The name David Gerber may not be familiar to most television viewers but many of the programs he produced during the past four decades certainly are. Gerber passed away this past Saturday (January 2nd) at the age of 86. According to The Hollywood Reporter:
Gerber earned an Emmy (and six other Emmy noms), a Golden Globe, a Peabody Award and the Christopher Award as well as honors from the American Film Institute, the Caucus of Producers, Writers and Directors and others by taking on serious, often controversial subjects. He was a pioneer of multiracial programming with such series as “Police Story,” “Batman,” “Room 222,” “thirtysomething,” “In the Heat of the Night” and dozens of TV movies, including his last longform, the critically acclaimed “Flight 93” in 2006.
Some of the shows he produced, based on his Internet Movie Database page, include The Ghost & Mrs. Muir, Born Free, Nanny and the Professor, Police Story, Quark, Police Woman, The Quest and Eischied, as well as the unsold pilot “Oh, Nurse!” in 1972. The Hollywood Reporter states he also worked on Room 222, Batman and thirtysomething. Reuters (via The New York Times) states he also produced That’s My Mama.
Gerber also produced another police series for Columbia Pictures Television in 1979-’80, based on a mini-series he also produced, that Fred Silverman believed the lead character could be as wildly popular as Telly Savalas’ “KOJAK”. It was Joe Don Baker’s “EISCHIED” [originally known in pre-production as “THE FORCE”, but Silverman believed the character’s name, like “KOJAK”, was a better idea for a title]. It lasted 13 episodes (the last three were “burned off”, with repeats of the series, in the summer of 1983!), and was revived in a Colex {Columbia Pictures Television/Lexington Broadcast Services} syndicated package of Columbia’s “one-season wonders” in the mid-’80s.
“EISCHIED”, incidentally, originally aired on NBC.
Mr. Gerber also produced HERE COME THE DOUBLE DECKERS on the American ABC network for a one-season shot on Saturday mornings. The Double Decker series was also for 20th Century-Fox Television and a London-based production firm.