Hallmark Hall of Fame Productions
| Hallmark Hall of Fame | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Genre | Anthology |
| Written by | Robert Hartung Jean Holloway Helene Hanff Gian Carlo Menotti |
| Directed by |
George Schaefer William Corrigan Albert McCleery Kirk Browning Fielder Cook Jeannot Szwarc |
| Composer(s) |
Gian Carlo Menotti Bernard Green Richard Addinsell Jerry Goldsmith |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 63 |
| No. of episodes | 250+ (list of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) |
George Schaefer Brent Shields |
| Producer(s) |
Maurice Evans Samuel Chotzinoff Phil C. Samuel Robert Hartung |
| Cinematography | Freddie Young |
| Editor(s) | Henry Batista Robert L. Swanson Sam Gold Richard K. Brockway |
| Running time | 30–150 minutes |
| Production company(s) | Hallmark Hall of Fame Productions (1951-2016) Crown Media Productions (2016-present) |
| Release | |
| Original network |
NBC (1951–78) CBS (1979–81, 1982–89, 1995–2011) PBS (1981) ABC (1989–95, 2011–14) Hallmark Channel (2014–present) |
| Audio format |
Monaural Stereo (from 1980) |
| Original release | December 24, 1951 – present |
Hallmark Hall of Fame is an anthology program on American television, sponsored by Hallmark Cards, a Kansas City-based greeting card company. The longest-running primetime series in the history of television, it has a historically long run, beginning in 1951 and continuing into 2016. From 1954 onward, all of its productions have been broadcast in color. It holds a place in television history as one of the first video productions to telecast in color, a rarity in the 1950s. Many television movies have been shown on the program since its debut, though the program began with live telecasts of dramas and then changed to videotaped productions before finally changing to filmed ones.
The series has received eighty Emmy Awards, twenty-four Christopher Awards, eleven Peabody Awards, nine Golden Globes, and four Humanitas Prizes. Once a common practice in American television, it is the last remaining television program where the title includes the name of its sponsor. Unlike other long-running TV series still on the air, it differs in that it broadcasts only occasionally and not on a weekly broadcast programming schedule.
The series is the direct descendant of two old-time radio dramatic anthologies sponsored previously by Hallmark: Radio Reader's Digest, adapting stories from the popular magazine (though the magazine never sponsored the show); and, its successor, The Hallmark Playhouse, which premiered on CBS in 1948. The Hallmark Playhouse changed to more serious literature from all genres. The Hallmark Hall of Fame debuted on 24 December 1951 on NBC television with the first opera written specifically for television, Amahl and the Night Visitors, by Gian Carlo Menotti, featuring Chet Allen and Rosemary Kuhlmann. It was the first time a major corporation developed a television project specifically as a means of promoting its products to the viewing public. The program was such a success that it was restaged by Hallmark several times during a period of fifteen years. Amahl was also staged by other NBC television anthologies. Under the supervision of creative executives at its advertising agency, Foote, Cone, and Belding in Chicago, Hallmark also transformed its radio Hallmark Playhouse into a Hallmark Hall of Fame format—this time, featuring stories of pioneers of all types in America—from 1953 through 1955.
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