Yancy Derringer
Yancy Derringer
Trailer for the DVD release of Yancy Derringer: The Complete Series, on DVD 10/23/12 from Timeless Media Group.
X Brands, Frances Bergen and Jock Mahoney in 1959.
Yancy Derringer is an American Western series that ran on CBS from 1958 to 1959, with Jock Mahoney (1919–1989) in the title role. The show was produced by Derringer Productions and filmed in Hollywood by Desilu Productions. Derringer Productions consisted of half interest for Warren Lewis and Don Sharpe as executive producers, and a quarter interest to Jock Mahoney for starring in the series, and a quarter interest toRichard Sale and Mary Loos, husband and wife, as creators. Desilu had just completed the 1956 series The Adventures of Jim Bowie which was also mostly set in New Orleans. The show’s sponsor was Johnson Wax, now S. C. Johnson, and CLEAR floorwax was a regular sponsor.
The Sales based the series on a 1938 short story that Richard Sale had written. In the 1930’s, Sale was one of the highest paid pulp writers. Which story was never mentioned, but it was about a destitute aristocrat and troublemaker who returns to New Orleans three years after the Civil War. In the story, Derringer has no first name; “Yancy” was added for the TV series.
Overview
Yancy Derringer is a gentleman adventurer. He is a former Confederate Army captain who has returned to New Orleans, Louisiana in 1868, three years after the end of the Civil War. Widely respected by all parts of New Orleans society, he is recruited by the Federal city administrator, John Colton, to work as a secret agent at no pay, and only Colton knows of his special role. Often at the beginning of an episode, Colton, a former Union Army colonel, asks Yancy to help solve New Orleans’ present threat and, often at the end of the episode, he arrests Yancy for breaking the law to do it. Yancy agrees, because the United States is one nation again.
Yancy owns a riverboat, the Sultana. His weapons of choice are a four-barrel SharpsDerringer gun carried in his hat, another up his left sleeve, and a knife in his belt. He is an expert marksman. He also carries a cane with a hidden sword and is said to have iron fists: one punch and his opponent remains unconscious for a day. (The belt buckle with a derringer was never one of Yancy’s props.) Yancy dresses elegantly, most often in a white suit with a long coat, ruffled white shirt, a silk vest, a sash instead of a belt, a black string tie, and a white flat-topped straw hat with curled brim.
Yancy’s sidekick, Pahoo-Ka-Ta-Wah, is a silent Pawnee American Indian who communicates only by hand gestures. Pa-hoo-Ka-Ta-Wah is Pawnee for “Wolf who stands in water.” Although Pahoo is short on talk, he is long on action. Beneath a blanketwrapped about his body, he carries a sawed-off double-barreled shotgun loaded with split buckshot, which he wields in emergencies. Most of the time however, he uses a throwing knife sheathed on his back.
Yancy and Pahoo live at the family plantation, Waverly. Yancy’s recurring love interest is Madame Francine (played by Frances Bergen, mother of Candice Bergen), the strong-willed, beautiful owner of a members-only gambling house in New Orleans, her real name is Nora and she’s actually Irish. Bridget Malone (played by Margaret Field, mother of Sally Field) is an Irish lass recently arrived from Ireland, originally endangered by the ship’s crew but rescued by Derringer. Miss Mandarin, Mei Ling, a former love interest and close friend of Yancy, is the proprietor of his favorite place to dine, the Sazerac Restaurant. Yancy also sometimes dines, usually al fresco, at the Charter House restaurant, whose specialty is French cuisine, and gambles at the Blackjack Club. Most of Yancy’s out-of-town associates stay at the King Louis Hotel. Yancy had a brother David who was killed in the Civil War, and his father Yancy, Sr. had also died during the war.
- Jock Mahoney – Yancy Derringer
- X Brands – Pahoo-Ka-Ta-Wah
- Kevin Hagen – John Colton, the city administrator of New Orleans
- Frances Bergen – Madame Francine
- Bill Walker – Obadiah and also as Jeremiah, doorman of Madame Francine’s Club (uncredited)
- Richard Devon – Jody Barker, Bourbon Street pickpocket
- Lisa Lu – Miss Mandarin
- Sandy Kenyon – Willy Nilly, bartender at the Sazerac
- Margaret Field (billed as Maggie Mahoney) – Bridget Malone
- Robert McCord, III – Captain Fry, local head of the United States Secret Service
- Woody Chambliss – Captain Tom of the Sultana
- J. Pat O’Malley – Captain Billy of the Sultana
- Larry J. Blake – Turnkey, the Jailer
- Gene Collins – Willy Quill, Sultana pilot
Madame Francine’s Club Hostesses
- Patricia Blair – Goldy
- Charlene James – Pearl Girl
- Joan Boston – Opal
- Jane Burgess – Chrystal
Guest Stars
- Julie Adams – Amanda Eaton (first episode only)
- Nick Adams – Duke Alexis in “The Night the Russians Landed”
- Claude Akins – Toby Cook
- John Anderson – Wayne Raven
- Charles Bronson – Rogue Donovan
- Jim Davis – Bullet Pike
- Gene Evans – Lonesome Jackson
- Louise Fletcher – twins Miss Nellie and Miss Alithia
- Beverly Garland – Coco LaSalle
- Brett King – Jesse James in “Outlaw at Liberty”
- Stuart Randall – Marshal Ike Milton in “Gone But Not Forgotten” (1959)
- Karen Sharpe – Patricia Lee in “A Game of Chance” (1959)
- Dan Sheridan – George Slocum in “Return to New Orleans”
- Kelly Thordsen – Colorado Charlie
- Lee Van Cleef – Ike Milton/Frank James
- Bill Williams – Duke Winslow