by Unknown
The pilot introduced viewers to the newly christened Michael Knight, who can be compared to the mythological story of the phoenix rising from
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the ashes. The guys loved the car and the girls loved Hasselhoff. Knight Rider lit the fuse of an NBC line up that would get only better as time went by. Assigned to Friday nights, the show began to erode the popular fan base of Dallas and demonstrated to advertisers that it could bring in the teenage crowd, a demographic highly sought after by NBC. Michael and K.I.T.T. bickered for most of the first season, with K.I.T.T. learning that humans have their faults and Michael silencing K.I.T.T. if needed. Bonnie, who installed an assortment of functions in order to have Michael use them in various missions, helped K.I.T.T.’s development along as well. Among those to last the series were Micro Jam and the Grappling Hook. Stu Phil ips, who composed the Knight Rider theme with Glen Larson, has nothing but fond memories of the series. “In the pilot, I enjoyed developing the Knight Rider theme and playing it with the whole orchestra, instead of only synthesizers, as Michael and K.I.T.T. were racing towards the airport. I also liked the cue when Michael wakes up after being rescued by Wilton. It did not quite fit, as it did not fol ow the musical trend of the episode. The pilot had a lot of musical variety to it, starting in Vegas and covering a variety of situations. In my opinion, the fol owing episodes became very typical TV fare.”
David Hasselhoff reflected in a 1983 TV Guide article on the limitation of some of the earlier scripts, especially “Deadly Maneuvers.”
K.I.T.T.’s incredible cockpit [Courtesy P. Sher Jr/Code One Auto] One Man Can Make a Difference •
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“There’s my costar in Knight Rider, for example,” he says. “It is a car—
a souped-up computerized Pontiac Trans Am called K.I.T.T., that can talk, think, fly 50 feet through the air, drive by itself, intercept police calls, elevate me through its roof, push huge dump trucks out of the way, plough through walls, do 10 times as much as the General Lee in The Dukes of Hazzard. But, in one show, K.I.T.T. was faced with the simple task of towing the car of a young woman who had stalled along the highway. K.I.T.T. broke down trying to do the tow, and we had to improvise a line for the car to say to me. When the car could not make the simple tow, Bill Daniels had to explain in a haughty tone of voice, ‘Towing is not my thing’.”
In “Good Day At White Rock,” Michael fights bikers who want to take over a small town. Anne Lockhart, who played Sherry Benson in the episode, recalls, “The episode started shooting on August 9, 1982 in Lake Sherwood, California and finished on August 17. The episode was shot knowing that Knight Rider was now a series.” Although this was Lockhart’s first appearance on Knight Rider, she was already familiar with the series.
“In early 1982, I went to an NBC office screen test to read for the role of Bonnie Barstow. I was brought into the room full of executives and, at this point, it was hard to understand the talking car concept—it was not fully explained. They kept asking me to talk to a table! So, I auditioned with a table but I did not get the part.” Lockhart, well known from her Battlestar Galactica days, says they joked often on the set. “We gave David the nickname ‘Knight Worm’, in reference to a scene in the episode where he jokes around about the night crawlers.” James Callahan, who played the sheriff, adds, “Anne was going through a rough time but you couldn’t tell when she was in character. She was a real trooper and she looked very much like her mom, who I also worked with. I remember how hard working and friendly David Hasselhoff was, and how talented the motorcycle riders were after witnessing some of the bike stunts they performed.” So what did Lockhart think of her most unusual experience of being in a show with a talking car? “Having not seen the effect of the talking car, I had to 32
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just look at the console—the script girl read the lines. There was no focus, nothing to aim at when talking. In most cases, you have some place to look. It was very odd to hear the script girl reciting the lines!”
“Not a Drop To Drink” began filming in September 1982 and Sondra Currie (who later would marry Knight Rider 2000 director Alan J. Levi) was brought in to play a feisty red-head. Currie remembers that, “Bob Cinader was fabulous to work for and a really sweet guy. It was much easier to work when he took a liking to you. Bob especially wanted me to get this role and even worked around my schedule.” Currie, however, managed to get in to a bit of trouble on the set. “We were shooting and I decided to wash my face after a scene. They tore into me because they had to reapply my makeup from scratch!” Currie remains proud of her role and adds, “For those who might have noticed, I actually did fall off the bull when it got away and I fell trying to catch him!” The role got her the chance to play a woman who could stand up and take charge. Hannah L. Shearer, who wrote the episode, and Currie remain friends to this day. Shearer recalls, “The network felt uneasy about the scene that took place on the river where Francesca Morgan is seen carrying a gun. I fought the network and told them it was necessary to the plot.” Currie was not fond of the scene either, saying that, “It looked funny and awkward since David was so tall. From that point on, they tried to cast women who were more David’s height.” Currie still jokes that Virgil W. Vogel, the director of the episode, called her “doll” because Currie always felt that her right side was the best side to film. To that, she says Vogel would say, “Look at what the doll wants!”
Stuntman Jack Gill was amused by the General Lee imposter seen in
“Give Me Liberty…or Give Me Death.” Since Gill was responsible for the stunt work in both The Dukes of Hazzard and Knight Rider, the crew teased him a bit about the irony of jumping over the General Lee.
