I'm not sure if I've ever even seen an episode of THE CISCO KID, but I'm certainly fascinated by its early switch to color film.
Does anyone know which season and which episode this series went to color? I know that THE ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN went to color in 1955, but this surpases even that.
Thanks in advance!
P.S.-How has the color film held up after all these years? They did a terrific job cleaning up the masters of THE ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN.
The entire run of " THE CISCO KID " was produced in color ...
However, in the early days of television, the vast majority of home viewers were only seeing these originally produced for television programs in black and white, so there has always been the feeling that originally these began in that manner then changed to color ...
Have never seen any episodes in black and white and I was an original viewer from the first showings as we had an early test RCA color TV set, although it is quite possible some early VHS, then later on DVD, sets have episodes that were turned out in black and white to save money for the producers who may have felt most buyers would think these were similar to almost all westerns of the early TV era which were mostly turned out in B & W ...
In watching the various programs through the entire run of the series you will find there is very bad fading in most episodes in any given year while other episodes are much brighter in same production years ...
Hard to know what the problems were but it appears some areas in these episodes might have been done with higher quality film or were redone again a few times as they kept going out for syndication ...
To-date, have never heard that any large number of these have been worked on with respect to colorization techniques, although based on the popularity of this superb early western series one feels this should happen at some point in order to sell more new sets on DVD ...
Hope the above response proves useful to you in this regard ...
" ALL GLORY IS FLEETING "
Believe it or not Cisco Kid was the first tv program filmed in color for its entire run during a time when most people had black and white tvs. One of the things remarkable about this is that the series was also syndicated.
shareThank you both for your comments. Very helpful and fascinating! I hope they have a chance to remaster this series and put it on DVD. As I said before, SUPERMAN looks superb, and the color episodes alone are 55 years old--they look like they could have been made yesterday!
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Netflix now has the series in original format from beginning to end. Brings back memories -- in black and white when i saw it of course. And their shows ended with the two of them riding up to the camera: Cisco says "goodbye amigos", and Pancho says, "see you soon, aha". Great stuff!!
shareThose end lines change from season to season. I started watching these on GRIT-TV a few months ago. The first ones I watched had Cisco saying, "Adios, Amigos." and Pancho saying, "Hasta la vista." After several episodes it switched to "Good-bye, amigos." and "See you soon." I wonder if there were complaints about using Spanish ---although I only remember such complaints and the English-only movement coming later -maybe in the 1980s or 90s. At the end of some episodes, Pancho says, something like "Do we really have to leave all our good friends so soon?" and Cisco says, "Only 'til next time."
And once in a while they don't say "Oh, Pancho." "Oh, Cisco." (It doesn't happen often but once in a while.
I watched those when I was a kid (on our B&W TV. ) At that time I was a cow-girl at heart, even though I lived in a big city. I loved playing cowboys with the neighbor boys.
I am enjoying the show now because I'm sure I didn't get half of Pancho's mangled English, his malapropisms, or his switched words such as "Don't sit there like a log on a bump," when I was a kid. I bet Leo Carillo had fun with his lines.
Every day, I write down some of Pancho's funny remarks (I've been posting them on the IMDb) and then I read the daily "Panchoisms" to my husband.
I think they made Leo's character like that for two reasons. One, of course was for the humor, but another reason is that Cisco has to explain things to Pancho, so at the same time, he is explaining them to the audience which was mainly made up of children.
Something else I didn't notice or pay attention to as a kid: Pancho's many references to Mexican food. I could swear I never heard of tortillas and other foods he mentions until I spent a summer in California in 1966, ten years after the last shows aired. (I don't think there was one Mexican restaurant within 200 miles of where I lived.)
And I love when Pancho introduces himself with his full name. Pancho Miguel Fernando Gonzales de Conejo. (Has anyone else noticed that sometimes the next to last name changed or maybe Leo just threw in an extra one?)
I didn't remember he had introduced himself like that either. I lived in Brazil for several years and there (even though everyone spoke Portuguese, not Spanish) most men introduced themselves like that ---with at least 5 names, sometimes a lot more. But some went by nicknames that had nothing to do with their real names. Sorting them out and figuring out what to actually call someone was mind-boggling.
I don't think I have ever seen a full show of the Cisco kid. If I have I don't remember. The show ended when I was five years old.
After reading Stormy724's comments on this show I'd like to see at least one episode. One will probably lead to me watching many more. Does anyone know if it's being shown on anything Dish Network offers?
THE CISCO KID was being shown late night Saturdays on the COZI channel, right before the LONE RANGER, as recently as several months ago. I remember hearing about the show when I was little, but I probably only saw an episode or two of it. I do remember reading an interview with Duncan Renaldo in the TV Guide about the show (this was eay back in the day,so it was possibly one of his last interviews.) After watching it recently, I like it because it was simply fun to watch. Another thing that was cool about the show that I'm surprised no one's brought up----for one, it had two actual Mexican-American actors (not two white actors playing Mexicans, as was so often the case back then) playing the lead roles,and they weren't the bad guys or sidekicks,or the stupid racist stereotypes that were typical of that era. When I was watching a documentary about the history of people of color on TV, THE CISCO KID was only shown in a brief clip, and only to make an example about stereotypes---it didn't even acknowledge the show at all, which didn't make any sense to me. Didn't know that it was of the first TV shows made n color,though.
And,yeah, I like that "Cisco Kid" song by War, of course.
The Cisco Kid is on COZI every morning at 4AM PST;
http://ftpcontent.worldnow.com/kiii/PDF/COZISchedule.pdf