Jason Robards, Jr.Filmography

On the Waterways, Episode 13: Tennessee-Tombigee Waterway - Slicing Through the South

On the Waterways, Episode 6: Lake Superior - Hiawatha's Gitche Gumee

On the Waterways, Episode 1: The North Atlantic - The Cradle of the Continent

On the Waterways, Episode 10: The Mid-Atlantic - The Great Eastern Shore

On the Waterways, Episode 9: The Eastern Great Lakes - The Fragile Bond

On the Waterways, Episode 12: The Lower Mississippi - The Working River

On the Waterways, Episode 11: Lake Michigan & The Illinois River - The Midwest Riviera

On the Waterways, Episode 3: Florida - Too Much, Too Fast

On the Waterways [TV Documentary Series]

On the Waterways, Episode 4: The Upper Mississippi - Mark Twain's River

On the Waterways, Episode 2: The Western Gulf Coast - From the Border to the Bayou

Going Home

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Sherry Stringfield, Clint Black, Ashley Crow, Christopher Rich

Synopsis: Jason Robards made his final filmed appearance in this relentlessly heartwarming made-for-TV drama. With her career as a book editor thriving, Katherine Barton (Sherry Stringfield) has no burning desire to return to her home town. But the decision is made for Katherine when she is informed by an Read More

Magnolia

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Julianne Moore, Tom Cruise, Philip Seymour Hoffman, John C. Reilly, William H. Macy

Synopsis: Writer/director Paul Thomas Anderson followed his critical and commercial breakthrough Boogie Nights with this wildly ambitious story of lives intertwining on a single day in California's San Fernando Valley. Earl Partridge (Jason Robards), a successful producer of television game shows, left his Read More

They Drew Fire: Combat Artists of World War II

Synopsis: The U.S. government commissioned seven artists -- Franklin Boggs, Howard Brodie, Manuel Bromberg, William Draper, Richard Gibney, Robert Greenhalgh, and Edward Reep -- to capture images of World War II on canvas. They Drew Fire: Combat Artists of World War II presents for the first time a close Read More

Enemy of the State

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Will Smith, Gene Hackman, Jon Voight, Lisa Bonet, Regina King

Synopsis: The action producing-directing team of Jerry Bruckheimer and Tony Scott is back with another thrill-a-minute ride called Enemy of the State. Taking its "innocent man accidentally caught up in political corruption" story from such films as Francis Ford Coppola's The Conversation, Alfred Hitchcock's Read More

Beloved

Actors: Oprah Winfrey, Danny Glover, Thandie Newton, Kimberly Elise, Beah Richards

Synopsis: Jonathan Demme directed this adaptation of Toni Morrison's fact-based fifth novel (winner of a 1988 Pulitzer Prize), written in an experimental stream-of-consciousness flow and capturing the impact and aftermath of slavery on the human soul. In 1873, middle-aged Sethe (Oprah Winfrey) lives near Read More

The Irish In America: Long Journey Home, Part 1 - The Great Hunger

Actors: The Chieftains, Elvis Costello, Sinéad O'Connor, Van Morrison, Mary Black

Synopsis: Part one of this acclaimed PBS series explores the earliest roots of the Irish people in the New World. Centering on the crucial event of the Potato Famine, this tape examines the causes of what would become one of the greatest mass migrations in world history. The conditions faced by early Read More

Heartwood

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Eddie Mills, Hilary Swank, John Terry, Randall Batinkoff

Synopsis: Young Frank (Eddie Mills), an outcast in his small lumber mill town, falls for the gorgeous Sylvia (Hilary Swank), the daughter of an engineer hired by the grizzled mill owner, Logan Reeser (Jason Robards), to save the business -- and the town. A greedy investor (Stanley DeSantis) wants Reeser to Read More

The Real Macaw

Actors: Jamie Croft, Jason Robards, Jr., Deborra-Lee Furness, Joe Petruzzi, John Waters

Synopsis: In the tradition of Babe and Paulie, this Australian family fantasy-adventure features mouthy macaw Mac (portrayed by Tango and three bird stand-ins). Mac, who once witnessed treasure buried on a South Sea Island, is owned by elderly eccentric bird collector Ben Girdis (Jason Robards). His son Read More

The Irish In America: Long Journey Home, Part 3 - Up From City Streets

Actors: The Chieftains, Elvis Costello, Sinéad O'Connor, Van Morrison, Mary Black

Synopsis: Part three of the acclaimed PBS series explores the golden age of Irish-Americans living in America as immigrants, with children who begin to make their first indelible marks upon American society. Included are brief profiles of such figures as Al Smith and Ned Harrigan. Also covered is the rise Read More

The Irish In America: Long Journey Home, Part 4 - Success

Actors: The Chieftains, Elvis Costello, Sinéad O'Connor, Van Morrison, Mary Black

Synopsis: Part four of the acclaimed PBS series explores the rise of two great Irish dynastic families in America, the Kennedys and the O'Neills. The trial, triumphs, and tragedies of these two clans are investigated in detail and held up as examples of the final arrival of the Irish in the New World. The Read More

The Irish In America: Long Journey Home, Part 2 - New Lives

Actors: The Chieftains, Elvis Costello, Sinéad O'Connor, Van Morrison, Mary Black

Synopsis: Part two of the acclaimed PBS series explores the path taken by new Irish arrivals in the New World. Irish roles in the building of the American nation are examined, as well as the emergence of Irish-American heroes including such figures as John L. Sullivan and John Mackey. Still dogged by Read More

American Experience: Truman

Synopsis: Upon the death of President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1945, Harry Truman became the 33rd president of the United States. This video captures the exciting details surrounding Truman's later race for re-election against Dewey, along with many other important historical moments. Viewers are reminded Read More

