Out of 437 applicants, the other three chosen for the cast of the TV show were Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork and Micky Dolenz. Running parts for 4 insane boys, age 17–21. Folk & Roll Musicians-Singers for acting roles in new TV series. On September 8–10, 1965, Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter ran an ad to cast the remainder of the band/cast members for the TV show: He was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical in 1963. Jones had previously starred as the Artful Dodger in the Broadway theater show Oliver!, which debuted on December 17, 1962, and his performance was later seen on The Ed Sullivan Show the same night as the Beatles' first appearance on that show, February 9, 1964. His involvement with The Monkees was publicly announced on July 14, 1965, when The Hollywood Reporter stated that he was expected to return to the United States in September (after a trip to England) "to prepare for TV pilot for Bert Schneider and Bob Rafelson". However, John Sebastian had already signed the band to a record contract, which would have denied Screen Gems the right to market music from the show.Īfter those plans fell through, Rafelson and Schneider focused on Davy Jones who, in September 1964, had signed to a long-term contract to appear in TV programs for Screen Gems, to make feature films for Columbia Pictures and to record music for the Colpix label. Rafelson and Schneider's original idea was to cast an existing New York folk rock group, the Lovin' Spoonful, who were not widely known at the time. As "The Raybert Producers", they sold the show to Screen Gems Television on April 16, 1965. The Beatles' films A Hard Day's Night and Help! inspired Rafelson and Schneider to revive Rafelson's idea for The Monkees. Rafelson and Schneider ultimately formed Raybert Productions. In May 1964, while working at Screen Gems, Rafelson teamed up with Bert Schneider, whose father, Abraham Schneider, headed the Colpix Records and Screen Gems Television units of Columbia Pictures. History Conception and casting (1962–1965) Īspiring filmmaker Bob Rafelson developed the initial idea for The Monkees in 1962 and tried selling it to Revue, the television division of Universal Pictures, but was unsuccessful. However, claims from newspapers and magazines that the Monkees in 1967 outsold the Beatles and the Rolling Stones combined are false and originated from Nesmith in a 1977 interview. With international hits, including " Last Train to Clarksville", " I'm a Believer", " A Little Bit Me, a Little Bit You", " Pleasant Valley Sunday", and " Daydream Believer", four chart-topping albums and three chart-topping songs ("Last Train to Clarksville", "I'm a Believer", and "Daydream Believer"), they sold more than 75 million records worldwide, making them one of the biggest-selling groups of all time. Spurred by the success of the show, the Monkees were one of the most successful bands of the 1960s. With Jones' death in 2012 and Tork's in 2019, Dolenz and Nesmith were left to embark on a farewell tour in 2021, finishing shortly before Nesmith's death at the end of the year. Tork left the band soon after, followed by Nesmith a year later, and the Monkees officially broke up in 1970.Ī revival of interest in the television show came in 1986, and over the following 35 years the group periodically reunited for official reunion tours, a major-network television special, and four new full-length studio albums, though these efforts rarely featured all four members performing together. By the end of 1968, they were once again a group in name only, the show had been canceled, and their motion picture, Head, had flopped. For two albums, the Monkees mostly performed as a group, but, within a year, each member was pursuing his own interests under the Monkees name. After a brief power struggle, the band members gained full control over the recording process. This arrangement yielded multiple hit albums and singles, but it did not sit well with the band members, who were facing a public backlash for not playing on the recordings. Music supervisor Don Kirshner was dissatisfied with the quartet's musical abilities, and he limited their involvement during the recording process, relying instead on professional songwriters and studio musicians. While the sitcom was a mostly straightforward affair, the music production generated tension and controversy almost from the beginning. Music credited to the Monkees appeared in the sitcom, which aired from 1966 to 1968, and was released on LP. They were conceived in 1965 as a fictional band for the sitcom The Monkees by the television producers Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider. The Monkees were an American pop rock band formed in Los Angeles in 1966, comprising Micky Dolenz, Michael Nesmith, Peter Tork and Davy Jones.
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