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n 1975, Levinson and Link, lifelong Queen fans, were allowed by NBC to do Queen the way they wanted. The result was Ellery
Queen which ran for only one full season. Stylistically, the producers went back to the radio show, setting this series in 1947. Although the pilot was based on a Queen novel, and one episode on a short story, the rest of the episodes were original stories, but stories that well-captured the spirit of an Ellery Queen mystery. Jim Hutton played Ellery as a good-natured, absent-minded young man for which there were legitimate bases in the books. Frederic Dannay said Hutton's portrayal reminded him not so much of the fictional Ellery, but of himself at about Hutton's age. Hutton's charm and natural manner played perfectly against David Wayne's crusty Inspector (despite lacking the moustache so often mentioned in the books, the definitive depiction of 'The Old Man'). The show had a sense of good humor, and its setting in 1947 lent a welcome sense of  nostalgia to the stories.
Although the episodes varied in quality, none was poor, and even the weakest of them is redeemed by the plot, the production values, and the marvelous casts.