Adam Cartwright, the eldest son in the Cartwright family on classic television’s Bonanza program, was portrayed by Pernell Roberts Jr.—one of the top actors of his time.
Roberts was born in 1928 in Waycross, Ga. As a young man, he once commented, “I distinguished myself by flunking out of college three times.” After pursuing occupations that ranged from tombstone maker to railroad riveter, he decided to become an actor.
His most famous role was Adam, an architectural engineer with a university education and was the one responsible for building the impressive Ponderosa ranch house.
Roberts left the show after five seasons. Despite leaving the show as a very popular regular, the character of Adam continued to make brief appearances over the next few seasons, before finally leaving for good.
“They told me the four characters (Lorne Greene, himself, Dan Blocker and Michael Landon as his brothers) would be carefully defined and the scripts carefully prepared,” he complained to The Associated Press in 1964. “None of it ever happened.”
“Doesn’t it seem a bit silly for three adult males to get Father’s permission for everything they do?” he once asked a reporter.
Roberts agreed to fulfill his six-year contract but refused to extend it, and when he left the series in 1965, his character was eliminated with the explanation that he had simply moved away.
After Bonanza, Roberts mainly made appearances on TV shows and in miniseries, or toured with such theatrical productions as “The King and I, “Camelot” and “The Music Man.”
His TV credits during that time included “The Virginian,” “Hawaii Five-O,” “Mission Impossible,” “Marcus Welby, M.D.,” “Banacek,” “Ironside” and “Mannix.”
In 1979, he landed another series, “Trapper John, M.D.,” in which he played the title role.
The character, but little else, was spun off from the brilliant Korean War comedy-drama “M-A-S-H,” in which Wayne Rogers had played the offbeat Dr. “Trapper” John McIntire opposite Alan Alda’s Dr. Benjamin Franklin “Hawkeye” Pierce.
Rogers had left that series after just three seasons.
In “Trapper John, M.D.,” the Korean War was nearly 30 years past and Roberts’ character was now a balding, middle-aged chief of surgery at San Francisco Memorial Hospital. He no longer fought the establishment, having learned how to deal with it with patience and wry humor.
From 1991 to 1993, in his last venture into television, Roberts lent his voice to narrate the TV anthology series FBI: The Untold Stories.
Although Pernell Roberts’ leaving the show was a surprise to his fans, it wasn’t a surprise for Bonanza’s production team. Roberts disliked the “assembly-line” mindset that stood behind the production of a serialized television show and also believed that his character’s dependence on his father was unrealistic, considering Adam was university educated, smart, and over 30 years old, but still sought out his “Pa’s” approval.
Ask fans of Bonanza about the show, and they’re more likely than not to start humming its theme song to themselves. But while the show’s theme song was unforgettable, not many fans know that it actually had lyrics that were originally sung by the show’s lead actors.
This version of the song was never aired, though, and instead, its instrumental version was played in every episode. This song was itself quite successful and it secured 19th position on the hit parade back in 1961.
The show was considered the second longest-running TV western of all time. With 14 seasons and 431 episodes, for nearly two decades it seemed like television wouldn’t be complete without a new episode of Bonanza each week.
But although 14 seasons of Bonanza might seem like a lot, there was one Western show which actually managed to surpass it. Bonanza was outdone by Gunsmoke, which topped the list with a whopping twenty consecutive seasons.
While most Westerns – and TV shows in general, at the time – focused on action and adventure, Bonanza tried to do things differently.
The show didn’t lack any action or adventure, but it also took on headier subjects, dealing with issues of racism and social justice that were heavily discussed at the time by the American public. By showing this quintessential American family dealing with these issues in the idealized setting of the wild west, it sparked conversation. This didn’t turn people away from the show—in fact, it only helped turn it into a popular subject for discussion.
Although initially, the use of colored TV was rare, Bonanza was seen across the globe. The show was a major hit with international audiences, some tuning in just to get a chance to see the stunning, full-color visuals.
In 2001, there was an attempt to revive the Bonanza franchise with a show titled Ponderosa, which covered the time when the Cartwrights first arrived at their ranch. The show showed Adam and Hoss as teens, and Joe as a young boy, and ran for 20 episodes.
Roberts died of cancer Sunday at his Malibu home in January 2010. He was 81.
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Adam Cartwright was my favorite of the three sons. I lost interest in the show after he left, but I still watched it because there was absolutely nothing else interesting to watch in that time slot! 🙂
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