Another example of classic 1970s TV movie-of-the-week was The Night Stalker. When ABC aired the film originally on January 11, 1972, as their ABC Movie of the Week, it garnered the highest ratings of any TV film at that time.
The plot concerns a series of murders plaguing the Las Vegas Strip. All of the victims had their bodies drained of blood. Carl Kolchak, a veteran reporter who has been fired from newspapers across the country due to his tenacious and unprofessional approach, thinks the killer believes himself to be a vampire. His managing editor, Tony Vincenzo, refuses to run the story under the vampire angle without proof, arguing it could cause a panic and soil the paper's reputation. But of course, there is a real vampire in Vegas and Kolchak is –seemly- the only one that believes it.
Directed by John Llewellyn Moxey (a veteran of theatrical and television films), who shot the film over 12 days, with an adaption done by Richard Matheson, and produced by Dan Curtis (best known at the time for Dark Shadows), The Night Stalker became the highest-rated original television film on US television, earning a 33.2 rating and 48 share. The television film did so well that it was released overseas as a theatrical film. It inspired a sequel television film titled The Night Strangler, which aired on January 16, 1973. A third film was in the works, when ABC decided to turn the film series into a TV series. And that’s when things got complicated.
It seems neither ABC nor Universal had obtained Carl Kolchak creator Jeff Rice's permission to use the characters and situations as TV series and so he sued the studio. The suit was resolved shortly before the series aired in the fall 1974 season. ABC maintained ownership of the two movies, the rights to the main character –Carl Kolchak (as well as the short lived 2005 reboot), Universal Studios held the rights to all twenty episodes of the weekly series. Meanwhile, Jeff Rice (1944 – 2015) retained the literary and publishing rights to the original written Kolchak works and The Kolchak Papers. Rice also received an on-screen credit as series creator, and after some negotiation, McGavin agreed to return as Kolchak and also serve as the series' executive producer, though he was never credited as such (and something that irked him). Simon Oakland also returned.
But basically the TV movies and TV series exist in two separate universes. Which meant the series could not reference the previous films in anyway, and side characters played by Carol Lynley in The Night Stalker and Jo Ann Pflug in The Night Strangler were never mentioned. However, the series did get away with doing a sequel episode to The Night Stalker. In The Vampire, an overlooked victim of the vampire Janos Skorzeny (not mentioned by name, but subtlety suggested) from Las Vegas named Catherine Rawlins, who makes her way to Los Angeles and begins killing anew.
Beyond the legal woes, the series was plagued with problems from the start, including budgetary issues and McGavin constantly struggling with the series' producer Cy Chermak over the direction. The show's ratings were mediocre and McGavin was growing dissatisfied, even as he found himself rewriting scripts and doing much of the work of a producer, but without getting either the full credit or the full compensation of one. McGavin had been unhappy with what he felt was the show's "monster of the week" direction, and an exhausting filming schedule. He asked to be released from his contract with two episodes remaining to be filmed, which the network granted in light of the show's dwindling ratings. The series was soon cancelled.
