Visions (1976 TV series)

Not to be confused with Star Wars: Visions.

Visions
Genre	Anthology drama
Creative director	Barbara Schultz
Country of origin	United States
Original language	English
No. of seasons	3
No. of episodes	32
Production
Executive producer	Barbara Schultz
Running time	90–120 minutes
Production company	KCET
Original release
Network	PBS
Release	October 21, 1976 (1976-10-21) – January 26, 1980 (1980-01-26)

Visions is a 90-minute American television weekly anthology series that aired from 1976 to 1978. It was produced by KCET in Los Angeles and televised nationally on PBS. It concentrated on the works of mostly new and some prominent writers, including Cormac McCarthy (The Gardener's Son), Marsha Norman, Jean Shepherd, Luis Valdez, and Robert M. Young. Each episode was written by a different writer and starred a different cast.

Among its stars were Tyne Daly, Charles Durning, Brad Dourif, Morgan Freeman, Carol Kane, and Judd Hirsch. Its directors included Maya Angelou, Richard Pearce, Michael Lindsay-Hogg, Paul Bogart, and Gordon Davidson.

Episodes included The War Widow and El Corrido.

It won one primetime Emmy Award and was nominated for three others.

Episodes

Print ad in the Los Angeles Times on October 19, 1977, promoting the upcoming launch of the Visions series with a calendar of episode titles, screenwriting credits, and premiere dates for the first season.

Episode list and credits adapted from The Arts on Television, 1976–1990: Fifteen Years of Cultural Programming (1991).

Series overview

Series overview for Better Call Saul

Season	Episodes		Originally aired
			First aired	Last aired
1	13		October 21, 1976 (1976-10-21)	January 13, 1977 (1977-01-13)
2	10		October 2, 1977 (1977-10-02)	December 4, 1977 (1977-12-04)
3	9		October 9, 1978 (1978-10-09)	January 26, 1980 (1980-01-26)

Season 1 (1976–77)

Visions season 1 episodes

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date
1	1	Two Brothers	Burt Brinckerhoff	Conrad Bromberg	October 21, 1976 (1976-10-21)
2	2	The War Widow	Paul Bogart	Harvey Perr	October 28, 1976 (1976-10-28)
3	3	El Corrido	Kirk Browning	Luis Valdez	November 4, 1976 (1976-11-04)
4	4	The Gold Watch	Lloyd Richards	Momoko Iko	November 11, 1976 (1976-11-11)
5	5	Liza's Pioneer Diary	Nell Cox	Nell Cox	November 18, 1976 (1976-11-18)
6	6	The Great Cherub Knitwear Strike	George Tyne	Ethel Tyne	November 25, 1976 (1976-11-25)
7	7	Life Among the Lowly	Adrian Hall	Adrian Hall, Richard Cumming	December 2, 1976 (1976-12-02)
8	8	Pennsylvania Lynch	Jeff Bleckner, Rich Bennewitz	Adrian Hall, Richard Cumming	December 9, 1976 (1976-12-09)
9	9	Scenes from the Middle Class (two plays): Monkey in the Middle and Winter Tour	Rick Bennewitz	Betty Patrick (Monkey in the Middle), David Trainer (Winter Tour)	December 16, 1976 (1976-12-16)
10	10	The Phantom of the Open Hearth	Fred Barzyk, David Loxton	Jean Shepherd	December 23, 1976 (1976-12-23)
11	11	The Tapestry and Circles	Maya Angelou	Alexis De Veaux	December 30, 1976 (1976-12-30)
12	12	The Gardener's Son	Richard Pearce	Cormac McCarthy	January 6, 1977 (1977-01-06)
13	13	Prison Game	Robert Stevens	Susan Yankowitz	January 13, 1977 (1977-01-13)

Season 2 (1977)

Visions season 2 episodes

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date
14	1	Iowa	Rick Bennewitz	Murray Mednick	October 2, 1977 (1977-10-02)
15	2	Freeman	Lloyd Richards	Phillip Hayes Dean	October 9, 1977 (1977-10-09)
16	3	Alambrista!	Robert M. Young	Robert M. Young	October 16, 1977 (1977-10-16)
17	4	The Dancing Bear	Burt Brinckerhoff	Conrad Bromberg	October 23, 1977 (1977-10-23)
18	5	Over/Under/Sideways/Down	Steve Wax, Eugene Corr	Peter Gessner, Eugene Corr	October 30, 1977 (1977-10-30)
19	6	Pleasantville	Ken Locker	Vicki Polon	November 6, 1977 (1977-11-06)
20	7	You Can Run But You Can't Hide	Rick Bennewitz	Brother Jonathan Ringkamp	November 13, 1977 (1977-11-13)
21	8	All I Could See from Where I Stood	Burt Brinckerhoff	Elizabeth Clark	November 20, 1977 (1977-11-20)
22	9	Nanook Taxi	Edward Folger	Jeffrey Hayes	November 27, 1977 (1977-11-27)
23	10	Secret Space	Rosalyn Regelson	Rosalyn Regelson, Roberta Hodes	December 4, 1977 (1977-12-04)

