Duel

From TeeVeePedia, the Internet TV Encyclopedia.

Duel was a TV movie directed by Ken Burns in the early 1970's. Initially shown on the ABC show Monday Night Movie of the Week and set during the War of 1812, Duel told the story of the infamous 1840 duel between former Campaign! winners President Davy Crockett and President Ben Franklin. From the long-winded explanation of how Franklin got his face on the $100 bill to the graphic depiction of the duel itself, Duel was considered by historians to be the most accurate historical drama of its day. Because of this (and the fact that, at 4 hours running time, Duel took 3 hours and 50 minutes longer than the actual duel), the movie netted ABC its lowest ratings for any made-for-tv movie in its history.

Following the poor performance of Duel, ABC scrapped Monday Night Movie of the Week and began airing Monday Night Football in its place. Director Burns, despondent, left film-making forever and became a truck driver. Surprisingly, Duel has been re-aired a number of times by PBS since its original airing, usually during pledge drive month.

In 2007, due to the writers strike, ABC ran out of ideas and made a game show version of Duel.