Christopher Canaan | Leslie Greif | Paul Haggis | Albert S. Ruddy - 196 episodes, 1993-2001
CAST
Chuck Norris
Clarence Gilyard Jr.
Sheree J. Wilson
Noble Willingham
COUNTRY
United States
PRODUCED BY
Tom Blomquist | Lisa Clarkson | Gordon T. Dawson | Bruce Cervi | John Lansing | Garry A. Brown | Bob Gookin | Chuck Norris | Aaron Norris | Rick Husky | Michael T. Elias | Leslie Stout Glennon | Anthony Brooks Ashley | John Ashley | Frank Lupo | Susan Fowler | Gregory S. Dinallo | Stephen Phillip Smith | Mike Stevens | Peter Lance | Nancy Bond | Walton Dornisch | Leslie Greif | Robert Hargrove | David Moessinger | Albert S. Ruddy | Cliff Fenneman | Terry D. Nelson | Calvin Clements Jr. | Leonard Katzman | Mitchell Wayne Katzman | Rob Wright | Robert M. Rolsky | Reuben Leder | J. Michael Straczynski |
DIRECTED BY
Michael Preece | Tony Mordente | Jerry Jameson | Eric Norris | Christian I. Nyby II | Joe Coppoletta | Mike Norris | Aaron Norris | Karl Kases | Rich Thorne | João Fernandes | Alexander Singer | Michael Vejar
NO. OF SEASONS
8
NO. OF EPISODES
203
ORIGINAL RUN
April 21, 1993 – May 19, 2001
OPENING/ENDING THEME
"Eyes of a Ranger" – penned by Tirk Wilder | performed by Chuck Norris
Music:
Christopher Franke - 46 episodes, 1993-2000
Ron Ramin - 15 episodes, 1995-1997
Jeff Sturges - 2 episodes, 1993
Larry Brown - 2 episodes, 1997
GUEST APPEARANCES
Luis Guzmán | Judith Hoag | Brian Thompson | Tobey Maguire | "Rowdy" Roddy Piper| Lee Majors | Gary Busey | Tom Bosley | Ernest Borgnine | Dionne Warwick | Barbara Mandrell | Sting | Selena Gomez | Mila Kunis | Joan Jett | Ernest Borgnine
1994 - Nominated Emmy Outstanding Individual Achievement in Sound Editing for a Series - Michael O'Corrigan (supervising sound editor/adr editor) | Dick Wahrman (sound editor) | Steve Olson (sound editor) | Joe Divitale (sound editor) | Marty Wereski (music editor) | Gail Steele (foley artist) | Evelyn Dutton (foley artist) - For episode "In The Name Of God"
1994 - Nominated Emmy First Americans in the Arts Awards
2000 - Won FAITA Award Outstanding Achievement in Stunts - David Alvarado
Image Awards
2000 - Won Image Award Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series - Clarence Gilyard Jr.
Lone Star Film & Television Awards
1999 - Won Lone Star Film & Television Award Best TV Supporting Actor - Clarence Gilyard Jr.
1998 - Won Lone Star Film & Television Award Best TV Supporting Actor - Noble Willingham
TV Guide Awards
1999 - Nominated TV Guide Award Favorite Actor in a Drama - Chuck Norris
Young Artist Awards
1999 - Nominated Young Artist Award Best Performance in a TV Drama Series - Guest Starring Young Actress - Camilla Belle
1998 - Nominated Young Artist Award Best Performance in a TV Drama Series - Guest Starring Young Actor - Haley Joel Osment
1996 - Nominated Young Artist Award Best Performance by a Young Actor - TV Drama Series - Billy Tolson
1996 - Nominated Best Performance by a Young Actress - Guest Starring Role TV Series - Lisa Wilhoit
Cordell Walker was a contemporary Texas Ranger working out of the Dallas office who believed in dealing with criminals the old-fashioned way by beating them up. Despite the rules that governed the way law-enforcement officers were supposed to act, Walker's approach closely resembled the "an eye for an eye" school of crime fighting. His partner was young Ranger Jimmy Trivette, who had grown up in the slums of Baltimore and used football as his ticket to a college education and a career with the Dallas Cowboys until he tore up a knee. Despite Jimmy's belief in computers and scientific criminology, working with Walker always seemed to leave him bruised and sore when Walker was trying to get information or take people into custody it was more than likely there would be a fistfight or karate kicks. County Assistant D.A. Alex Cahill, his sometimes girlfriend, frowned on Walker's methods, even if they did get results. When not on duty Walker and the others hung out at C.D.'s, the saloon/restaurant owned by his buddy C. D. Parker, a former Ranger forced to retire after taking a bullet in the knee, who still provided help and advice on cases. Uncle Ray was the wise old Native American who had raised Walker.
