The Starlost
| The Starlost | |
|---|---|
The Starlost title card from the original series.
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| Genre |
Science fiction Drama |
| Created by | Harlan Ellison (as Cordwainer Bird) |
| Written by | Harlan Ellison (as Cordwainer Bird) George Ghent Norman Klenman Martin Lager |
| Directed by |
Harvey Hart Martin Lager George McCowan Leo Orenstein Ed Richardson Joseph L. Scanlan |
| Starring |
Keir Dullea Gay Rowan Robin Ward |
| Country of origin | Canada |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 16 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | William Davidson Gerry Rochon Douglas Trumbull Jerome M. Zeitman |
| Producer(s) | William Davidson Ed Richardson Gerry Rochon Douglas Trumbull Jerome M. Zeitman |
| Editor(s) | Bernie Clayton Gordon Stoddard |
| Camera setup | Single-camera |
| Running time | 50 mins. |
| Production company(s) |
20th Century Fox Television CTV Television Network Glen Warren Productions |
| Distributor |
Bell Media 20th Television |
| Release | |
| Original network | CTV |
| Picture format | 480i (4:3 SDTV) |
| Original release | September 22, 1973 – January 5, 1974 |
The Starlost is a Canadian-produced science fiction television series created by writer Harlan Ellison and broadcast in 1973 on CTV in Canada and syndicated to local stations in the United States. The show's setting is a huge generational colony spacecraft called Earthship Ark, which has gone off course. Many of the descendants of the original crew and colonists are unaware, however, that they are aboard a ship. The series experienced a number of production difficulties, and Ellison broke with the project before the airing of its first episode.
Foreseeing the destruction of the Earth, humanity builds a multi-generational starship called Earthship Ark, 50 miles (80 km) wide and 200 miles (320 km) long. The ship contains dozens of biospheres, each kilometres across and housing people of different cultures; their goal is to find and seed a new world of a distant star. In 2385, more than one hundred years into the voyage, an unexplained accident occurs, and the ship goes into emergency mode, whereby each biosphere is sealed off from the others.
In 2790, four hundred and five years after the accident, Devon (Keir Dullea) a resident of Cypress Corners, a conservative agrarian community with a culture resembling that of the Amish, discovers that his world is far larger and more mysterious than he had realized. Considered an outcast because of his questioning of the way things are, especially his refusal to accept the arranged marriage of his love Rachel (Gay Rowan) to his friend Garth (Robin Ward), Devon finds the Cypress Corners elders have been deliberately manipulating the local computer terminal, which they call "The Voice of The Creator". The congregation pursues Devon for attacking the elders and stealing a computer cassette on which they have recorded their orders, and its leaders plot to execute him, but the elderly Abraham, who also questions the elders, gives Devon a key to a dark, mysterious doorway, which Abraham himself is afraid to enter. The frightened Devon escapes into the service areas of the ship and accesses a computer data station that explains the nature and purpose of the Ark and hints at its problems.
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Wikipedia