FRIDAY HALL OF FAMERS - PAUL RYAN

So far, our July Friday Hall of Famers, we’ve inducted a defense lawyer, a British detective from the beginning to the end of his career, and a hard-nosed American cop.  For our last Law & Order inductee into the Television Crossover Hall of Fame for this month, we’re going to look at the prosecutorial side of a court case.

This week our inductee is Paul Ryan.  Not not that Cheesehead who was the Speaker of the House.  I’m talking about the assistant district attorney for Los Angeles County from the late sixties to the early seventies – at least as far as what we could see on the TV.  (Life goes on in Toobworld after cancellation.)

PAUL RYAN

From Wikipedia:
'The D.A.' is an American half-hour legal drama that aired Fridays at 8:00-8:30 pm on NBC for the 1971-72 season. It ran from September 17, 1971 to January 7, 1972 and was replaced by the more successful 'Sanford and Son' the following week. The show was packaged by Jack Webb's Mark VII Limited for Universal Television and is not to be confused with a show Webb produced in 1959 with a similar name, 'The D.A.'s Man’, which starred John Compton in the lead role.

'The D.A.' starred Robert Conrad as Deputy District Attorney Paul Ryan, a tough-minded, hard-hitting prosecutor in Los Angeles County who was assisted by criminal investigator Bob Ramirez (Ned Romero). He prosecuted all types of cases under the watchful eye of his supervisor, Chief Deputy District Attorney H. M. "Staff" Stafford (Harry Morgan, who directed at least one episode himself). His opponent was usually Public Defender Katherine Benson (Julie Cobb).

During the courtroom segments Ryan also provided a voice-over narration (like 'Dragnet'), which brought the audience in on legal jargon and court procedures and allowed there to be less exposition in the dialogue, which was necessary due to the program's brevity, as most legal dramas have episodes twice the length of that of 'The D.A.'.
Robert Forward produced the show, which was spun off from two TV-movies produced by Webb's production company, Mark VII Ltd., "Murder One" from 1969 and "Conspiracy to Kill" from 1971, both of which fictionalized cases prosecuted by Vincent Bugliosi, world-famous as the prosecutor of Charles Manson. Bugliosi served as technical advisor on both of the pilot films. In his account of the Manson prosecution, "Helter Skelter", Bugliosi stated that Conrad modeled the Ryan character on Bugliosi.

A two-part cross-over episode began on another Webb show, 'Adam-12', in which officers Malloy (Martin Milner) and Reed (Kent McCord) made an arrest. In the follow-up episode from 'The D.A.', Ryan handled the eventual prosecution. Co-star Morgan also accompanied Webb's Joe Friday character on the 1967-70 version of 'Dragnet' as Officer Bill Gannon.

Four episodes of the series were combined into a feature-length TV-movie called "Confessions of the DA Man". "The People vs. Saydo" was used as the basic plot, and, while Ryan is attempting to get a friend of the defendant to testify, describes previous cases to try to illustrate the importance of testifying. The cases he recounts are "The People vs. Slovik" because the witness's idealism reminds Ryan of the attorney he faced in that case, "The People vs. Fowler" to illustrate the importance of testifying even when it's difficult (as in the case of the rape victim), and "The People vs. Walsh" to illustrate the dangers faced by police in their daily jobs. The film first aired January 20, 1978 as a 'CBS Late Movie'.

Here are Ryan’s qualifications for membership:
D.A.: Murder One  
(1969 TV Movie)
D.A.: Conspiracy to Kill
(1971 TV Movie)
The D.A.
(1971-1972)
15 episodes
Adam-12
- The Radical
(1971)
Confessions of the D.A. Man
(1978 TV Movie)

O’Bservation – As stated above, this is basically a retread of one of Ryan’s cases which featured his flashback memories of three other cases. So it should be combined as such.
This marks Conrad’s second character in the TVXOHOF as a character, James T. West being the other.  There may be two more who are eligible, with one being saved until his death, which I hope is a long way off…..
Welcome to the Hall, Mr. Ryan!