes it even more amusing that Mrs. Douglass is singing the line about keeping Manhattan . . . to an attorney!

Would Mr. Douglass have been serving as the defense against the Indian leader had the two series collided?

[–] MAGolding (1240) 5 months ago

Would Mr. Douglass have been serving as the defense against the Indian leader had the two series collided?

That's funny.

Of course most of the thousands of US tv shows happen in their own separate fictional universes. Some shows clearly share universes with others, and some fans have claimed that tens or hundreds of shows might share the same universe.