Fortune Dane and Carl Weathers

Producer Barney Rosenzweig, following his giant success with the TV series Cagney and Lacey, asked me to create an opening title sequence for his new TV show called Fortune Dane, starring Carl Weathers as a private detective.

From Carl’s fame as Apollo Creed in the Rocky films, he was very buff and muscular. As an ex-football player turned private detective, Dane had to handle himself well and worked out to maintain his tough guy appearance.

So I suggested a sequence of seeing him working out and then prepare for work, dressing and gathering himself for the day.

I arranged a stage and crew for filming, met with Carl, briefed him on our shooting plans and later met and shot the footage with him in one long day.

We devised various shots where we could really see his muscles, his movements and his apparent gracefulness in handling himself.

Carl Weathers and the cast of Fortune Dane

He kept reminding me to talk to Jimmy Crabe on how to light him because he was so happy with how Crabe lit him in Rocky. Of course on the stage, it was too late to talk to Crabe, but I managed to light him particularly effectively and he was very happy. He was very engaging, we had a good time and got lots of great shots.

Designing the sequence with titles was next. I designed a tall, compressed logo stacking the first and last name into a tight column of strength but used a bold, serif face to suggest the characters graceful elegance. It worked nicely. I did some effective ‘streaking’ effects with some shots to punctuate the coolness of his character and excite the eye a bit, as well.

Fortunately – no pun intended – I was able to visit the recording session when they laid down the title music with a terrific sax solo. Then, later, had the benefit to design and edit to the music to make the sequence a solid, tightly packaged piece.

Barney and Carl were very happy with the result and it looked great on TV. Unfortunately, the show didn’t last long before going down in flames.

More stories and anecdotes like this can be found in my book.