American Experience: TR, The Story of Theodore Roosevelt

Synopsis: Viewers will find a historical review of the lives of both Teddy Roosevelt and Franklin D. Roosevelt on these two tapes that constitute part two of this series on the American presidency. Teddy Roosevelt's long years of public service are noted prior to his becoming the President in 1901 when Read More

A Thousand Acres

Actors: Michelle Pfeiffer, Jessica Lange, Jason Robards, Jr., Jennifer Jason Leigh, Colin Firth

Synopsis: A feminist farm belt version of William Shakespeare's King Lear, this film is based on Jane Smiley's novel about an aging farmer and his three daughters. The Lear-like farmer, Larry Cook (Jason Robards), decides to divide up his thousand-acre farm among his three daughters, but he disinherits his Read More

Journey

Synopsis: Jason Robards and Meg Tilly star in this acclaimed made-for-TV family drama in which an 11-year-old farm boy named Journey comes to live with his crusty grandfather after his mother leaves. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide Read More

Crimson Tide

Actors: Denzel Washington, Gene Hackman, George Dzundza, Viggo Mortensen, James Gandolfini

Synopsis: Two leaders with different philosophies about battle and leadership wage war with each other in this tense military thriller. Capt. Frank Ramsey (Gene Hackman) is the commanding officer of a nuclear submarine, the U.S.S. Alabama. Ramsey is a distinguished veteran near the end of his career, and he Read More

My Antonia

Synopsis: Made for the USA Network, this first film adaptation of Willa Cather's classic novel is a coming-of-age story of set in 1880s Nebraska. Orphaned after his parents die in a smallpox epidemic in Virginia, the teenaged Jimmy Burden (Neil Patrick Harris) moves to the farm of his grandparents (Jason Robards Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Extra Innings

The Enemy Within

Actors: Forest Whitaker, Sam Waterston, Dana Delany, Jason Robards, Jr., Josef Sommer

Synopsis: An attempt to overthrow the President of the United States is the subject of this made-for-cable conspiracy-thriller. Forest Whitaker stars as Colonel Mackenzie Casey, a loyal member of President Foster's (Sam Waterston) inner circle. When Casey discovers a plot by his superior (Jason Robards) to Read More

The Paper

Actors: Michael Keaton, Robert Duvall, Glenn Close, Marisa Tomei, Randy Quaid

Synopsis: Director Ron Howard's drama follows a beleaguered reporter during a hectic 24 hours at a New York City tabloid. Michael Keaton stars as Henry Hackett, a metro editor for the struggling New York Sun. Hackett is being wooed by the Sentinel, a more upscale paper, but he's addicted to the Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 7 - The Capital of Baseball

Synopsis: New York held sway in the world of baseball from 1950-1960, and the seventh episode -- or "inning" -- of Ken Burns' documentary series focuses on the dominating forces of the Yankees, Dodgers, and Giants. At least one of these teams played in every World Series between 1949 and 1958, and six of Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 8 - A Whole New Ballgame

Synopsis: The classic black-and-white newsreel clips and old photographs that dominated the first seven innings of Ken Burns' documentary tribute to America's pastime now give way to color clips as baseball enters the '60s in Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 8 -- A Whole New Ballgame. In this decade, Mickey Read More

Little Big League

Actors: Luke Edwards, Timothy Busfield, John Ashton, Ashley Crow, Kevin Dunn

Synopsis: A 12-year old boy inherits the Minnesota Twins in this baseball comedy that is aimed toward younger viewers. Young Billy, a normal twelve-year old, is nuts about baseball and knows almost everything there is to know about the game. He should, his grandfather owns the perennial losers, the Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 5 - Shadow Ball

Synopsis: Negro League Baseball, in all of its triumphs and tragedies, is captured in inning five of Ken Burns' classic baseball documentary. The stories of great Negro League players such as Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, Cool Papa Bell, Judy Johnson, and Buck Leonard help set the stage for the history-making Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 4 - A National Heirloom

Synopsis: In a decade dominated by the New York Yankees, Babe Ruth became the nation's "heirloom." Inning four of Ken Burns' sweeping nine-part documentary series focuses on the years 1920-1930, when baseball's black mark left by the Black Sox scandal of 1919 was erased by the legend of Babe Ruth. His Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 9 - Home

Synopsis: Ken Burns' celebrated baseball documentary has come full circle, from the black-and-white images of the game's beginnings to the full color of the modern era. Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 9 -- Home, the final episode, deals with such threats to our national pastime as drug use by players, the egos Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 6 - A National Pastime

Synopsis: The previous five "innings" of Ken Burns' sweeping baseball documentary set the stage for the triumphant moment in this sixth episode when Jackie Robinson takes the field in his first Major League game for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1942, an event of enormous personal and social significance. Other Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 1 - Our Game

Synopsis: The first episode in Ken Burns' spectacular documentary of America's favorite pastime takes us from baseball's origins in the 1840s to the dawning of a new century, when glorious moments were captured in still photos rather than newsreel footage. Learn about the valuable contributions of Albert Read More

American Experience: Pearl Harbor - Surprise and Remembrance

Synopsis: The magical paradise of Pearl Harbor was shattered on December 7, 1941, when the Japanese bombed the territory of Hawaii. In this documentary, narrated by Jason Robards, questions surrounding that event, many of which still remain, are addressed. Using newsreels, Hollywood movies, Japanese films Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 3 - The Faith of Fifty Million People

Synopsis: The third inning of Ken Burns' nine-inning documentary leads us into the Roaring '20s, but not before hitting the sport's stumbling block that was the Black Sox World Series scandal of 1919. Charles Comisky's stingy handling of the Chicago White Sox, who would eventually throw the series against Read More

Ken Burns' Baseball: Inning 2 - Something Like War

Synopsis: At the turn of the 20th century, Ken Burns' documentary homage to baseball history enters its "second inning." Baseball's first decade in the new century began with the creation of a new league, as "Ban" Johnson's unbending will -- along with the 500-dollar bonus he offered National League players Read More

