Who has starred in the most successful TV series?

[Telemark]

Bumping this because Ted Danson now has a new show Mr Mayor where he is the lead. Obviously just one season so far, but he certainly has been getting starring roles on TV for many decades.

[nightshadea]

wait the guy who played frost was in duckula ? wow i bet he played the butler …i miss that show … it was so off the rails

[Banksiaman]

Never too late to add something:

Michael Langdon

Bonanza [yes, part of an ensemble cast, but core cast - 428 episodes]

Little House on the Prairie

Highway to Heaven

[TCMF-2L]

DI Frost (actor David Jason) voiced the actual Count Duckula.

TCMF-2L

[needscoffee]

@Banksiaman

Never too late to add something:

Michael Langdon

Bonanza [yes, part of an ensemble cast, but core cast - 428 episodes]

Little House on the Prairie

Highway to Heaven 

Kind of too late - see post#22… (and Landon, not Langdon)

[Cervaise]

Read the whole thread and was surprised Ed O’Neill didn’t even get an honorable mention. It’s only two series (Modern Family and Married w Children) but he was top-billed on both and each one ran eleven seasons. That has to count for something.

Maybe the better criterion would be “total number of seasons as the top-billed star across more than one show.” That makes O’Neill’s number 22.

[Banksiaman]

Thanks. I did do a search, but clearly with the wrong spelling.

[CalMeacham]

I realize that the man is disgraced now, but we didn’t know it back then.

I nominate Bill Cosby

I, Spy

The Bill Cosby Show (the one where he’s a gym teacher)

Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids (animated)

The New Bill Cosby Show (Variety Show, which had Groucho Marx as a guest!)

The Cosby Show (Doc Huxtable; ran 8 seasons)

Cosby (the one with Phylicia Rashad and Madeline Kahn)

Kids say the Darndest Things

[Dewey_Finn]

@Cervaise

Read the whole thread and was surprised Ed O’Neill didn’t even get an honorable mention. It’s only two series (Modern Family and Married w Children) but he was top-billed on both and each one ran eleven seasons. That has to count for something.

Maybe the better criterion would be “total number of seasons as the top-billed star across more than one show.” That makes O’Neill’s number 22.

I thought that Modern Family was considered an ensemble show, with no one top-billed star.

[RealityChuck]

@Rick_Kitchen

@RealityChuck

Harry Morgan: December Bride, Dragnet, and Mash. Pete and Gladys ran two seasons, so that’s close.

Bea Benaderet: Burns and Allen, The Flintstones, Petticoat Junction

John Forsythe: Bachelor Father, Charlie’s Angels, Dynasty

I don’t see Harry Morgan as starring in December Bride, nor Bea Benaderet as a star of Burns and Allen.

Depends on how you want to define “starring.” I think it applies to anyone who is part of the regular cast.

[Cervaise]

@Dewey_Finn

I thought that Modern Family was considered an ensemble show

Traditionally, ensemble casts are billed alphabetically.

[Dewey_Finn]

And what?

[ISiddiqui]

From IMDB, Ed O’Neill and Sofia Vergara are credited first in Modern Family. But Ed O’Neill does come first alphabetically among the adult actors (but not the kids)

[Cervaise]

Modern Family credits order: Ed O’Neill, Sofia Vergara, Julie Bowen, Ty Burrell, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Eric Stonestreet. Not alphabetical.

[Smid]

@Cervaise

Read the whole thread and was surprised Ed O’Neill didn’t even get an honorable mention. It’s only two series (Modern Family and Married w Children) but he was top-billed on both and each one ran eleven seasons. That has to count for something.

Maybe the better criterion would be “total number of seasons as the top-billed star across more than one show.” That makes O’Neill’s number 22.

Add LA Dragnet, which ran for a season and a half, and is really good. I need to rewatch it having finally found someone on the torrents who seeded it (DVD not for sale).