I loved Sea Hunt! My dad called Lloyd Bridges,"The guy with the rubber underwear."
Duhhh.. I had dreams of being a deep sea diver while watching that show. I had a book that showed the real deep sea divers back then with big huge helmets, puffed up diving suits filled with air and a big giant hose hooked to the boat. It was pretty scary and mysterious. I wanted to do that, but of course, I couldn't. If you read my previous post, Nurse, Teacher, Or Mother, you would know why.
Did you know that Sea Hunt was the first show about sea diving and the most popular TV show in the 1960's? The star of the show, Lloyd Bridges, never had any diving experience before starting the series. He learned quick and became an accomplished diver and treated his viewers with underwater action.
His character, Mike Nelson (ex Navy frogman, turned freelance diver) hunted down criminals from the undersea underworld and tangled with manta rays, sharks, and octopuses. Mike Nelson was the man of the sea, going after treasures and performing rescues.
Danger and excitement were the themes of the shows and at the end of each episode, Lloyd Bridges made a plea to save the oceans. The footage was filmed in many places, but most of all, the action scenes were shot in a huge aquarium in California.
When the series first came out, the diving sequences were short. As the series became more popular, more of the action took place under water and from Mike Nelsons high-tech boat, the Argonaut.
As far as merchandise from the show, Sea Hunt became number one in sales. Everything from flippers, goggles and rubber boats were selling like wild fire.
Here's a bit of trivia from Sea Hunt.
Lloyd Bridges decided to leave the show after four seasons because the producers wanted cops and robbers plots, but Bridges wanted to focus on the environment.
Lloyd complained about the weight of the tanks on the above surface scenes. So, the art director had the tanks made from balsa wood and painted silver.
Isn't that great? Don't you just miss these old TV series? I really can't think of anything quite as good as Sea Hunt.