The Trial

Actors: Kyle MacLachlan, Anthony Hopkins, Jason Robards, Jr., Jean Stapleton, Polly Walker

Synopsis: Franz Kafka's classic tale of Josef K., a bank clerk who is placed on trial for an unnamed, unknowable crime, is given a faithful, if not overly literal, treatment in this drama. Knowing only that he has been charged, Josef naturally sets out to defend himself, but soon finds himself deeply mired Read More

Philadelphia

Actors: Tom Hanks, Denzel Washington, Jason Robards, Jr., Mary Steenburgen, Antonio Banderas, Ron Vawter, Joanne Woodward

Synopsis: At the time of its release, Jonathan Demme's Philadelphia was the first big-budget Hollywood film to tackle the medical, political, and social issues of AIDS. Tom Hanks, in his first Academy Award-winning performance, plays Andrew Beckett, a talented lawyer at a stodgy Philadelphia law firm. The Read More

The Adventures of Huck Finn

Actors: Elijah Wood, Courtney Vance, Robbie Coltrane, Jason Robards, Jr., Ron Perlman

Synopsis: This eighth adaptation of the timeless Mark Twain novel casts Elijah Wood as Huckleberry Finn, the half-literate son of a drunk who runs away from home and follows the Mississippi River with an escaped slave named Jim (Courtney S. Vance). Along the way, the duo encounter adventures with colorful Read More

Heidi

Actors: Jane Seymour

Synopsis: This Disney-produced made-for-TV version of the classic children's tale features Noley Thornton as Heidi, the plucky girl from the Alps, with Jane Seymour as a mean-spirited governess and Jason Robards as Heidi's kindly grandfather. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide Read More

Storyville

Actors: James Spader, Joanne Whalley, Jason Robards, Jr., Charlotte Lewis, Mike Warren, Piper Laurie

Synopsis: Mark Frost, the writer and director best known for his work with David Lynch on the TV series Twin Peaks, made his feature film directorial debut with this convoluted thriller. Cray Fowler (James Spader) is running for congress, partly to satisfy his own political aspirations and partly to resolve Read More

Lincoln: Now He Belongs to the Ages, 1865

Synopsis: This video is the fourth installment of the Lincoln series, originally aired on PBS. This volume focuses on the last days and hours of Abraham Lincoln's life. Viewers watch as Lincoln's enemies plot their final revenge on the man they believed had dishonored their heritage. The video also reveals Read More

Greatest Stories Ever Told: Jonah and the Whale

Synopsis: This video is part of a series that features some of the best-loved stories in the Bible. This episode presents the story of Jonah and the whale. Narrated by Jason Robards, the frightening saga of Jonah, who is swallowed by the whale, unfolds. Jonah must go into the belly of the whale and Read More

Lincoln: I Want to Finish This Job, 1864

Synopsis: By the third year of the Civil War, personal and national tragedy had worn down President Lincoln. However, he focused on his job tenaciously, having a strong sense of history. This is the third of four programs in the Lincoln series, which originally aired on PBS. Produced and directed by Peter Read More

Lincoln: The Making of a President, 1860-1862

Synopsis: A shrewd politician, Abraham Lincoln had the intelligence, ambition, and principles to grow into his job as president. This is the first of four videos in the Lincoln series, which originally aired on PBS. Produced and directed by Peter W. Kunhardt, this program is narrated by renowned actor James Read More

Lincoln: The Pivotal Year, 1863

Synopsis: President Abraham Lincoln leads the Union in the fight to end the awful bloodshed of the Civil War. The year is 1863. The president had a continuous struggle with the commanders of his army, and the bloodshed from the fighting at Antietam and Fredericksburg distressed him greatly. 1863 was the Read More

Jonah & the Whale

Synopsis: A biblical story of Jonah, this animated feature is educational and enjoyable for kids of all ages. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

Reading Rainbow: Sam the Sea Cow

Actors: LeVar Burton

Synopsis: True-life stories can be more dramatic than fictional ones, and Sam the Sea Cow by Francine Jacobs features a real life-and-death situation for its hero. In Reading Rainbow: Sam the Sea Cow, Jason Robards narrates the tale of Sam, a manatee who becomes wedged in a sewer drain. The Miami Seaquarium Read More

Pure Luck

Actors: Martin Short, Danny Glover, Sheila Kelley, Sam Wanamaker, Scott Wilson

Synopsis: This wacky buddy comedy was the fifth in a series of Hollywood remakes of films by French director Francis Veber, none of which were box office successes. Sheila Kelley is Valerie Highsmith, an heiress who, despite her family's wealth, suffers from horribly bad luck. On a vacation to Mexico, she Read More

Reunion

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Christien Anholt, Samuel West, Françoise Fabian, Maureen Kerwin

Synopsis: Jason Robards plays an older Jewish man who returns to Stuttgart, Germany which he left in 1933 during the onslaught of the Third Reich. He reunites with a German man who, as a boy, was his childhood friend. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

An Inconvenient Woman, Part 1

Synopsis: Dominick Dunne's best-seller An Inconvenient Woman had enough plots, subplots and peripheral characters to fill 10 TV movies; this adaptation manages to pack all the essentials into a mere four hours. Dunne's beloved American Aristocracy is put under the microscope in this rambling tale of Read More

The Perfect Tribute

Actors: Lukas Haas, Campbell Scott

Synopsis: Jason Robards, who portrayed Abraham Lincoln in a 1964 Hallmark Hall of Fame production of Abe Lincoln in Illinois, reprised the role 27 years later in the made-for-TV The Perfect Tribute. The film intertwines two separate plot threads. In one, Lincoln, plagued by the war and the conduct of his Read More

