William T. Orr (
27 September 1917 -
25 December 2002) was principally a
television producer, most associated with a string of
western and
detective programs of the 1950s-1970s.
As the first head of
Warner Brothers Television department, he forged a fruitful alliance with
ABC, which resulted in ABC having a number of
prime time hits, such as
Maverick,
77 Sunset Strip, and
F Troop. At the height of this relationship in the early 1960s, Orr had nine programs in prime time simultaneously.
Of these, though, no program was more significant than one of his earliest,
Cheyenne. It was a groundbreaking series that was both the first hour-long western and the first series of any kind made by a major
Hollywood film studio comprised entirely of content wholly exclusive to television.
A curator at the
Museum of Television and Radio once encapsulated Orr's importance to Warner Brothers by saying, "Television began as a step-child. But because of Orr, it became equal with film in creating revenue and jobs for the studio." One of the key reforms he made to effect this change was to move Warner's nascent television department from cramped quarters in
New York City to
Los Angeles studios separate from the film division.
His impact on the genre of western fiction was recognized with a
Golden Boot Award upon the announcement of his death.
Despite broadly positive posthumous recognition for his work as a whole, Orr did receive negative press during the height of his career.
Time Magazine characterized Orr and Jack Warner as a co-architects of unfair
contracts during late-1950s pay disputes waged by Warner Brothers star television actors
Clint Walker,
James Garner, and
Edd Byrnes.
In 1963,
Jack Webb replaced Orr as executive producer of ABC's
77 Sunset Strip detective series. Webb completely changed the format and retained only
Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., in the role of Stuart Bailey. The revision was a disaster, and the program was cancelled even prior to the end of the sixth season.
A former film actor, Orr married
Jack Warner's stepdaughter,
Joy Page, in 1945. The couple
divorced in 1970. Their son,
Gregory Orr, is a writer and producer.