''Flight into Danger'' is a 1956 Canadian live television play starring James Doohan, Corinne Conley and Cec Linder. It was written by

Arthur Hailey Arthur Frederick Hailey, AE (5 April 1920 – 24 November 2004) was a British-Canadian novelist whose plot-driven storylines were set against the backdrops of various industries. His books, which include such best sellers as ''Hotel'' (1965), ...

, produced and screened by

CBC Television CBC Television (also known as CBC TV) is a Canadian English-language broadcast television network owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the national public broadcaster. The network began operations on September 6, 1952. Its French-l ...

, and broadcast on April 3, 1956, on the '' General Motors Theatre'' series. It was later adapted into two different feature films, a parody feature film, a novel, and international television versions in the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany, and Australia.

Plot

While on a flight from Toronto, Ontario, to Vancouver, British Columbia, the pilots at the controls of a

Canadair North Star The Canadair North Star is a 1940s Canadian development, for Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA), of the Douglas DC-4. Instead of radial piston engines used by the Douglas design, Canadair used Rolls-Royce Merlin V12 engines to achieve a higher cruisin ...

, a large commercial airliner, fall victim to

food poisoning Foodborne illness (also foodborne disease and food poisoning) is any illness resulting from the spoilage of contaminated food by pathogenic bacteria, viruses, or parasites that contaminate food, as well as prions (the agents of mad cow disease) ...

. Approximately half of the passengers have also been incapacitated by eating the same fish served to the pilots. After the stewardess (Corinne Conley) asks for help from the passengers, George Spencer ( James Doohan), an ex- Second World War Spitfire fighter pilot, is forced to take over, with the stewardess's assistance.

Cast

Production

Playwright Hailey, a former British pilot in the Second World War, emigrated to Canada in 1947. He began working as a sales promotion manager for a tractor-trailer manufacturer in Toronto. On a flight between Vancouver and Toronto in 1955, he came up with the original idea that spawned ''Flight into Danger''. The story of an airliner whose passengers and crew were threatened by an unforeseen event such as food poisoning was written in only nine days and shopped about as a screenplay. The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, whose television service was less than four years old, bought the script for $600. The production acquired the cockpit of a Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) Canadair North Star and had it shipped by road to RCAF Station Trenton, where the filming took place, including aerial shots. The Malton Airport at Malton, Ontario, present day Toronto Pearson International Airport, was also used for the airport scenes.

Reception

When ''Flight into Danger'' was broadcast live-to-air on April 3, 1956, on the network's ''General Motors Theatre'', it was seen by two million people and received a resounding positive reaction. "In the words of one journalist, it was 'probably the most successful TV play ever written anywhere'." A kinescope of the live production was broadcast in August 1956 due to viewer demand. The play was remade with a new cast and production staff on NBC's anthology series '' The Alcoa Hour'' on September 16, 1956, and later the same month the original CBC version was shown by the BBC in the United Kingdom and was a major factor in the supervising producer of CBC's television dramas, Sydney Newman, being brought across to work in the UK. There he made a significant impact on the British television drama industry. In 1957, ''Flight into Danger'' was adapted into the feature film '' Zero Hour!'' and, in 1962, the story was adapted for an episode of the BBC series '' Studio 4''."Arthur Hailey".
''ABC Bookworld''. Retrieved: September 6, 2014. In 1964, a German version of the television film was produced under the title ''Flug in Gefahr''. Czechoslovak radio (Československý rozhlas) has produced it as part of the radio series ''Let do nebezpečí'', directed by Jiří Horčička. An Australian television version was produced in 1966. In ''Flight into Danger'', Hailey created the template for future disaster films. Character-driven plot lines built up among diverse characters would dominate, with brief episodes or flashbacks giving back stories, and all the individual stories coming together at the climax. Hailey's story was adapted as a novel by John Castle (a pseudonym for Ronald Payne and John Garrod), with Hailey receiving credit as co-author. The book was called ''Flight into Danger'' (Souvenir Press) for its British publication in 1958, but retitled ''Runway Zero-Eight'' (Doubleday) for its American publication in 1959.Hailey, Sheila (1978). ''I Married a Best Seller: My Life with Arthur Hailey''. Open Road Media, 2014. Kindle Edition. The story was again produced for American television in 1971 as '' Terror in the Sky'', a Movie of the Week, and more famously parodied in the 1980 comedy feature film '' Airplane!''.Cady, Brian
"Zero Hour."
''Turner Classic Movies''. Retrieved: September 6, 2014.

References

Citations

Bibliography

* Fromow, D. L. ''Canada's Flying Gunners: A History of the Air Observation Post of the Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery''. Ottawa, Ontario, Canada: Air O.P. Pilot's Association, 2002. . * Haliley, Sheila. ''I Married a Best Seller: My Life with Arthur Hailey''. New York: Open Road Media, 2014. . * Kay, Glenn and Michael Rose.''Disaster Movies: A Loud, Long, Explosive, Star-studded Guide to Avalanches ...'' Oakville, Ontario, Canada: Mosaic Press, 2006. . * Sparber, Max. '' Ultra-Actors: William Shatner''. Seattle, Washington: Ultramod, 2011. .

External links

* {{Arthur Hailey English-language Canadian films 1956 television films 1956 films Canadian aviation films Canadian drama television films CBC Television original films Films set on airplanes Films with screenplays by Arthur Hailey 1950s English-language films Films directed by Gabriel Axel 1950s Canadian films Canadian black-and-white films