Planet Earth (1986 TV series)
| Planet Earth | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Genre | Nature documentary |
| Narrated by | Richard Kiley |
| Composers | Jack Tillar and William Loose |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Original language | English |
| No. of episodes | 7 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer | Thomas Skinner |
| Producer | Debbie Glovin |
| Running time | 57 minutes (Total 399 minutes approx.) |
| Production company | WQED Pittsburgh |
| Original release | |
| Network | PBS |
| Release | January 22 – March 5, 1986 |
Planet Earth is a seven-episode 1986
PBS television documentary series focusing on the Earth, narrated by Richard Kiley
.
Planet Earth explores
natural resources; its biosphere and the effects of life on the physical world; its relationship to the Sun and other bodies in the Solar System; and its possible future in the face of pressures the growing human population places on the natural world.[1]
The BBC used the same title for its 2006 series, but the two series are completely unrelated and quite different in focus and content.
Production
Produced by
IBM funded production of the series.[2] It enjoyed success in its original run, airing weekly on Thursday evenings on PBS from January 22 to March 5, 1986.[3]
A companion book to the series written by Jonathan Weiner, also entitled Planet Earth, was published in 1986 by Bantam Books. Both the series and the companion book sometimes are marketed as Our Planet Earth in an attempt to avoid confusion with the 2006 BBC series Planet Earth.
Some footage shot for Planet Earth later also was used in the 1992 PBS series Earth Revealed.
Critical reception and awards
In January 1986, Los Angeles Times critic Lee Margulies praised Planet Earth as "serious, but not dry" and credited it for its vivid filming of natural scenery, use of computer graphics, and achievement of depicting ongoing scientific research of the early and mid-1980s as "challenging, interesting, and worthwhile."[1]
Planet Earth was the co-winner of the 1985-1986
Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Informational Series or Special, sharing it with Laurence Olivier - A Life, a multi-part biography of Laurence Olivier that aired on the PBS series Great Performances that season.[3]
Episode list
- "The Living Machine" (aired January 22, 1986) – The episode discusses Salisbury Crags, and Siccar Point; California's Owens Valley and San Andreas Fault; New Madrid, Missouri; and Ascension Island.
- "The Blue Planet" (aired January 29, 1986) – The episode discusses major new revelations about the Houston, Texas, and Baffin Bay; and makes dives in a bathysphere into the ocean's midwater zone and with the United States Navy research submersible Sea Cliff to the bottom of the Pacific Ocean.
- "The Climate Puzzle" (aired February 5, 1986) – The episode examines the complexities of the Earth's Rajasthan Desert on the Indian subcontinent; northern New Zealand; Switzerland; Barbados; Columbia University in New York City; the Hudson Valley in New York; Vostok Station; the Institute of Glaciology in Grenoble, France; the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii; Venice, Italy; the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado; and Colorado's Lake Pueblo State Park.
- "Tales from Other Worlds" (aired February 12, 1986) – Using Washington; stromatolites in Western Australia; a quarry in Utah; and the town of Gubbio, Italy; and discusses the work of Gene Shoemaker, Peter H. Schultz, Percival Lowell, Walter Alvarez, and Jack Sepkoski.
- "Gifts from the Earth" (aired February 19, 1986) – The episode focuses on the Earth's San Francisco, California; the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California; and the Cuprite Hills of Nevada.
- "The Solar Sea" (aired February 26, 1986) – The episode explores the Earth's relationship with the .
- "The Fate of the Earth" (aired March 5, 1986) – The episode explores the role of life in shaping the Earth and discusses the planet's possible future. It discusses the first Amazon Basin; the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado; India; the International Rice Research Institute in the Philippines; and the Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, and highlights the work of James Lovelock, Stanley Awramik, Michael McElroy, Thomas Lovejoy, Brian Toon, and Stephen Schneider.
References
- lerner.org Overview: Planet Earth
- tv.com Planet Earth (1986 miniseries) at tv.com/shows/planet-earth-1986-miniseries/episodes/
External links
- Opening of Planet Earth episode "The Blue Planet" on dailymotion.com
- Planet Earth at IMDb
- Transcript of Episode 1 "The Living Machine"
- Transcript of Episode 2 "The Blue Planet"
- Transcript of Episode 3 "The Climate Puzzle"
- Transcript of Episode 4 "Tales from Other Worlds"
- Transcript of Episode 5 "Gifts from the Earth"
- Transcript of Episode 6 "The Solar Sea"
- Transcript of Episode 7 "Fate of the Earth"