An Inconvenient Woman, Part 2

Synopsis: In Part One of the TV-movie adaptation of Dominick Dunne's An Inconvenient Woman, we saw how billionaire businessman Jason Robards compromised his marriage and reputation by falling for poverty-stricken waitress Rebecca DeMornay. In Part Two, Ms. DeMornay is confronted by Robards' outwardly Read More

Ken Burns' America: Empire of the Air - The Men Who Made Radio

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Adapted from Tom Lewis' best-selling book, this documentary by premier historic filmmaker Ken Burns examines the legendary figures who took the small-scale hobby of radio and turned it into a major industry -- not to mention a revolutionary force for social change. Empire of the Air recreates the Read More

An Inconvenient Woman

Synopsis: An Inconvenient Woman, an excellent television mini-series based on the novel by Dominick Dunne, which is loosely based on the Alfred Bloomingdale scandal, tells the story of the mistress of a famous man who he has murdered when she threatens his security. Jules Mendelson (Jason Robards) and his Read More

Mark Twain and Me

Synopsis: This made-for-cable Disney effort stars Jason Robards as the writer Mark Twain who, in the twilight of his life, met and befriended an 11-year-old girl named Dorothy Quick. Their relationship served as the basis for Quick's autobiographical book Enchantment: A Little Girl's Friendship with Mark Twain, Read More

Final Warning

Actors: Jon Voight, Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: This made-for-television drama centers on the events that transpired at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant the day something went horribly wrong and a meltdown occurred. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Quick Change

Actors: Bill Murray, Geena Davis, Randy Quaid, Jason Robards, Jr., Bob Elliott

Synopsis: Bill Murray co-directed (along with Howard Franklin) this mixture of The Out-of-Towners and After Hours, concerning Grimm (Bill Murray), a frustrated city planner who is fed up with the corruption and venality of New York City. Getting together a couple of accomplices -- Phyllis (Geena Davis), who Read More

Ken Burns' Civil War [TV Documentary Series]

Synopsis: Ken Burns' epic series begins with the causes of the Civil War in 1861 and ends with the war's aftermath in 1865. A combination of photographs, interviews, and narration create a sweeping historical documentary. Commentary and anecdotes by historian Shelby Foote add another level of authority to Read More

Parenthood

Actors: Steve Martin, Mary Steenburgen, Dianne Wiest, Jason Robards, Jr., Rick Moranis

Synopsis: This feel-good ensemble comedy tracks a quartet of suburban siblings and their families over the course of a single summer. Hardworking Gil Buckman (Steve Martin) and his stay-at-home wife, Karen (Mary Steeenburgen), have just a few months to help their oldest son, Kevin (Jasen Fisher), overcome Read More

Dream a Little Dream

Actors: Corey Feldman, Meredith Salenger, Jason Robards, Jr., Piper Laurie, Harry Dean Stanton

Synopsis: In 1987-88, a quartet of films with the same basic body-switching premise deluged theaters: Like Father, Like Son (1987), Big (1988), Vice Versa (1988), and 18 Again (1988). One year later, Dream a Little Dream (1989) followed suit. Coleman Ettinger (Jason Robards) is forever scolding the local Read More

Thomas Hart Benton: Tom Benton's Missouri

Ken Burns' America: Thomas Hart Benton

Synopsis: Documentarian Ken Burns, better known for his epic studies of the Civil War and of Baseball, here explores the life and works of one of the hallmark painters of the U.S., Thomas Hart Benton (1889-1975). He is most famous for his ability to evoke the vast rolling spaces of the Great Plains, and for Read More

Black Rainbow

Actors: Rosanna Arquette, Jason Robards, Jr., Tom Hulce, Mark Joy, Ron Rosenthal

Synopsis: British director Mike Hodges brought an extra measure of integrity to this made-for-TV thriller. Rosanna Arquette stars as Martha Travis, a psychic who travels the rural American South with her alcoholic father, Walter (Jason Robards), plying her mystical trade for credulous yokels. In reality Read More

The Good Mother

Actors: Diane Keaton, Liam Neeson, Jason Robards, Jr., Ralph Bellamy, Teresa Wright

Synopsis: Anna Dunlap (Diane Keaton) is a divorced mother living is Boston with her 6-year-old daughter Molly (Asia Viera). She supports herself and her daughter by working part time in a lab and teaching piano. Her ex-husband Brian (James Naughton) is a Washington lawyer who has since remarried. Anna meets Read More

Bright Lights, Big City

Actors: Michael J. Fox, Kiefer Sutherland, Phoebe Cates, Swoosie Kurtz, Frances Sternhagen

Synopsis: Michael J. Fox once more makes a courageous effort to shed his nice-guy image in Bright Lights, Big City. Fox plays an impressionable Kansan who comes to the Big Apple to take a job at a major magazine. It isn't long before he falls into the twin traps of drug and alcohol abuse. His only hope for Read More

Inherit the Wind

Synopsis: This courtroom drama was inspired by the notorious Scopes trial of 1925 concerning the teaching of Darwinism in public schools. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

The Christmas Wife

Synopsis: Afraid to spend the Christmas holiday alone, an aging widower decides to hire himself a spouse to spend the vacation with him in his lovely mountain retreat and finds true romance in this heartwarming made-for-cable television drama that is based on a story by Helen Norris. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Read More

Square Dance

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Jane Alexander, Winona Ryder, Rob Lowe, Deborah Richter

Synopsis: Gemma (Winona Ryder) is a young teen raised by her crusty grandfather Dillard (Jason Robards) in this drama of a young woman's coming of age. When she goes to the city to spend the summer with her estranged mother Juanella (Jane Alexander), she falls for Rory (Rob Lowe), a rural rube of Read More

