Quantum Leap

Quantum Leap
Genre	Science fiction
Created by	Donald P. Bellisario
Starring	Scott Bakula Dean Stockwell
Narrated by	Deborah Pratt (Intro)
Theme music composer	Mike Post
Composer(s)	Velton Ray Bunch
Country of origin	United States
Original language(s)	English
No. of seasons	5
No. of episodes	97 (list of episodes)
Production
Producer(s)	Donald P. Bellisario Deborah Pratt Harker Wade
Production location(s)	California, USA
Running time	45 minutes
Production company(s)	Belisarius Productions Universal Television
Distributor	NBCUniversal Television Distribution
Release
Original network	NBC
Picture format	SD: 4:3 (broadcast/DVD release) HD: 16:9 (streaming)
Original release	March 26, 1989 (1989-03-26) – May 5, 1993 (1993-05-05)
External links
Website (NBC)

Quantum Leap is an American science-fiction television series that originally aired on NBC for five seasons, from March 1989 through May 1993. Created by Donald P. Bellisario, it starred Scott Bakula as Dr. Sam Beckett, a physicist who leaps through spacetime during an experiment in time travel, by temporarily taking the place of other people to correct historical mistakes. Dean Stockwell co-stars as Admiral Al Calavicci, Sam's womanizing, cigar-smoking companion and best friend, who appears to him as a hologram.

The series features a mix of humor, drama, romance, social commentary, and science fiction. The show was ranked #19 on TV Guide's "Top Cult Shows Ever".^[1]

Premise

Quantum Leap follows the narrative of Dr. Sam Beckett (Bakula), a physicist who has become stuck in the past as a result of a time-travel experiment gone wrong, and his attempts to return to his present, the late 20th century, by altering events in the past for the better, with the aid of a hologram of his friend Admiral Al Calavicci (Stockwell), monitoring him from Sam's present.^[2][3]

In the series premiere, Sam has theorized the ability to travel in one's own lifetime and is the lead of the government-funded Project Quantum Leap, operating from a secret laboratory in New Mexico; Al oversees the project for the government. When Al learns that funding for the project is in danger of being pulled because no demonstrable results have come from the project, Sam takes it upon himself to step into the Quantum Leap accelerator to prove the project works and is sent into the past. When Sam gains consciousness, he finds himself suffering from partial amnesia, and is more surprised to find that his appearance to others, including what he sees in the mirror, is not his own face. He finds that Al has come to his aid as a hologram that only Sam can see and hear, as it is tuned to his brainwaves. Al, working with the project's artificial intelligence Ziggy (voiced by Deborah Pratt), determines that Sam must alter an event in the current period he is in so as to re-engage the Quantum Leap process and return home. Al helps Sam overcome some facets of his "Swiss-cheese memory" and provides information on history as it originally happened. He also updates Sam on future events and relates possible outcome-probabilities using a handheld communication device in contact with Ziggy. The device is often temperamental and must be struck a few times as it emits electronic beeping and whirring sounds before the information is revealed. With Al and Ziggy's help, Sam is able to successfully change history, and then leaps out, only to find himself in the life of someone else in a different period of time.^[4]

Episodes in the series subsequently follow Sam's reaction to each leap (typically ending the cold open with him uttering "Oh, boy!" on discovering his situation), and then working with Al and Ziggy to figure out his new identity and who he needs to help to "set right what once went wrong" and trigger the next leap.^[5] An episode typically ends as a cliffhanger, showing the first few moments of Sam's next leap (along with him again uttering "Oh, boy!" on discovering his situation), which is repeated in the following episode's cold open. Though initially Sam's leaping is believed by Al and the others on the Quantum Leap team to be random, the characters come to believe in later seasons that someone or something is controlling Sam's leaping, and this is a central focus of the show's finale episode, "Mirror Image".

When Sam leaps, his body is physically present in the past, although he appears to others as the person into whom he leaped. In one case, after leaping into a Vietnam veteran who has lost both legs, Sam is still able to walk normally, but appears to others as if he is floating. Sam's body and mind may become jumbled with those into whom he has leaped. In one situation, he leaps into a woman near the end of her pregnancy and feels her birth pains, while in another episode, he leaps into Lee Harvey Oswald and feels an intense pressure to assassinate John F. Kennedy, despite knowing that it is the wrong thing to do. Similarly, the persons into whom Sam has leaped are brought into the future, where they appear as Sam to the others; they are normally kept in an isolated waiting room to prevent them from learning anything about the future, and they return to their own time when Sam leaps.