“Everyone was telling me, ‘Oh, now you’re jumping over yourself.’ We almost did not do that shot because I had weighted the car out and the transportation guy was bringing it over. He did not know that the weights One Man Can Make a Difference •
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were in it and lost control. The car tumbled down a hill and was completely wrecked. Luckily, I had another car on the trailer with a cage in it so we pulled it off with that car.”
The most famous (and most reused) Knight Rider car jump came in season one’s “The Topaz Connection,” where a driverless K.I.T.T. leaps a ravine. Jack Gill recalls, “That ravine was 90 feet across and I had to use a bulldozer to create the road so I could build up enough speed. We always mount a camera inside a crash box on the right side of the car for a pointof-view feeling. We ran cables from the box into the car and then I would turn the camera on when I approached the ramp. It would only run for about a minute. When I hit the ramp, it broke the cable loose and sent it flying through the air. When I hit on the other side, the camera came loose and started tumbling, but the footage survived.” The dangling cable can be seen in the episode. That jump would be reused in “Nobody Does It Better,” “Lost Knight,” “Junk Yard Dog,” and “Knight Flight to Freedom.”
In a hair-raising chase sequence from “A Nice, Indecent Little Town,”
Michael must maneuver his way through the crowded alleys of a small rural town to subdue a criminal. Jack Gill recalls one of his toughest car jumps from this episode: “There was only a foot and a half clearance on either side of the car. When I landed, the entire steering column broke off and fell into my lap. Had it happened before the car took flight, I probably would have hit the building.” Besides having to worry about the jump, Gill was also distracted by a disbelieving professor. “A technical advisor from a college came out to watch the jump. He got his tape measure out, measured the ramp, and began making some calculations. He then proceeded to tell the producers and the policemen that I would never make it across Main Street. He said that I would only make it about halfway across and then crash into the cars below. I told him that I had done these jumps a hundred times and finally convinced the producers that I could do it. When I completed the jump successfully, I got out of the car
only to find the guy getting into his car and leaving without saying a word.”
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The early part of the first season found Michael saving a stunt show, protecting a senator from a crooked politician, and busting Devon out of jail on trumped up charges. One of the highlights of Knight Rider’s freshman season was “Trust Doesn’t Rust.” We learn about the Knight Automated Roving Robot, or K.A.R.R., who was for all intents and purposes a failed prototype of K.I.T.T. Given no personality and essentially no conscience, the car had all the abilities of K.I.T.T., but little of his concern for the preservation of human life. K.A.R.R. became a menace to society, forcing Michael and K.I.T.T. to stop the car before it hurt anyone. Setting K.I.T.T. on a collision course, Michael risked it all and came out the winner. However, when Michael pulled K.I.T.T. into the semi for a few repairs, a whole new conflict emerged.
Bonnie and Michael begin flirting with each other and Michael took a risk and asked her out. However, Bonnie’s work came first and that meant the car before the man. Michael poked fun at her several times during the first season and Patricia McPherson utilized whatever little screen time she was given to make the viewers interested in her character. Bonnie showed the viewers that a mechanic can be a female and have brains. Her white overalls were dropped after the first season in favor of more casual clothing. After Bonnie returned in season three, she and Michael grew closer as friends. The first season provided Michael with a great bickering partner as well as a boss who was sympathetic to Michael’s need for a constant vacation, most of the time.
McPherson recalls her character and her attire during that first season.
“Actually, the white overalls were nice because, at first, the character was supposed to be wearing some hot, super flashy, gaudy thing, and I asked if we could tone it down. The dressers at the time believed that the way to go was a sophisticated appearance. That is how the white costuming with the black boots came about, to try to give Bonnie a more sophisticated and elegant look. As the episodes progressed, they went into more color. It got tough wearing this white thing day after day, it was like ‘enough of this, can we move into new looks for the character?’”
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While they become like family later in the series, Devon Miles and Michael Knight did not always feel that way toward each other. Devon thought Michael was foolish and Michael thought Devon followed the rulebook too much. However, this type of conflict was exactly what made the first season unique and exciting. Devon watched over Michael as a father would, but still feuded with him over little things, like his “girl of the week” mentality—which only got worse after he gave up on Bonnie. Aside from “Hearts of Stone,” the biggest transition episode of the first season was “White Bird.” In it, Devon tells Michael that he had to give up on love too, Bonnie is heartbroken that she never knew Michael had a fiancée before he was shot, and K.I.T.T. cannot understand why Michael is acting the way he is. No longer is the first season working towards the characters getting to know each other, but they now become family and must work together to make a difference.
David worked off the screen as well, making personal appearances to get interest in the show. “I’ve used my weekends to do 17 personal appearances all over the country—the crowds got bigger and more enthusiastic each time out. I also noticed that the audiences changed along the way from primarily four-year-olds to a broad cross-section of the population.” As the season went along, David was getting noticed and so was the show. “I really felt we were going over the top when the show got a People’s Choice Award nomination for the most popular program of the year and I won the award for Most Popular Male in a New Television Series.” Knight Rider was on its way up and Hasselhoff was enjoying the ride.