Laguna Heat

Actors: Harry Hamlin

Synopsis: Harry Hamlin stars in this made-for-cable thriller as a private eye who returns to his boyhood home only to find himself on the trail of a serial killer. ~ Jason Ankeny, All Movie Guide Read More

Breaking Home Ties

Synopsis: Based on an illustration by Norman Rockwell and set in a tiny Texas town during the 1950s, this touching made-for-television domestic drama tells the tale of a hard-working father who dreams of sending his boy to college. The lad, anxious to spread his wings, is happy to go. Unfortunately his Read More

Johnny Bull

Synopsis: Made for television, Johnny Bull is set in a Pennsylvania mining town, circa 1959. Peter MacNicol, the son of a Hungarian immigrant family, brings home pregnant Suzanna Hamilton, the cockney girl he'd married while a GI in England. Hamilton's movie-generated visions of a glamorous America are Read More

The Last Frontier

Actors: Tony Bonner, Linda Evans, Jack Thompson

Synopsis: The frontier of the title is Australia, the locale for this sprawling four-hour TV movie. Linda Evans stars as an American divorcee who marries an Australian cattleman (Tony Bonner). He dies in a plane crash, leaving Evans and her two teenaged stepchildren stranded on a drought- and debt-ridden Read More

The Spy Who Never Was

The Unknown Soldier

Synopsis: This emotional and bracing documentary, the second volume in award-winning producer Arnold Shapiro's Trilogy of Tribute, honors the fallen soldiers of 20th century wars (particularly World War II) who lie in unmarked graves on the battlefields of Europe and Asia, their bodies never found or Read More

The Long, Hot Summer

Actors: Don Johnson, Jason Robards, Jr., Cybill Shepherd, Ava Gardner, Judith Ivey

Synopsis: The made-for-TV The Long Hot Summer was based on the 1958 theatrical film of the same name-which, in turn, was based on two William Faulkner short stories. Don Johnson plays Ben Quick, a Southern drifter who is under suspicion as a "barn burner." Ben secures a job at the Mississippi mansion of Read More

The Atlanta Child Murders

Synopsis: The Atlanta Child Murders is a five-hour, two-part dramatization of one of the most tragic and controversial homicide cases of the past twenty years. From 1979 through 1982, some 28 African-American children and young adults disappeared from Atlanta--some without a trace, but others to later turn Read More

Sakharov

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Glenda Jackson, Nicol Williamson, Frank Finlay, Marion Bailey

Synopsis: The made-for-TV Sakharov stars Jason Robards as famed Soviet nuclear physicist D. Andrei Sakharov. Lauded by his government for his scientific achievements, Sakharov nonetheless becomes an outspoken critic of Russia's human rights violations. He is reclassified as a "non-person" and exiled to the Read More

America & Lewis Hine

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Forgotten photography pioneer Lewis Hine, 1874-1940) is the subject of this fascinating documentary on a man who ironically died in poverty after spending his life chronicling its American manifestation. In 1905, Hine began photographing immigrants as they came off Ellis Island, a high-point in Read More

Hughie

You Can't Take It with You

Synopsis: This 116-minute TV adaptation of Kaufman and Hart's Pulitzer Prize-winning You Can't Take It With You was taped during a stage performance before a live audience. Staged by Ellis Rabb, this is a faithful rendition of the original, concentrating on the zany goings-on of the Sycamore household Read More

Something Wicked This Way Comes

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Jonathan Pryce, Diane Ladd, Pam Grier, Royal Dano

Synopsis: After a carnival comes to Green Town, the good citizens are compelled to follow their deepest desires, caught under the spell of the malevolent Dr. Dark (Jonathan Pryce) who can grant those desires on one condition: that the grantees will forever join his freak show. Dr. Dark is after two young Read More

The Day After

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., JoBeth Williams, Steve Guttenberg, John Cullum, John Lithgow, Amy Madigan

Synopsis: A peaceful Midwestern city attempts to recover after it is destroyed by a nuclear missile strike in this powerful and deeply disturbing testament to the folly of pro-military hawks who believed that annihilation was a justifiable means of attaining power and control. The Day After originally aired Read More

Max Dugan Returns

Actors: Marsha Mason, Jason Robards, Jr., Donald Sutherland, Matthew Broderick, Dody Goodman

Synopsis: Max Dugan (Jason Robards Jr.) is an elderly ne'er-do-well whose tenuous mob connections have made him persona non grata with his daughter Marsha Mason. Struggling to raise her restless son Matthew Broderick on her own, Mason is none too pleased when Max returns to the family fold with yet another Read More

Burden of Dreams

Actors: Werner Herzog, Klaus Kinski

Synopsis: Documentarian Les Blank, who filmed Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe, trained his cameras on Herzog again, as the eccentric German filmmaker made his epic, Fitzcarraldo, in the Amazon rainforest of Peru. Herzog's production is in trouble right from the start. He begins filming with Jason Robards Read More

Ghosts of Cape Horn

Synopsis: In this documentary on seafaring in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the weathered crews who sailed from New York to San Francisco come alive again. Focusing on the dangerous and often fatal voyage around Cape Horn in South America, the film goes back in time using previously unseen, 1920s Read More

The Legend of the Lone Ranger

Actors: Klinton Spilsbury, Michael Horse, Christopher Lloyd, Matt Clark, Juanin Clay, Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: An orphan grows up to become an Old West legend as the story of the Lone Ranger comes to the big screen in this western saga featuring Christopher Lloyd and Jason Robards. Orphaned as a young boy, John Reid struck up a lifelong friendship with a loyal Indian boy named Tonto. Years later, Reid has Read More

Cabo Blanco

Actors: Charles Bronson, Jason Robards, Jr., Dominique Sanda, Fernando Rey, Simon MacCorkindale

