Saturdays 1p 2:30p 9p & 10:30p
About the Show
Cast

  • Celebrating the 50th Anniversary as an INSP Exclusive

    Starring James Drury, Doug McClure, Lee J. Cobb and Roberta Shore

    James Drury stars in the first 90-minute color Western television series. Based on the classic Owen Wister novel, The Virginian, who is never named, plays the tough, mysterious foreman of the Shiloh Ranch who seeks to maintain order in 1890s Wyoming. Only stars James Drury and Doug McClure were with the show for all nine seasons, making it the third longest-running Western.

    Averaging thirty 90-minute episodes a season, The Virginian series had one of the most demanding production schedules in TV history. ”There were times when we had four Virginian episodes shooting on the same day,” Drury recalls. “I would literally ride on horseback from set to set to give two lines here, three lines there, then over here to do 10 pages of script.”

    INSP is pleased to present The Virginian on its 50th anniversary as an exclusive series on the network beginning September 22nd, and continuing on a regular basis during the Saddle Up Saturday entertainment block beginning September 29th.

     

  • James Drury

    James Drury plays the star of the first 90-minute color western TV series, The Virginian. He worked in such classic films as Blackboard Jungle, Forbidden Planet, The Tender Trap, Love Me Tender, The Last Wagon, Pollyanna, Ride the High Country and many others. He guest starred in numerous television series including “Playhouse 90,” “Gunsmoke,” “Rifleman,” “Cheyenne,” “Alfred Hitchcock Presents,” “Wagon Train,” “Rawhide” and “Death Valley Days” before being chosen for the role of The Virginian, which aired from 1962-1971. In 1991, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Western Performers at the National Cowboy and Western Heritage Museum in Oklahoma City. Drury, now 78, and Carl Ann, his wife of over 30 years, reside in Houston, Texas.

    Doug McClure

    Doug McClure plays the role of Trampas, a happy-go-lucky young cowboy, in “The Virginian.” He also acted in many TV series and movies, including a spy series, “Search,” from 1972 to 1973, and with William Shatner in ABC’s western “Barbary Coast” in 1975. He made numerous guest appearances on television, notably in the 1977 series “Roots.” Years later his Virginian co-star James Drury was on hand when McClure received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, shortly after he began fighting lung cancer. McClure succumbed to cancer at the age of 59 and is survived by his wife, Diane, and two children, Dane and Valerie.

    Roberta Shore

    Roberta Shore was a teen actress/singer in the 1950-60s who appeared in Disney shows as well as TV sitcoms. After three seasons of co-starring on “The Virginian” – in which she played Betsy Garth, the daughter of Shiloh Ranch owner Judge Garth played by Lee J. Cobb — she quit to get married, breaking a seven-year contract. She appeared in one episode in the fourth season, in which she marries a minister played by Glenn Corbett. After the mid-1960s, Shore did little in the way of movies or television. These days, Shore lives in Utah and appears at Western film festivals around the country with surviving cast members of The Virginian.

    Lee J. Cobb

    Lee J. Cobb played Judge Henry Garth on “The Virginian,” but achieved immortality through the character of Willy Loman in the original 1949 Broadway production of Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, for which he won an Emmy nomination as for a made-for-TV movie of the play. Miller even said that he wrote the role with Cobb in mind. Cobb died of a heart attack in Woodland Hills, Calif., on February 11, 1976, at the age of 64. He is buried in Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles.

    Gary Clarke

    Gary Clarke is best known for his role as Steve Hill in The Virginian. He appeared only in the first three seasons of the show. He has three sons and a daughter and lives near Austin, Texas. He makes appearances with other cast members of The Virginian at film festivals and Western film fairs.