In March 1998, Walker rescued his friend Carlos, a Dallas police detective, who was in trouble on an undercover drug assignment. Trent Malloy, a mutual friend and one of Walker's former students who now ran his own karate school, helped out. For the next year, until Carlos left the force and became Trent's partner in a detective agency, they showed up regularly on Walker. In the May 1998 season finale Walker was about to ask Alex to marry him when she was shot by an ex-con who blamed her for his incarceration. She almost died but eventually recovered and they got engaged that fall.
In the fall of 1999 two new Rangers who often worked undercover, Gage and Cooke, were added to Walker's team and that December C. D. made his last on-screen appearance. The following May Cordell and Alex finally got married. In the series finale it was revealed that a vindictive criminal on a vendetta to kill a dozen Rangers, culminating with Walker, had poisoned C. D. (who had died mysteriously from a heart attack the previous October). The criminal helped a number of his colleagues escape from a high-security prison and they went on a rampage. They first shot and killed one Ranger from long range, then rigged Trivette's car to crash and burn but he had been thrown from it as it rolled and survived. When Walker and Alex went to see Trivette in the hospital, she went into labor and gave birth to a daughter, Angela. In the final confrontation Walker killed the criminal by pulling the pin on a grenade he had tied to his belt.
Star Chuck Norris, a former karate champion and movie star, played Walker in the deadpan unemotional style he had used in most of his feature films. Nothing ever seemed to excite him, and the violence on the show had a cartoon quality about it. There was a surrealistic efficiency about Walker—he almost never broke a sweat, got hurt, or wasted a blow - violence because it was necessary but never glorying in it.
INTERESTING FACTS
Walker was always referred to by his Uncle Ray as "Wa-sho", which in Cherokee meant "Lone Eagle".
Walker's full last name is "Firewalker". When his parents died, he went to an orphanage where the others teased him because he didn't look like a Native American. Therefore, he shortened it to Walker.
Uncle Ray Firewalker's name is an inside joke: Ray is Chuck Norris’s real middle name (and his late father's first name); Firewalker was a movie Norris made with Lou Gossett, Jr., Melody Anderson, Sonny Landham and John Rhys-Davies in 1986.
The exterior view of "C.D.'s Bar and Grill" is actually the legendary White Elephant Saloon located in Ft. Worth's Historic Stockyards District. When it was built, the White Elephant was owned and operated by wild west gambler/gunfighter Luke Short, a friend to such famous figures as Wyatt Earp, Bat Masterson, and "Doc" Holiday.
For the first several seasons, you could always tell the "bad guys" by the cars they drove - a Ford. The "Good Guys" that lived drove a Dodge and the "Good Guys" that died drove Chevys.
In the early episodes, Walker drove a GMC truck; in the later episodes he drove a Dodge Ram.
FAMOUS QUOTES
Victor LaRue: Victor LaRue, your new best friend.
Buddy Rebotco: Can I have one of those guns?
Victor LaRue: You're not that good of a friend.
CD Parker: You know? Life's funny - you can sleep off a hangover but you can't sleep off ugly.
