Lately I’ve been “doing” Nero Wolfe on YouTube. First the 1981 series starring William (“Cannon”) Conrad and Lee Horsely, and currently the 2001 series with Maury Chaykin and Timothy Hutton. But in the course of my fumbling about on the site I stumbled on the little-known video above. It’s a 1959 pilot for a half-hour NW series starring Kurt Kasznar and none other than a pre-Star Trek William Shatner. But more about that below.

I sought out the Conrad-Horsely series for sentimental reasons. The series was one of my favorites back when it came out. Critics complained that it violated some of the basic protocols of the ordered household author Rex Stout created. Though I’m fond of the original Wolfe books, I’m not as punctilious about them as I am about, say, Sherlock Holmes or Travis McGee. I thought Bill Conrad was just splendid as Nero Wolfe, and he had excellent chemistry with Horsely’s Archie. The set designers worked meticulously (and at considerable cost) to recreate Wolfe’s office. I particularly liked the big chair. Stout often mentions in the stories that Wolfe’s upholstered desk chair was specially built to support his great weight.

The only problem with that handsome chair was that it was physically too large for Bill Conrad, who kind of got lost in it. I suspect it was designed with Orson Welles, who was originally meant to play the role, in mind.

But after I’d watched that series’ one season of episodes, I moved on to the 2001 series. It’s very well done and very faithful to the original stories. Also extremely stylish and shot in period. Maury Chaykin as Wolfe is growing on me, though I still prefer Conrad. I’ve always seen Wolfe as a dark-haired man. Timothy Hutton seems a little lightly constructed for Archie, but the attitude is spot on.

But now, back to the 1959 pilot. I was surprised how good it was. Bill Shatner may be the best Archie Goodwin of them all. The role plays exactly to his strengths. And Kurt Kasznar (whom I believe I saw in person once, as Moriarty in a road production of William Gillette’s “Sherlock Holmes” play, but I may have him confused with someone else), has a good look for Wolfe and brings the additional value of an Austrian accent. Stout’s Wolfe was Montenegran by birth, but I think this is the only time anyone ever portrayed him with an accent (except for Sidney Greenstreet’s English tones). The plot is stripped-down, as is necessary for the half-hour format (not ideal for the material), and the office set lacks the rich detail of the later productions. But all in all it’s a commendable effort and pretty entertaining.

(It also features the actor Alexander Scourby [whose Bible narration you may have heard], whom I also saw in person once, in college, doing a reading of Walt Whitman. I had a chance to meet him but missed out, as is my custom in life.)

One wonders why it wasn’t accepted by the network. However, if that had happened, Bill Shatner might have still been busy when Gene Roddenberry went looking for an actor to play Captain Kirk a few years later. And the world would have missed out on a rich font of camp, parody, and Facebook memes.