Maverick: Legend of the West

MAVERICK: LEGEND OF THE WEST is a behind-the-scenes look at the iconic Emmy Award-winning Western series that turned the genre inside out, featuring interviews and commentary from series creator and producer Roy Huggins, writers Marion Hargrove and Howard Browne, directors Budd Boetticher and Leslie H. Martinson, producer Coles Trapnell, actors Roger Moore (“Beau Maverick”) and Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (“Dandy Jim Buckley”), and other key series personnel.
Bret Maverick (James Garner), and later his brother Bart (Jack Kelly), neither looked nor behaved like a traditional cowboy hero. He dressed in black, played cards for a living, and wasn’t above sneaking out the back door if it meant avoiding trouble. At a time when television was chock full of Westerns, Maverick (ABC, 1957-1962) stood out from the pack, putting series creator Roy Huggins on the map as a producer while making James Garner a star.
Maverick quickly became a bona fide TV legend, burning itself indelibly in the hearts and minds of Baby Boomers around the world. But like most legends, the show’s history on television is a mixture of fact and fiction. MAVERICK: LEGEND OF THE WEST examines the myths and the realities, probing what made Maverick such a huge success in its first two seasons, while also revealing the backstage struggles with Warner Bros. that eventually drove away Huggins and Garner, the show’s two key components.
This revised third edition includes more than a dozen new interviews with such Maverick guest stars as William Reynolds, Ruta Lee, Connie Stevens, William Schallert, Dawn Wells, and Mike Connors; additional photographs that did not appear in previous editions of this book; new behind-the-scenes information about the series, including a freshly discovered revelation about Maverick’s fifth season; new comments from James Garner himself; and more.