Synopsis: In this strange, unsatisfying remake of Casablanca, directed by J. Lee Thompson, a bar owner helps a woman find a missing fortune. Right after the end of WWII, Giff Hoyt (Charles Bronson) owns a bar in Peru into which Marie Allesandri (Dominique Sanda) enters one day, in search of her lover and Read More

Raise the Titanic

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Richard Jordan, Alec Guinness, David Selby, Anne Archer

Synopsis: This box-office bomb is about some schemers' hell-bent efforts to raise the fated vessel from its murky grave when they suspect that there's a fortune in radioactive cargo aboard. To add a little excitement, a bunch of Russians decide they want to get there first. ~ All Movie Guide Read More

F.D.R. The Last Year

Actors: Eileen Heckart, Kim Hunter

Synopsis: Jason Robards stars as the ailing, 62-year-old President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in F.D.R.: The Last Year. Though visibly frail and weary, Roosevelt runs for a precedent-setting fourth term. He also oversees plans for the D-Day Invasion and engages in tempestuous summit meetings with his wartime Read More

Haywire

Synopsis: Haywire was adapted for television by Ivan Davis and Frank Pierson from the best-selling autobiography of Brooke Hayward. Played herein by Deborah Raffin, Brooke is the daughter of legendary Broadway producer Leland Hayward (Jason Robards) and the brilliant stage and film actress Margaret Sullavan Read More

Melvin and Howard

Actors: Paul Le Mat, Jason Robards, Jr., Mary Steenburgen, Jack Kehoe, Michael J. Pollard, Dabney Coleman, Pamela Reed

Synopsis: Jonathan Demme's breakthrough movie featured the shaggy energy and affection for marginal American eccentrics that marked his earlier Citizens Band (1977) and such later films as Something Wild (1986) and Married to the Mob (1988). Melvin Dummar (Paul LeMat) is a barely-getting-by Nevada milkman. Read More

Hurricane

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Mia Farrow, Max von Sydow, Trevor Howard, Dayton Ka'ne

Synopsis: This film showed up on TV as Forbidden Paradise, but you can't fool us. It's really The Hurricane, producer Dino De Laurentiis' ill-advised remake of the 1938 Sam Goldwyn production of the same name. The story of the casual cruelties imposed by the white ruling class on the natives of the isle of Read More

Comes a Horseman

Actors: James Caan, Jane Fonda, Jason Robards, Jr., George Grizzard, Richard Farnsworth

Synopsis: Old man Ewing (Jason Robards) owns a ranch right next to the ranch of Ella (Jane Fonda). This is a source of two problems: Ewing wants to gobble up most of the land around the two ranches and also wants Ella's ranch; secondly, when Ella was too young to know better, she went to bed with the man Read More

A Christmas to Remember

Synopsis: As warm as winter's fire and sentimental as the sixth glass of wassail, this heart-tugging made-for-television holiday drama tells the Depression-era story of a gruff Minnesota grandfather and his wife who must take in their teenage grandson for Christmas. A city kid, the youth finds it difficult Read More

Julia

Actors: Jane Fonda, Vanessa Redgrave, Jason Robards, Jr., Maximilian Schell, Hal Holbrook

Synopsis: The film traces the lifelong relationship between playwright Lillian Hellman and Julia, a wealthy girl who turns her back on her upbringing to follow her ideals. In the 1930s, while the adult Hellman (Jane Fonda) struggles to establish herself as a playwright with the help of her lover, Dashiell Hammett Read More

Washington: Behind Closed Doors

Synopsis: This 12-hour TV miniseries (expanded from a 2-hour concept) was based on the political "roman a clef" The Company, by Watergate coconspirator John Erlichman. It was originally titled simply Washington; the Behind Closed Doors part was added to avoid a potential lawsuit from Gore Vidal Read More

All the President's Men

Actors: Dustin Hoffman, Robert Redford, Jack Warden, Martin Balsam, Hal Holbrook, Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Conspiracy film specialist Alan J. Pakula turned journalists Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein's best-selling account of their Watergate investigation into one of the hit films of Bicentennial year 1976. While researching a story about a botched 1972 burglary of Democratic Party headquarters at the Read More

Death of a Stranger

A Moon For the Misbegotten

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Colleen Dewhurst

Synopsis: Jason Robards and Colleen Dewhurst star in this made-for-TV adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's final play, featuring the cast and director of the award-winning 1974 Broadway production. James Tyrone Jr. (Robards) is a washed-up former actor whose dreams of stardom on Broadway were washed away by Read More

The Death Merchants

A Boy and His Dog

Actors: Don Johnson, Susanne Benton, Tiger, Tim McIntire, Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Based on the novella by Harlan Ellison, A Boy and His Dog is set in a post-apocalyptic future where canned goods are used as currency and where entertainment often consists of old porn reels. Vic (Don Johnson) is a violent, illiterate scavenger, principally interested in getting laid. He Read More

Mr. Sycamore

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Sandy Dennis, Jean Simmons, Robert Easton, Mark Miller

Synopsis: A meek and mild mailman decides that the only way to escape the constant nagging of his battle-ax of a wife is to turn himself into the title tree in this off-beat fantasy. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide Read More

Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid

Actors: James Coburn, Kris Kristofferson, Bob Dylan

Synopsis: A former friend betrays a legendary outlaw in Sam Peckinpah's final Western. Holed up in Fort Sumner with his gang between cattle rustlings, Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson) ignores the advice of comrade-turned-lawman Pat Garrett (James Coburn) to escape to Mexico, and he winds up in jail in Read More

Holiday Treasure

Synopsis: Set during Thanksgiving, this feature stars veteran performers Jason Robards, Sr. and Melvyn Douglas in a touching story of warmth, compassion, and reaching out during the feast of the year. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide Read More

