Don Matheson (1929-2014)

Landofgiants
Actor Don Matheson, best known for playing one of the humans stranded in the Land of the Giants, died June 29 at the age of 84.

Don_Matheson

Don Matheson in Land of the Giants

Set in the future – 1983 (!) – Irwin Allen’s Sixties TV series Land of the Giants often involved rescuing one of the human crew who’d been captured by the giants. The series was one of the most expensive ever made, reportedly costing $250,000 per episode.

Matheson’s genre credits include appearances in two other Irwin Allen productions, Lost in Space (two episodes) and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (one epsiode).

He also worked on General Hospital and primetime soaps Falcon Crest and Dynasty.

5 thoughts on “Don Matheson (1929-2014)

  1. Towards the end of the second season of Land of the Giants, Matheson married co-star Deanna Lund (Valerie), they had a daughter, actress Michele Matheson (Howling VI: The Freaks), but later divorced.

  2. Interesting. The show obviously had followers, it was on for two seasons, though I don’t have any particular memory of it. May have been one of the few sf tv shows I didn’t follow in the Sixties. In fact I just checked the old TV listings — I was probably tuned into “Wild Kingdom” and “The Wonderful World of Disney” on NBC.

  3. While the sets and effects were impressive, the stories were not. And some of the special effects were used over and over. The giant hand that grabbed an actor was always the same hand….no fault to the actors, as they seem to have done their best.

  4. Back then, the UK only had two channels. I seem to recall this show played on a Sunday afternoon (the same slot as Voyage had occupied), so the alternative was most likely some religous tosh on the BBC.

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