Gilligan's Island

Episodes

The pilot episode, "Marooned," was filmed in November 1963. The pilot featured seven characters, but only four—Gilligan (Denver), the Skipper (Hale), and the Howells (Backus and Schafer)—were carried forward into the series. The three characters who did not carry forward were two secretaries and a high school teacher. In the pilot, the Professor was instead a high school teacher played by John Gabriel.

Ginger, the movie star, was still red-haired, but she worked as a secretary and was played by Kit Smythe. Mary Ann, the Kansas farm girl, was instead Bunny, Ginger's co-worker, played as a cheerful 'dumb blonde' by Nancy McCarthy. Because of these changes, the pilot was not shown before the series first aired on September 26, 1964. The original pilot eventually aired over 29 years later on TBS.

The pilot's opening and ending songs were two similar calypso-styled tracks written by John Williams and performed by Sherwood Schwartz impersonating singer Sir Lancelot. The lyrics of both differ from those of the TV series, and the pilot's opening theme song is longer. The pilot proper begins with the seven castaways waking up on the beached SS Minnow and continues with them performing various tasks, including exploring the island, trying to fix the transmitter, building huts, and finding food. The pilot contained no detailed accounts of the characters' backgrounds.

Last broadcast episode

The background music and even the laugh tracks of the pilot appear nearly identical to those used during the series. The first episode broadcast, 'Two on a Raft,' is sometimes incorrectly referred to as the series pilot. The last episode of the show, 'Gilligan, the Goddess,' aired on April 17, 1967, and ended just like the rest, with the castaways still stranded on the island. It was not known at the time that it would be the series finale, as a fourth season was expected but then canceled.

Typical plots

Most episodes of Gilligan's Island use variations of five recurring basic plots: Life on the island, where a running gag is the castaways' ability to fashion various useful objects from bamboo, coconuts, gourds, vines, and other local materials—including framed huts, bamboo closets, a communal dining table and chairs, Gilligan's hot water pipes, a stethoscope, and a pedal-powered car. Visitors to the island, where an assortment of people visit the remote, uncharted island, all of whom either refuse or fail to help rescue the castaways. Dream sequences in which one of the castaways dreams they are some character related to that week's storyline, with all of the castaways appearing as other characters within the dream.

A piece of news concerning one or more of the castaways is heard over the radio and causes distress or discord among them. The appearance or arrival of unusual objects to the island, such as a World War II naval mine. The only episode in which the entire cast leaves the island (albeit temporarily) is 'The Friendly Physician' aired in Season 2.

Production

All 36 episodes of the first season were filmed in black and white and were later colorized for syndication. The show's second and third seasons (62 episodes) and the three television film sequels (broadcast between 1978 and 1982) were filmed in color. Gilligan's Island received solid ratings during its original run and grew in popularity during decades of syndication, especially in the 1970s and '80s, when many markets ran the show in the late afternoon.

Film sequels

Three television film sequels were broadcast between 1978 and 1982.