Leonard Horn

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Leonard Horn
Born(1926-08-01)August 1, 1926
Bangor, Maine, U.S.
DiedMay 25, 1975(1975-05-25) (aged 48)
Los Angeles, California, U.S.
OccupationDirector

Leonard Horn (August 1, 1926 – May 25, 1975) was an American director of prime time television programs in the 1960s and 1970s and helped shape a number of "classic" adventure and sci-fi series, including Mission: Impossible, Mannix, Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, and Wonder Woman. Horn was born in Bangor, Maine.

Career

Horn started directing in 1959-1962 for

Peter Graves
appeared for the first time as "Mr. Phelps".

Contemporary fan-sites, such as the viewer polling pages of the

Internet Movie Database (IMDB) and TV.com
, show Horn's work to have stood the test of time. Many of the 94 episodes he directed for 34 prime-time television series rank among the more popular moments in the first "Golden Age of Television."

TV pilot episodes

Horn was responsible for a number of classic TV pilots. In 1967, he directed the first episode of

Ironside ("Split Second to an Epitaph"). His last pilot, and final television production, was for the series Wonder Woman
in 1975, and was nominated for an Emmy in graphic design and title sequencing.

Sci-fi shows

Along with adventure, science-fiction was among Horn's most successful genres. Of three first-season episodes he directed for The Outer Limits, two are ranked in the top ten by IMDB users, and one, "The Man Who Was Never Born" is considered among the series' classics. Horn's single Lost in Space entry ("Invaders from the 5th Dimension") likewise makes the IMDB top ten of the series' first-season episodes. In the premier season of Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, the four most popular episodes among IMDB users were all directed by Horn, with "The Fear-Makers" called by one user "the first truly great episode".[1]

Other genres

Even when Horn turned his attention to less familiar genres, such as the Western, he often managed to get the best performances out of his actors. The one episode he directed for

police drama Nakia
.

Producer

Horn briefly tried his hand at producing as well as directing in the series It Takes a Thief. His one other effort as a producer (this time without directing) was the made-for-TV movie The Lindbergh Kidnapping Case (1976) – which garnered an Emmy for lead Anthony Hopkins, and a Golden Globe nomination for Best TV Movie. One earlier directorial effort, the TV movie Rogue's Gallery (1968), also landed a Golden Globe nomination for lead Greta Baldwin.

Feature films

Horn directed The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart (1970) which Andy Warhol called "the quintessential, most truthful studio-made film about the '60s counterculture".[3] Horn also directed Corky (1972) starring Robert Blake as a stock car racer.

Death

Horn suffered a heart attack while shooting the pilot for Wonder Woman in the spring of 1975 and died that May at the age of 48 in Los Angeles, California.

References

  1. ^ TV.com users ranked the Horn episode "Sub Sunk Here" the best of the first season Sub Sunk Here
  2. ^ The Mod Squad episode is listed on Horn's TV.com page but not on IMDB.com Leonard Horn, TV.com
  3. ^ The Magic Garden of Stanley Sweetheart Internet Movie Database trivia page
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