Season 3 (1978–1980)

Visions season 1 episodes

No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date
24	1	Charlie Smith and the Fritter Tree	David Loxton, Fred Barzyk	Charles Johnson	October 9, 1978 (1978-10-09)
25	2	Escape	Robert Stevens	Jonathan Reynolds	October 16, 1978 (1978-10-16)
26	3	Fans of the Kosko Show	John Desmond	David Epstein	October 23, 1978 (1978-10-23)
27	4	Blessings	Arvin Brown	Murray Mednick	October 30, 1978 (1978-10-30)
28	5	Blackout	Rick Bennewitz	Naomi Foner Gyllenhaal	November 13, 1978 (1978-11-13)
29	6	Ladies in Waiting	Oz Scott, Michael Lindsay-Hogg	Patricia Resnick	January 8, 1979 (1979-01-08)
30	7	Shoes and String	Oz Scott	Ted Shines (Shoes), Alice Childress (String)	January 12, 1980 (1980-01-12)
31	8	It's the Willingness	Gordon Davidson	Marsha Norman	January 19, 1980 (1980-01-19)
32	9	He Wants Her Back	Kaye Braden	Stanton Kaye	January 26, 1980 (1980-01-26)

Awards

Awards and nominations received by Visions

Award	Year	Category	Nominee(s)	Result	Ref.
Cannes Film Festival	1978	Caméra d'Or	Robert M. Young (for Alambrista!)	Won
Peabody Awards	1977	—	Visions	Won
Primetime Emmy Awards	1977	Outstanding Achievement in Graphic Design and Title Sequence	Gene Piotrowsky (for The Gardener's Son)	Nominated
		Outstanding Achievement in Lighting Direction	Ken Dettling, Leard Davis (for Gold Watch)	Nominated
		Outstanding Achievement in Video Tape Editing for a Series	Roy Stewart (for The War Widow)	Won
	1978	Outstanding Achievement in Lighting Direction	Ken Dettling, Leard Davis (for You Can Run But You Can't Hide)	Nominated

Sources

• Cook, Bruce (October 1976). "The Writer Unblocked". American Film. II (1). Washington, D.C.: American Film Institute: 26–30 – via the Internet Archive. (registration required)
• Jones, Paul (April 25, 1977). "Peabody Awards Cite Winners". The Atlanta Constitution. Vol. 109, no. 234. p. 9-B – via Newspapers.com. (subscription required)
• Krafft, Rebecca, ed. (Fall 1991). "Visions". The Arts on Television, 1976–1990: Fifteen Years of Cultural Programming. Washington, D.C.: Media Arts: Film/Radio Television Program, National Endowment for the Arts. pp. 100–104. ISBN 978-0-16-035926-2. Retrieved August 3, 2023 – via Google Books. This article incorporates text from this source, which is in the public domain.
• Margulies, Lee (August 4, 1977). "'Roots' Tops Nominations at Emmy Rerun". View – Part IV. Los Angeles Times. Vol. XCVI, no. 244. Los Angeles. pp. 1, 15–16 . Retrieved August 21, 2023 – via Newspapers.com. (subscription required)
• Brown, James (September 11, 1977). "'Eleanor and Franklin' Wins Television Honors". Part I. Los Angeles Times. Vol. XCVI, no. 282. Los Angeles. pp. 3, 26 . Retrieved September 3, 2023 – via Newspapers.com. (subscription required)
• Smith, Cecil (August 11, 1978a). "NBC Leads in Emmy Nominations". View – Part IV. Los Angeles Times. Vol. XCVII, no. 251. Los Angeles. pp. 1, 29–30, 32 . Retrieved September 3, 2023 – via Newspapers.com. (subscription required)
• ——— (October 9, 1978b). "A Living Black Cowboy in 'Visions'". View – Part IV. Los Angeles Times. Vol. XCVII, no. 310. Los Angeles. pp. 1, 16 . Retrieved September 3, 2023 – via Newspapers.com. (subscription required)

External links

• Visions at IMDb
• Visions at CVTA with list of episodes