The Lineup (TV series) explained

Alt Name:	*San Francisco Beat*
Genre:	Police drama
Director:	William Asher Earl Bellamy Seymour Berns Thomas Carr Paul Henreid Hollingsworth Morse Don Siegel Harold D. Schuster
Starring:	Warner Anderson Tom Tully Marshall Reed
Country:	United States
Language:	English
Num Seasons:	6
Num Episodes:	190
Producer:	Cecil Baker Jaime Del Valle Robert Sparks
Runtime:	30 mins. (1954–1959) 60 mins. (1960)
Channel:	CBS^[1] ^[2]

The Lineup is an American police drama which aired on CBS radio from 1950 to 1953 and on CBS television from 1954 to 1960.

Syndicated reruns of the series were broadcast under the title San Francisco Beat.

Radio

The radio version depicted the investigations of Lieutenant Ben Guthrie (played by Bill Johnstone, one of several actors to play The Shadow on radio) and Sergeant Matt Greb (played by Wally Maher until his death on December 27, 1951), later replaced by Sergeant Pete Carger (played by Jack Moyles), detectives in the police force of an unnamed "great American city". The primary writer of the radio series was Blake Edwards.

Television

The television version was set specifically in San Francisco and was produced with the cooperation of the San Francisco Police Department, which received a credit at the close of each episode. It starred Warner Anderson as Guthrie and Tom Tully as Grebb. Grebb was now an inspector instead of a sergeant because at the time the series was made there was no such rank as sergeant in the Bureau of Inspectors, SFPD's investigative division, and a full inspector was the closest equivalent to the generic detective sergeant the character had been on radio. The TV version, a CBS Television production, was filmed on location, using Desilu's production facilities.

In the final season, the show expanded to an hour, and the Grebb character was replaced by a number of younger officers, including Policewoman Sandy McAllister (played by Rachel Ames).^[3] Others in the cast were Jan Brooks, Bob Palmer, Skip Ward, William Leslie, Tod Burton, Marshall Reed, and Ruta Lee. The announcer was Art Gilmore.^[4]

The Lineup was a Top 20 Nielsen ratings hit for three of its six seasons during its original network run.The series finished at number 17 in the Nielsen ratings for the 1955–1956 season, at number 16 for 1956–1957 and at number 18 for 1957–1958.^[5] It received an Emmy nomination for Best Action or Adventure Series in 1956.^[6]

Cast

Warner Anderson as Det. Lt. Ben Guthrie
Tom Tully as Inspector Matt Grebb (seasons 1–5)

Episodes

Season 1: 1954–55

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Season 2: 1955–56

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Season 3: 1956–57

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Season 4: 1957–58

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Season 5: 1958–59

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Season 6: 1959–60

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date

Guest stars

Russ Conway appeared in "The Robert Avery Case" (1957) and "The Missing Cargo Case" (1958).
Walter Coy appeared in "The Murdered Blonde Case" (May 8, 1959).
Ron Hagerthy appeared in "The Toy Tiger Case" and then as John Oakhurst in "The Security Officer Case" (1957).
Rodolfo Hoyos Jr. guest-starred as Luis Gonzalez in "The Reluctant Addict Case" (1957).
Douglas Kennedy appeared in "The Charles Cleveland Case" (1959) and "The Drugstore Cowgirl Case" (1959).
Joyce Meadows appeared as Paula Adams in "The Boylston Billing Case" (1959).
Eve Miller appeared in "The Christmas Story" (1954), "The Stanley Devlin Case" (1957) and "The Daniel Leadley Case" (1959).
Nan Leslie was cast three times, in "The Chick Madison Case" (1958) and "The Pigeon Drop Case" and "The Girls and Guns Case" (both 1959).
Donna Martell guest-starred in "Girl Safecrackers" (1955) and "The Pawn Ticket Case" (1958).

Film version

The film The Lineup, based on the series, was released in 1958 by Columbia Pictures, with Eli Wallach in the starring role. It was directed by Don Siegel, who had also directed "The Paisley Gang", the pilot episode of the television series.

Notes and References

Web site: CBS-KNX Script Collection . RPTF/ARSC Sound Collections Database . American Radio Archives, Thousand Oaks Library Foundation . 14 August 2023.
Web site: KNX Collection (PA Mss 167) . Library . UCSB . 14 August 2023 . en . 15 March 2021.
Aaker, Everett (2006). Encyclopedia of Early Television Crime Fighters. McFarland & Company, Inc. . pp. 13–14.
Terrace, Vincent (2011). Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 through 2010. McFarland & Company, Inc. . p. 608.
Web site: ClassicTVguide.com: TV Ratings.
Web site: The Line-Up.