The Thanksgiving Treasure

Synopsis: Set in 1947, The Thanksgiving Treasure takes place on the small Nebraska farm of the Mills family. 11-year-old Addie Mills (Lisa Lucas) is of the opinion that the purpose of Thanksgiving is to turn an enemy into a friend--just as the Pilgrims and the Indians did back in 1620. Addie hopes to mend Read More

A House without a Christmas Tree

Synopsis: Embittered by the death of his wife, James Mills (Jason Robards) refuses to buy a Christmas tree for his 10-year-old daughter Addie (Lisa Lucas). Undaunted, Addie wins a Christmas tree at school, which enrages her father. With the help of her loving grandmother (Mildred Natwick), Addie eventually Read More

The War Between Men and Women

Crew: Songwriter

Actors: Janya Brannt, Jack Lemmon, Barbara Harris, Jason Robards, Jr., Herb Edelman, Severn Darden

Synopsis: Loosely based on the life and work of cartoonist and essayist James Thurber, The War Between Men and Women stars Jack Lemmon as cartoonist Peter Wilson, who, while visiting an eye doctor for his failing vision, quite literally stumbles upon Terry Kozlenko (Barbara Harris), an attractive but Read More

Johnny Got His Gun

Actors: Timothy Bottoms

Synopsis: The author of the famous late 1930's antiwar book Johnny Got His Gun wrote and directed this film adaptation. It concerns a nameless young soldier (Timothy Bottoms) in a veteran's hospital in the World War I period. The young man has had his face blown off, he is without the use of any of his Read More

Murders in the Rue Morgue

Actors: Christine Kaufmann, Herbert Lom

Synopsis: The fourth film to explore Edgar Allan Poe's classic tale, this clever adaptation takes some rather broad liberties with the source material. A flamboyant Jason Robards plays Cesar Charron, owner of a Grand Guignol theatre in 19th-century Paris, who is launching a stage adaptation of "Murders in Read More

Operation Snafu

Synopsis: Don't confuse this 1970 Italian/Yugoslav Operation Snafu with the 1962 British comedy-drama of the same name. While the earlier film boasted an engaging story and a boisterous early appearance by Sean Connery, the 1970 film is a witless mess. Even star Peter Falk fails to raise a laugh in his role Read More

Tora! Tora! Tora!

Actors: Martin Balsam, So Yamamura, Joseph Cotten, Tatsuya Mihashi, E.G. Marshall

Synopsis: This 25-million dollar epic collaboration accurately recreates the events that led to the Japanese attack on the American naval base during World War II. With Germany's invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939, the wheels are set in motion by Japan to plan the attack. After internal differences in Read More

Julius Caesar

Actors: Charlton Heston, Jason Robards, Jr., John Gielgud, Richard Johnson, Robert Vaughn

Synopsis: Except for the omission of several passages in the original play, this 1970 adaptation of Julius Caesar faithfully retells Shakespeare's account of events surrounding the assassination of Caesar in 44 B.C. The film begins when Caesar John Gielgud is at the height of his power after conquering Read More

Fools

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Katharine Ross, Scott Hylands, Roy Jenson

Synopsis: In this drama, a romance is sparked when two people, dissatisfied with their lives, move to San Francisco in hope of a fresh start. Ex-horror star Matthew South (Jason Robards, Jr.) encounters unhappily-married Anais Appleton (Katharine Ross) and the two fall in love. Their newfound happiness is Read More

The Ballad of Cable Hogue

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Stella Stevens, David Warner, Strother Martin, Slim Pickens

Synopsis: After the intense bloodshed of The Wild Bunch (1969), this comic western fable took the opposite approach to director Sam Peckinpah's continuing examination of the end of the West. Left for dead by a couple of lizard-slaughtering desperados in the middle of the desert, prospector Cable Hogue (Jason Robards Read More

Once Upon a Time in the West

Actors: Charles Bronson, Claudia Cardinale, Henry Fonda, Jason Robards, Jr., Gabriele Ferzetti

Synopsis: In Sergio Leone's epic Western, shot partly in Monument Valley, a revenge story becomes an epic contemplation of the Western past. To get his hands on prime railroad land in Sweetwater, crippled railroad baron Morton (Gabriele Ferzetti) hires killers, led by blue-eyed sadist Frank (Henry Fonda) Read More

The Night They Raided Minsky's

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Britt Ekland, Norman Wisdom, Forrest Tucker, Harry Andrews

Synopsis: Narrator Rudy Vallee announces that he knows we are a "real high class audience," thus he has "some swell story to tell." Thus begins The Night They Raided Minsky's, set in the rarefied world of burlesque in the 1920s. Amish girl Rachel Schpitendavel (Britt Ekland) comes to New York in hopes of Read More

Isadora

Actors: Vanessa Redgrave, John Fraser, James Fox, Jason Robards, Jr., Ivan Tchenko

Synopsis: Vanessa Redgrave stars in this film biography of the free-spirited modern interpretive dancer Isadora Duncan. Trained in classical dance, Duncan shattered the traditional conformities in her art and her personal life. The film begins at the end of her life as she recalls the past while dictating Read More

Barbra Streisand: The Belle of 14th Street

Actors: Barbra Streisand, Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Experience turn-of-the-century vaudeville as few modern audiences have as singer Barbra Streisand pays loving tribute to a bygone era in a classic television special that features a variety of talented guest stars including Jason Robards, Susan Alpern, Lee Allen, and John William Sublett. Read More

Hour of the Gun

Actors: James Garner, Jason Robards, Jr., Robert Ryan, Albert Salmi, Charles Aidman

Synopsis: John Sturges directed this sequel to his Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, which is more of a melancholy character study than an action Western. The Edward Anhalt screenplay (based on Douglas D. Martin's Tombstone's Epitaph) traces Wyatt Earp's (James Garner) moral decline from a lawman with high Read More

