Axed by NBC, ‘I’ll Fly Away’ Wings to PBS

“I’ll Fly Away,” the acclaimed drama canceled by NBC this year, will move to PBS in the fall with an original movie wrapping up the story, followed by a rerun of the entire series, the non-commercial network confirmed Tuesday.

The series, which was yanked by NBC despite viewer protests and 15 Emmy nominations last year, stars Sam Waterston as a white Southern lawyer and Regina Taylor as his black housekeeper during the emergence of the nation’s civil rights movement beginning in the 1950s.

Following the planned 90-minute wrap-up movie on PBS Oct. 11, the series’ 39 episodes will be rerun, starting with the two-hour pilot that launched the show in 1991 with high ratings and much praise. Although never a big ratings winner during its run, many viewers protested that NBC’s moving of the show to different time slots ruined its chances to attract a steady audience.

NBC did, however, spend several million dollars giving the series a few added episodes during the winter to see if the ratings might pick up appreciably. But they didn’t.

“I’ll Fly Away” is only one of a few network series to move to PBS. In the late 1970s, CBS’ “The Paper Chase,” starring the late John Houseman as a tough, principled law professor, also aired in reruns on PBS after its network cancellation. It then switched to the Showtime pay-TV channel in 1983 with new episodes. NBC’s “Lifeline” series was also rerun on PBS in 1983.

Other network series that have been shown on some PBS stations include “Star Trek,” “The Twilight Zone,” “Lou Grant,” “The Saint,” “The Fugitive,” “Alfred Hitchcock Presents,” “Daktari,” “The Avengers,” “The Untouchables,” “Capt. Kangaroo,” “Dark Shadows,” “SCTV,” “The Prisoner,” “Centennial”.

PBS’ offering of “I’ll Fly Away” will be packaged and presented by KCET-TV Channel 28, which said it will seek underwriting for the movie and the reruns. The original film tying up the loose ends of the award-winning series will be written by the show’s creators, Joshua Brand and John Falsey.

The finale “begins in the present day with Lilly (Taylor), now 63 years old, relating her experiences with the civil rights movement to her 12-year-old grandson,” a PBS spokesman said. Her remembrance includes the specific incident in 1962 that “forever changes the lives” of the families headed in the series by Taylor and Waterston.

Ian Sander, who will produce the finale with Brand and Falsey and is also the director, said:

“The series ended more abruptly than people would have liked. A lot of people have asked us what happened to these people--where did they ultimately end up? Lilly had within her the potential to be great. Forrest (Waterston) had strong feelings about civil rights.

“We’ll see Forrest in the present day also. He’s in his 80s and will be retired and go back and tell us a little about what happened. Lilly attempts to fill the promise she had. She raises her daughter, who will be in her 30s.”

Sander said the question of what exactly happened to Lilly will not be disclosed until the end of the movie. Asked if she was still a housekeeper, he said: “No.”