''The Lazarus Man'' is an American

Western Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US *Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that id ...

television series produced by

Castle Rock Entertainment Castle Rock Entertainment is an American film and television production company founded in 1987 by Martin Shafer, director Rob Reiner, Andrew Scheinman, Glenn Padnick and Alan Horn. It is a label of Warner Bros. Entertainment, itself a subsidia ...

which first aired on January 20, 1996, and ended on November 9, 1996. Starring

Robert Urich Robert Michael Urich (December 19, 1946 – April 16, 2002) was an American film, television, and stage actor, and television producer. Over the course of his 30-year career, he starred in a record 15 television series. Urich began his ca ...

as the title character, ''The Lazarus Man'' debuted on

TNT Trinitrotoluene (), more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagen ...

and ran for 20 episodes.

Opening narration

Plot

The setting for the series is Texas following the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...

. An

amnesiac Amnesia is a deficit in memory caused by brain damage or disease,Gazzaniga, M., Ivry, R., & Mangun, G. (2009) Cognitive Neuroscience: The biology of the mind. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. but it can also be caused temporarily by the use o ...

claws his way out of a shallow grave wearing a Confederate uniform and carrying a U.S. Army revolver. He is haunted by the memory of being attacked by a man wearing a derby. Calling himself Lazarus after the man resurrected by

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...

(

John 11 John 11 is the eleventh chapter of the Gospel of John in the New Testament of the Christian Bible. It records the raising of Lazarus from the dead, a miracle of Jesus Christ, and the subsequent development of the chief priests' and Pharisees' p ...

:41-44), he sets out to discover his true identity and the reason why he was buried alive. Near the end of the series, Lazarus is revealed to be James Cathcart, a captain in the US Army and a member of President Abraham Lincoln's personal bodyguard detail. The memory that plagues him is from the night of April 14, 1865, when Lincoln was shot at

Ford's Theatre Ford's Theatre is a theater located in Washington, D.C., which opened in August 1863. The theater is infamous for being the site of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. On the night of April 14, 1865, John Wilkes Booth entered the theater bo ...

. Cathcart, realizing that the President was in danger, ran to stop the assassin, but was attacked by his superior, the treasonous Major Talley, who wanted to see Lincoln dead.

Cancellation

The series first season did well enough to warrant TNT to order a second season. However, the series' production company, Castle Rock Entertainment, cancelled the series after Urich was diagnosed with synovial cell sarcoma in July 1996. Urich later sued Castle Rock for breach of contract. In the suit, Urich maintained that although he was undergoing cancer treatments, he never informed Castle Rock that he would be unable to perform in the series. Castle Rock decided to cancel the series anyway and failed to pay Urich the $1.47 million he was to be paid for a second season.

Episodes

DVD release

On February 13, 2018, ''The Lazarus Man: The Complete Series'' was released on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...

in Region 1 by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment via their

Warner Archive Collection The Warner Archive Collection is a home video division for releasing classic and cult films from Warner Bros.' library. It started as a manufactured-on-demand (MOD) DVD series by Warner Bros. Home Entertainment on March 23, 2009, with the inte ...

. This is a Manufacture-on-Demand (MOD) release available via WBShop.com & Amazon.com. The episodes appear out of chronological order on the DVDs.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Lazarus Man 1996 American television series debuts 1996 American television series endings 1990s American drama television series 1990s Western (genre) television series English-language television shows Period television series TNT (American TV network) original programming Television series by Castle Rock Entertainment