In most of Sam's leaps, the changes he makes are small on the grand scale, such as saving the life of a person who might otherwise have died, or helping making someone's life better. Selected episodes, however, demonstrate more dramatic effects of his time travels. In one episode, Sam's actions ultimately lead to Al's death prior to the project, and Sam finds himself suddenly aided by a new hologram, "Edward St. John V" (played by Roddy McDowall), and must work to prevent Al's death. In another episode, when again the project's funding is threatened, Sam helps a young woman successfully pass the bar; this results in her becoming one of the members of Congress who oversees the project and aids in the restoration of its funding. In the episode involving Lee Harvey Oswald, while Sam and Al do not prevent the assassination of Kennedy, Sam's actions prevent Oswald from making a second shot that killed Jacqueline Kennedy in the original fictional history.

Because of the time-travel aspect, many episodes allude to famous people or incidents indirectly, such as Sam suggesting to young Donald Trump that New York real estate will be valuable in the future, suggesting the lyrics of "Peggy Sue" to a teenaged Buddy Holly, showing young Michael Jackson his signature moonwalk dance for the first time, giving Dr. Henry Heimlich the idea for his namesake maneuver by saving him from choking,^[3] and setting in place actions that lead to the discovery of the Watergate scandal. Two notable episodes place Sam directly at the center of significant historical events, one being the leap into Oswald. In "Goodbye Norma Jean", Sam appears as Marilyn Monroe's bodyguard, who saves her life and convinces Marilyn to remain alive for her starring role in The Misfits. Other episodes explore the past of the main characters, such as Sam saving his brother from being killed in the Vietnam War, and saving Al's marriage to Beth.

In the final episode, "Mirror Image", Sam leaps through spacetime as himself (without replacing another person), arriving at the exact time of his birth, where he meets a mysterious barkeep (Bruce McGill, who also appeared in the first episode in a different role). The barkeep is aware of Sam's situation and assures him that Sam himself controls the very nature and destinations of his leaps ("to make the world a better place"), and that Sam is always able to return home at any time he truly wants. In the final episode's epilogue, Sam is shown to leap back to visit Al's wife Beth as himself again, assuring her that her husband (who was a prisoner of war at the time) will return home to her; this results in Al and Beth remaining happily married in the future,^[3] while Sam continues leaping, never returning home.

Cast and characters

• Dr. Samuel "Sam" Beckett (played by Scott Bakula) is a quantum physicist with six doctoral degrees. He grew up on his parents' farm in Elk Ridge, Indiana, with an older brother (Tom) and a younger sister (Katie). Sam's idol is Albert Einstein.
• Albert "Al" Calavicci, USN (played by Dean Stockwell) is a womanizing U.S. Navy rear admiral and Sam's best friend, who grew up in an orphanage and was later active in the Civil Rights Movement. At the time of Sam's leaps, Al spends his free time with his lover and the project's medical technician Tina Martinez (played by Gigi Rice), who appears in the fourth-season episode "The Leap Back".
• Ziggy (voiced by the narrator and co-executive producer Deborah Pratt) is the self-aware artificial intelligence "parallel hybrid computer with an ego" that runs the Project Quantum Leap, and helps Sam throughout his leaps; appearing in the fourth-season episode "The Leap Back".
• Irving "Gooshie" Gushman (played by Dennis Wolfberg) is the project's often-mentioned head programmer, who is said to have bad breath. He appears in five episodes, including the finale.
• Dr. Verbena Beeks (played by Candy Ann Brown) is often mentioned as the project's psychiatrist. She appears in two episodes throughout the series.

In each episode, a different cast of guest characters appears, mostly the ones whom Sam replaces with his leaps. Several other characters are referred to regularly throughout the series, but are mostly unseen.

Production

Episodes

Reception

Despite its struggling start with poor broadcast timings,^[3] the series had gained a large 18–49 demographics of viewers. The finale was viewed by 13 million American households.^[14] In 2004 and 2007, Quantum Leap was ranked #15 and #19 on TV Guide's "Top Cult Shows Ever."^[1]

Other media

References

External links

• "Quantum Leap". Sci-Fi Channel. Archived from the original on April 23, 2006.
• Quantum Leap on IMDb
• Quantum Leap at AllMovie
• Quantum Leap at TV.com