Empire is an hour-long Western television series set on a 1960s 500,000-acre (2,000 km2) ranch in New Mexico, starring Richard Egan, Terry Moore, Ryan O'Neal and Charles Bronson. It ran on NBC from September 25, 1962, to May 14, 1963.
After NBC cancelled the original series due to low ratings, a later version was made to rename it to Redigo (instead of having a 2nd season), truncated from one-hour episodes to half hour episodes, in black and white instead of color, and again starring Egan as Redigo. That version ran only for a partial season. However, even after NBC cancelled the original series in 1963 due to low ratings, ABC reran the show on Sundays, 7:30-8:30pm, on the partial part of the 1963-64 network television season, on Spring 1964.
In the UK the series was shown in the London ITV area (Associated-Rediffusion) under the title Big G, from Jun 12th 1963 to Jan 16th 1964.
In 1965 Columbia Pictures released the pilot episode as a film called This Rugged Land outside the US.
Contents
Cast
Main cast
Richard Egan as Jim Redigo (both versions 1 and 2)
Ryan O'Neal as Tal Gerret (both versions 1 and 2)
Terry Moore as Connie Gerret (version 1)
Anne Seymour as Lucia Gerret (version 1)
Charles Bronson as Moreno (version 2)
Warren Vanders as Chuck (version 2)
Guest stars
Guest stars who appeared on Empire included:
Film/TV production crew
Executive producer:
William Sackheim (E14)
Hal Hudson (E18, E26)
Producer:
Frank Pierson (E14)
Andy White (E18, E26)
Assistant to the Producer:
Ernest Nims (E14)
David Bretherton (E18, E26)
Story executive:
Anthony Wilson (E14)
Sidney Biddell (E18)
Tom Crow (E26)
Theme music: Johnny Green
Created by: Kathleen Hite
Director of photography: Charles S. Welborn
Art director: Robert Peterson
Film editor:
Harry Gerstad (also a part of the A.C.E.) (E14, E26)
Joseph Silver (E18)
David Bretherton (E30)
Set decorator:
Sidney Clifford (E18, E26)
Louis Diage (E30)
Make-up supervisor: Ben Lane (also a part of the S.M.A.)