Divorce American Style

Actors: Dick Van Dyke, Debbie Reynolds, Jason Robards, Jr., Jean Simmons, Van Johnson

Synopsis: An unhappy couple discover breaking up really is hard to do in this satiric comedy. Richard Harmon (Dick Van Dyke) and his wife, Barbara (Debbie Reynolds), are a typical married couple in American Suburbia -- which is to say they're not very happy with each other. After 15 years together, Richard Read More

The St. Valentine's Day Massacre

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., George Segal, Ralph Meeker, Jean Hale, Clint Ritchie

Synopsis: Schlockmeister Roger Corman produced this graphically violent chronicle of the Chicago gangster wars of the 1920s and the events that lead to the bloody title showdown between rival mobsters Al Capone (Jason Robards) and Bugs Moran (Ralph Meeker) that marked a brutal end to a terrifying era. Fred Steiner Read More

A Big Hand for the Little Lady

Actors: Henry Fonda, Joanne Woodward, Jason Robards, Jr., Charles Bickford, Burgess Meredith, Kevin McCarthy, Paul Ford, Chester Conklin, Mae Clarke

Synopsis: The action in A Big Hand for the Little Lady centers around a high-stake poker game. The participants include some of the wealthiest men in the West (among them Jason Robards Jr., Kevin McCarthy, Charles Bickford and Paul Ford). Into this rarefied atmosphere trudges impoverished farmer Henry Read More

Any Wednesday

Actors: Jane Fonda, Jason Robards, Jr., Dean Jones, Rosemary Murphy, Ann Prentiss

Synopsis: The star of the Broadway version of Any Wednesday was Sandy Dennis. Headlining the 1966 film version is Jane Fonda, who imbues her character with enough quirkiness to satisfy both herself and the endearingly mannered Ms. Dennis. Fonda plays the dippy mistress of philanderer Jason Robards, who Read More

A Thousand Clowns

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Barbara Harris, Martin Balsam, Gene Saks, William Daniels

Synopsis: Jason Robards Jr. superbly re-creates his Broadway role in this 1965 film version of Herb Gardner's play. Robards plays Murray Burns, head writer of TV's popular Chuckles the Chipmunk show. Fed up with the rat race, Murray quits his job and retreats to his cluttered Manhattan apartment, where he Read More

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr., Albert Paulsen

Synopsis: This TV adaptation of Alexander Solzhenitsyn's semi-autobiographical novel stars Jason Robards Jr. in the title role. Ivan is a prisoner in a Siberian gulag, one of a group of inmates who've been promised transfer to warmer quarters if they can top the camp's previous work record within a single Read More

Act One

Actors: George Hamilton, Jason Robards, Jr., Jack Klugman, Sam Levene, Ruth Ford, Eli Wallach, George Segal

Synopsis: This autobiographical story traces the career of playwright Moss Hart. Moss (George Hamilton) struggles as a dramatic writer until he concentrates his efforts on writing comedy. He suffers through a series of professional and romantic failures before a meeting with George S. Kaufman (Jason Robards Jr Read More

Long Day's Journey into Night

Actors: Katharine Hepburn, Ralph Richardson, Jason Robards, Jr., Dean Stockwell, Jeanne Barr

Synopsis: Playwright Eugene O'Neill sold Random House the text of his intensely autobiographical 1941 play on the proviso that the play not be produced during O'Neill's lifetime. Two years after the playwright's death in 1953, the play was given its first Broadway staging and won a Pulitzer Prize. Set in Read More

Tender Is the Night

Actors: Jennifer Jones, Jason Robards, Jr., Joan Fontaine, Tom Ewell, Cesare Danova

Synopsis: David O. Selznick had intended to film an adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night as a vehicle for his wife Jennifer Jones. But financial difficulties compelled Selznick to sell the property (including Ms. Jones' services) to 20th Century-Fox. Jones stars as a wealthy but disturbed Read More

By Love Possessed

Actors: Lana Turner, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Jason Robards, Jr., George Hamilton, Susan Kohner

Synopsis: There's always something simmering beneath the quaint and placid surface of small-town New England lives -- and that includes the usual maladies of alcoholism, rape, and suicide. At least this is the case if you go by the tortuous tale told in By Love Possessed, a Peyton Place knock-off, directed Read More

The Iceman Cometh

Actors: Jason Robards, Jr.

Synopsis: Sidney Lumet's made-for-television adaptation of Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh tells the tale of Hickey (Jason Robards), a fun-loving drunk who has had a drastic change in his life. Now sober -- and cynical -- Hickey arrives at a familiar pub and attempts to convince the other patrons in the Read More

A Doll's House

Synopsis: A Doll's House is a 90-minute TV adaptation of the 1879 play by Henrik Ibsen. Julie Harris stars as Nora Helmer, the dutiful wife of Torvald Helmer (Christopher Plummer). Though Torvald loves his wife, he considers her a child and a possession. What he doesn't know is that, years earlier, Nora Read More

The Journey

Actors: Yul Brynner, Deborah Kerr, Jason Robards, Jr., Robert Morley, E.G. Marshall

Synopsis: The two romantic leads in this standard but well-acted political drama renew a famous pairing that began with The King and I in 1956. Deborah Kerr is Lady Diana Ashmore, caught at the wrong side of the Hungarian-Austrian border in 1956, and Yul Brynner is Major Surov, a Russian commander who works Read More

Philco Television Playhouse: The Death of Billy the Kid

Actors: Paul Newman, Frank Overton, Joseph Anthony, Michael Conrad, George Mitchell

Synopsis: The 1958 theatrical feature The Left-Handed Gun was adapted from the 1955 Philco Television Playhouse offering The Death of Billy the Kid. Both the film and the TV program boasted the same star (Paul Newman), the same author (Gore Vidal) and the same director (Arthur Penn). Broadcast live, The Read More