"McHale's Navy" (1962) TV series 1962-1966

Seasons:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Release Date:

11 October 1962 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | War

Tagline:

Batten down the hatches!

Plot:

The misadventures of a misfit PT Boat crew during World War II.

Plot Keywords:

Navy | Prisoner Of War | Gambling | US Navy | Con Artist

Awards:

Nominated for 5 Primetime Emmys. Another 1 nomination

Cast

Ernest Borgnine	...	Lt. Commander Quinton McHale (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Joe Flynn	...	Captain Wallace B. Binghamton / ... (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Tim Conway	...	Ensign Charles Parker (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Carl Ballantine	...	Lester Gruber (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Gary Vinson	...	George Christopher (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Billy Sands	...	Harrison Bell (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Edson Stroll	...	Virgil Edwards (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
John Wright	...	Willy Moss (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Yoshio Yoda	...	Fuji Kobiaji (138 episodes, 1962-1966)
Bob Hastings	...	Lt. Elroy Carpenter / ... (129 episodes, 1962-1966)
Gavin MacLeod	...	Joseph Haines / ... (73 episodes, 1962-1964)

Also Known As:

McHale's Men (USA) (working title)

Runtime:

30 min (138 episodes)

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Australia:G | New Zealand:G | USA:TV-G

Filming Locations:

CBS Studio Center - 4024 Radford Avenue, Studio City, Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Sto-Rev-Co Productions

Trivia:

During the final season, McHale and his crew along with Captain Binghamton and Lt. Carpenter were all shipped from the Pacific theater of operations to the European Theater. In reality, transfers of this nature were rare if they even occurred at all.

Quotes:

[repeated line]
Capt. Binghamton: I could just scream!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in "Mystery Science Theater 3000: Revenge of the Creature (#9.1)" (1997)

Borgnine's show, but Flynn & Conway were the real stars

I know this was Ernest Borgnine's show, and though he played it too broadly sometimes, he was still pretty good in it. However, the main reason I watched the show was for Joe Flynn's Captain Binghamton and Tim Conway's Ensign Parker. Binghamton was always trying to nail McHale and his crew (he kept calling them "you and your pirates") and some of his schemes to get rid of them were hilarious, especially when, as usual, they blew up in his face. Conway's eager but almost totally incompetent Ensign Parker was a a joy to watch, due to Conway's comic genius. It was side-splitting to watch him squirm, stutter and completely fall apart whenever he was given any kind of responsibility at all; he'd try to do a good job, and it usually worked out in the end, but what happened in between was always good for a lot of laughs. I especially enjoyed watching him totally dissolve whenever Claudine Longet put the moves on him. Conway was one of TV's great clowns, as shown by his work on "The Carol Burnett Show," and he's at the top of his form; he had the amazing ability to move his body in three or four different directions at the same time--he would look like a marionette with the strings tangled--and that combined with his twitches, facial expressions and look of total incomprehension was a riot. Another actor I really enjoyed was Bob Hastings, who played Binghamton's loyal, long-suffering and abused underling, Lt. Carpenter. Carpenter was the ultimate company man, so eager to please his boss that he gladly entered into whatever lame-brained scheme Binghamton cooked up to discredit McHale ("Oh, good-o, sir, that's brilliant!"), which usually wound up with Binghamton's shifting the blame to him whenever it went wrong--which Carpenter, of course, always readily accepted ("I'm sorry, sir, of course it was all my fault"). Carl Ballantine's scheming Gruber, always on the lookout to make a (usually dishonest) buck, was a lot of fun, too.

I think the series lost a bit of steam when the location was moved from the South Pacific to Italy, and some of the supporting cast was somewhat weak (Gavin McLeod's Happy was especially annoying), but overall it was a very funny, enjoyable show, with some great byplay between Flynn and Conway.