Ernie Kovacs - 50's TV Westerns featuring "Schwarze Bart"

[wmbrown6]

Nice to see the RCA TK-10/30 camera (with round air vents put in) at the 1:39 mark.

[notredamehesamighty]

Typical Kovacs... insightful, funny and on-the-mark for its time.

[ChrisK42]

6:30  OOPS, a blooper they left in!

[RRaquello]

Rancid the Devil Horse kind of looks like a horsey version of Ernie Kovacs himself. Jolene Brand's most famous role (outside of the Kovacs shows) was in Walt Disney's Zorro TV show, which was something of a western. But my favorite Kovacs western was "Blue Bows", which was a spoof of all the TV western gimmicks of the time (Bat Materson's cane, Josh Randall's sawed off shotgun, etc.) that Jay Ward spoofed mercilessly in one of his Aesop & Son's cartoons—the one with the rabbit & the "ears bit".

[pylgrym]

Most all the prime time shows in the Fall of 1959 were westerns. To watch each episode here on YouTube from that season would take the better part of the rest of your life!

[yogafan6500]

Das Einsam Aufseher. Sounds like a cool western. Vintage Kovacs

[rolko52]

@yogafan6500 - "Das Einsam Aufseher" loosely translates to "The Lonely Guard".

[KRAZYCorps]

The Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman and the Incredible Shrinking Man spoofs were great (not to mention the Twilight Zone Western)

But what seriously got me laughing uncontrolibly for about 5 minutes was the Sourkraut Western (as opposed to Spagetti Westerns) near the end.

[xander7ful]

Brilliant. Especially his paranormal, Twilight Zone Western. He was way ahead of his time.

[krelllabs]

Long before THE SOPRANOS, a bad guy on a couch...

[Freenbean]

That "formula for success" is still used by the entertainment industry today.

[rolko52]

@Freenbean Unfortunately!

[pauldavisfan]

Pure genius!

[fromthesidelines]

This was produced for one of Ernie's 1961 ABC specials (of course, he utilized the same sets and costumes [and Joe Mikolas] for several of his "integrated" Dutch Masters commercials seen during those specials). Jolene Brand [the future Mrs. George Schlatter], Mikolas, Maggi Brown and Bobby Lauher also appear. Keep in mind there were 26 Westerns on the three networks at the time this first aired. Rod Serling, in fact, DID create a Western- "THE LONER", starring Lloyd Bridges, for CBS in 1965-'66.

[UglyMannheim]

This is sheer brilliance.

I've never seen this one before. Thank you much.