DVD Release: Route 66: The Complete Series

DVD Release Date: May 22, 2012
Price: DVD $129.99
Studio: Shout! Factory


Route 88 scene

George Maharis( l.) and Martin Milner get their kicks on Route 66.

Shout! Factory gets its kicks with the release of the 1960 road tip drama television show Route 66: The Complete Series which marks the first time all four seasons of the show have been issued as one set.

Created by Academy Award-winning writer Stirling Silliphant and producer Herbert Leonard, Route 66 follow the lives of two young men: Yale graduate Tod Stiles (Martin Milner, TV’s Adam-12), an intellectual who has led a privileged and sheltered life, and Buz Murdock (George Maharis, TV’s The Most Deadly Game), a tough young man raised in “Hell’s Kitchen” who’s been struggling his entire life just to survive. When his wealthy father dies, Tod finds himself unexpectedly penniless with just one possession, a Chevrolet Corvette. On a quest to find adventure – and themselves – Tod and Buz hit the open road in a classic American journey.

Over the course of its four year run, the 116 episodes of the respected drama featured an impressive array of guest stars, including Barbara Eden (TV’s I Dream of Jeannie), Buster Keaton (Our Hospitality), Boris Karloff (Frankenstein), Burt Reynolds (Deliverance), Cloris Leachman (American Cowslip), James Caan (Rollerball), Joan Crawford (Trog), Lee Marvin (Point Blank), Martin Sheen (Apocalypse Now), Robert Duvall (Get Low), Robert Redford, Rod Steiger (Doctor Zhivago) and Walter Matthau (The Odd Couple), among others.

The 24-disc collection includes a handful of supplements, including a featurette about Corvette, the first mass-produced American sports car.

 

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About Laurence

Founder and editor Laurence Lerman saw Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest when he was 13 years old and that’s all it took. He has been writing about film and video for more than a quarter of a century for magazines, anthologies, websites and most recently, Video Business magazine, where he served as the Reviews Editor for 15 years.