Larson reflects on the beginnings of the show by explaining that, “My deal with them was really to create a pilot and then supervise the hiring of a staff, and supervise the first 13 episodes. Give notes, tell them what I think should be done. I was somewhat critical of the first 13. When they assembled the show, I felt they cut a few corners in a few places. I probably would have spent a little more money in a couple places and I would 36
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have probably opted for a bit more humor, a little closer to the pilot. They were good traditional 8 o’clock episodes.”
When asked to reflect on the style of the late Robert Cinader, Larson commented that, “Bob Cinader was the first producer and he came from the Jack Webb (of Dragnet fame) cast. Jack was not known for his humor. He had an entirely different style. I used a phrase—not situation comedy, but predicament humor. Get the guy in trouble so the audience is chuckling. Bob did not do much writing as he was more of a supervising producer. It was a source of annoyance at Fox. The real revelation to me was not that it scored with younger people, boys especially, but the professional people I knew. I got calls from people I never heard of telling me how much they loved this new show and it revealed to me what a love interest people had with cars.”
Glen Larson handed the show over to Robert Foster after the first thirteen episodes and replaced Stu Phillips with another well-known composer named Don Peake. Peake recalled how he became involved with the series. “I had just done a TV Movie called I Desire for NBC. I got a phone call a few weeks later from Robert Foster, who wrote the movie. He really liked the score from it and asked if I was interested in writing music for a show about a car. I was a California boy and I loved cars, so I accepted.”
Peake became very involved with Knight Rider, and was even involved in the meetings where they changed the sound effects of the car. Peake adds,
“It was very exciting for me as I was an ex-race car driver and very tuned into cars.”
Peake was given one week to compose the music for each episode. “We did a spotting session, which was essentially watching the episode. I would write all week and finish on Thursday night. The scores were then picked up and taken to Universal where the copyists would divide up the parts. I would come in at 10am on Friday and conduct the orchestra. After that, I would go into a projection room with the producers and they would show me the next show. Richard Lapham, who has since passed away, would sit there and take notes while we talked about the show. He would then type One Man Can Make a Difference •
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up the show in detail (at five seconds, Michael walks into the room, and six seconds he turns, etc). I scored the show simply from Lapham’s notes.”
Peake utilized approximately twenty-five to thirty players in his orchestra, except in rare cases (such as “The Scent of Roses”) where sixty players were required.
Music was an important aspect of Knight Rider and, in most cases, the original theme song was used in a fragmented or slightly different form throughout the series. With Knight Rider, it was not only the theme that was used, but also a variety of popular or golden oldies. Gino Grimaldi once said, “We take great care with the songs. I sit down with the guy responsible for the music and we sort out rock ‘n roll, country, and western or popular chart material that might suit particular moments of action. It adds a touch of realism.” Composer Don Peake adds, “I was also composing the sound-alike songs. I must have done a pretty good job because the original artist would occasionally call and ask if that was their song! We had permission from the publishers, it’s just that it was so expensive to buy the master. It was cheaper for us to rerecord it.”
One of the key elements to any good show is a theme song. Knight Rider was no different as it utilized synthesizers and effects to make a compelling theme. Stu Phillips and Glen Larson both worked on the theme that is now known the world over. Phillips recalls that, “My decision was influenced to a large extent by the network. They very much wanted for me to try and write something similar to a German recording they had heard that featured a synthesizer on it. The Knight Rider theme itself bore little resemblance to the original. It took some thought to
figure out how to approach it with multiple synthesizers. Up until that time on television, the predominate use of a synthesizer was as a lead instrument only. Five or six synthesizers were used to record the Knight Rider theme, along with drums, percussion, and a fender bass. I personally like to make use of the theme of whatever show I am working on. I was pleased that Glen and the network had confirmed that the theme would be used throughout the 38
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show. In my opinion, utilizing the theme helps to better underscore the dramatic moments in the show.”
In 1998, Phillips and Larson achieved Billboard Top 10 status when Busta Rhymes’ “Turn It Up/Fire It Up” used a sample of his Knight Rider theme. “They took the original recording, sampled it, and used it throughout the entire record. I must admit that after listening to the records, it was sort of a kick. Also, having one of the records reaching ‘top ten’ on the charts was nice. The only drawback was the fact that the writing credits now include several members of the group. Oh well…you can’t have everything.”
For fans who noticed the musical difference after Peake took over in
“Hearts of Stone,” Phillips recalls that, “Occasionally, I did watch a few episodes after I left the show. What Don Peake composed was definitely different. However, the producer obviously liked what he wrote. Don used to make demos for Screen Gems music before he became a composer. I would have to say that the main difference in our approach to the underscore was a matter of style.”
The cast and crew were informed during the filming of “Short Notice”
that the series was renewed. Don Peake recalls, “Richard Lindheim came out and said, ‘Guys, you’ve been renewed’. I thought, ‘How nice of him to come out to this funky little night club to tell us.’ He was quite pleased.”
During the first season wrap party, the producers put the number one hero car up on a pedestal with the scanner flashing and William Daniels’