Alan Hale Jr. Starred Opposite A Screen Legend In An Underrated Western Series

Though he'll always be best known as The Skipper from "Gilligan's Island," Alan Hale Jr. is somewhat of Western legend. Simply by dint of coming to prominence at a time when the genre was the most popular form of entertainment, Hale Jr. was as familiar with the Old West as any Western icon. In fact, aside from appearing opposite luminaries such as Clint Eastwood in one of his most important Westerns, the "Gilligan's Island" star played roles in some of the best Western TV shows of all time. Take his appearance on "Wanted Dead or Alive," the show that turned Steve McQueen into a TV star prior to his movie career taking off.

McQueen would shoot to movie stardom by playing itinerant gunslinger Vin Tanner in John Sturges' 1960 Western "The Magnificent Seven." But his real breakthrough came with "Wanted Dead or Alive," in which he plays bounty hunter Josh Randall. A former Confederate soldier, Randall isn't your typical self-serving bounty hunter. Though he's a laconic antihero, he also follows a strict moral code, and often gives his earnings to the needy. But that doesn't mean he's a pushover, either. On the show, McQueen developed the famously cool on-screen persona that would serve him so well in the years to come, helped enormously by the fact he carried an undeniably cool weapon in the form of a sawed-off Winchester rifle. Randall was a formidable adversary to those who dared get on his bad side.

The show aired for three seasons between 1958 and 1961 on CBS, the same network with which Hale Jr. would make his name three years after "Wanted Dead or Alive" ended. By that time, Hale Jr. could claim to have worked with the cream of the Western crop, which very much included McQueen's bounty hunter.

Across three seasons, "Wanted Dead or Alive" welcomed esteemed guest stars including Martin Landau, Cloris Leachman, and Steve McQueen's "The Magnificent Seven" co-star James Coburn. Alan Hale Jr. joined the show at the beginning of its run, appearing in the Season 1 episode "Passing of Shawnee Bill."

The fifth episode of the inaugural season aired in October 1958, just a year after Hale Jr. had headlined his own Western series "Casey Jones." In that short-lived show, the future Skipper actor played the titular engineer in what was a wholesome outing that allowed him to freely radiate his inherent warmth and charm. In "Wanted Dead or Alive," however, Hale Jr. played the altogether more shady character of William Poe, who meets Josh Randall in a saloon and offers to take him to wanted man Shawnee Bill in exchange for half the considerable bounty up front. Randall agrees, but after hurriedly sending his share of the money to his wife, Poe double crosses McQueen's cowboy, revealing himself to be the real Shawnee Bill and telling Randall, "You bet into a hand that's a little too big for you this time."

But no hand is too big for this particular bounty hunter, who forces Bill to accompany him on the trek to Colorado to claim his bounty. Unfortunately, the pair are pursued by other hunters and the Skipper doesn't make it out alive.

The episode serves to demonstrate how Randall's morality doesn't always serve him well. Had he given Bill a round from his Winchester and tried to claim the bounty from afar, he would have come out on top. But trying to keep the man who double crossed him alive worked against him in the end.

Josh Randall found himself outsmarted by The Skipper in "Passing of Shawnee Bill," making for a great episode that stands as an excellent example of Alan Hale Jr.'s range. As the titular outlaw, Hale is charming, but in a very different way to his "Gilligan's Island" character, Captain Jonas Grumby. He's cunning and charismatic, much like Hale's real-life outlaw Cole Younger in 1957 Western "The True Story of Jesse James." The actor is clearly at home in the role of Shawnee Bill and seems to be having a great time double-crossing Steve McQueen.

Sadly, "Wanted Dead or Alive" itself became one of the best Western TV shows nobody talks about anymore. Overshadowed by juggernauts such as "Gunsmoke," the series just doesn't get the due it deserves today. Even while audiences recall how "Rawhide" turned Clint Eastwood into a cowboy and launched his career, "Wanted Dead or Alive" rarely gets the same recognition for how it propelled McQueen to stardom.

Not that McQueen, or Hale for that matter, cared too much. While the former soon went on to bigger things, the latter was only a few years away from his debut as The Skipper, by which point McQueen had become one of many greats with whom the experienced character actor had worked. That said, many of Hale's supporting roles didn't actually give him all that much to do. "Passing of Shawnee Bill," however, gave him as much screen time as McQueen himself, and is one of the best Alan Hale Jr. guest spots in a career full of memorable performances.