Pernell Roberts Truly Hated Him More Than Anyone – HT

 

 

 

I felt the thing that I might be most comfortable with was Jaques’ speech out of As You Like It and The seven ages of man. Yeah, so we can go >> [clears throat] >> In 2008, filmmaker Marcus Welby received a secret offer. Pernell Roberts, Bonanza’s most rebellious star, wanted to record 6 hours of confessions about the actors he despised the most.

 But there was one rule. When the interviews ended, Welby had to destroy every tape on the spot. Roberts even paid $50,000 to guarantee silence. Welby pretended to obey, then recovered everything from a hidden backup. Now, after 14 years, the forbidden truth has finally surfaced. And once you hear it, you’ll understand why he wanted it erased forever.

Number one, Michael Landon. The first name on Pernell Roberts’ secret list wasn’t a surprise to anyone who truly knew what happened behind those studio walls. Michael Landon. And the hatred wasn’t quiet or symbolic. It was born from moments so sharp that Roberts still flinched when he talked about them decades later.

People loved Landon, but Roberts had seen a version of him the public never met. That tension started early. Landon quickly figured out that the fastest way to climb in Hollywood wasn’t talent, but access. Producers loved him, NBC executives adored him, and Landon worked that room with the confidence of someone who already understood he would outgrow the show.

Roberts sensed the shift the moment Landon began joining meetings he wasn’t invited to, pulling chairs closer to the decision-makers, taking notes as though he were already running the place. Then came the day everything cracked. A closed-door script meeting, a dozen people around the table, and Roberts raising concerns about a storyline portraying Native people as violent savages.

He spoke with the same seriousness he always had, but Landon wasn’t in the mood for conscience. He lifted his script, waved it dramatically, and said loud enough for every single person to heard, “Here we go again. Pernell wants to rewrite the entire West.” Landon wasn’t done. He slouched back, turned to a producer, and added, “We’re here to make a hit, not teach history.

Somebody tell him that.” Roberts looked directly at him, stunned that Landon would humiliate him so openly. That moment circulated around the set for weeks. Landon, meanwhile, acted as if nothing had happened. But the real betrayal came quietly late one evening when Roberts passed by Landon talking to a network executive near the studio hallway.

The executive asked whether Roberts was still being difficult. Landon didn’t hesitate. He chuckled and replied, “Give him time. He’ll quit or get over it.” That laugh burned into Roberts’ memory. He later said it felt like being slapped by someone he once respected. Years later, while Roberts struggled to find work, Landon was writing episodes, directing, shaping the final years of Bonanza like it belonged to him alone.

The power imbalance was impossible to ignore. Roberts once admitted to a friend, “He didn’t hate me. He just enjoyed stepping over me.” And that was something Roberts never forgave. Number two, Dan Blocker. The second name on Pernell Roberts’ list hits harder than any feud with a co-star or producer. Dan Blocker.

No outsider would ever guess it, but behind the scenes, the warmest, friendliest face of Bonanza delivered the coldest cut Roberts ever felt. And that wound came from someone he once trusted more than anyone on the show. These two weren’t casual colleagues. They shared the same Southern roots, the same skepticism about Hollywood, the same private conversations about how outdated and insulting some of the scripts were.

 Blocker would shake his head, roll his eyes, and say, “Man, this is garbage.” Then finish the scene anyway. Roberts mistook those moments as solidarity. He didn’t know they were just stress relief for Blocker. The day everything ended happened without warning. Roberts sat across from Blocker at a diner they’d visited a hundred times before.

 He told him simply, “I’m leaving the show.” He expected worry, maybe sadness. Instead, Blocker’s expression hardened instantly. He leaned forward and demanded, “You’re really walking away? From all of us?” Roberts tried to explain the racism, the frustration, the endless battles with the writers, but Blocker’s tone sharpened. “Don’t spin it like you’re saving the world. You’re quitting.

” It stunned Roberts. Blocker had never spoken to him that way. And then came the line that destroyed their friendship in one swing. “You want to go down on principle? Do it alone.” Not long after, words spread across the set that Blocker had said, “We’ll be better without his preaching.” Whether he said it out of anger or honesty, Roberts believed every word.

And that belief burned. Rober

ts reached out repeatedly. Calls, letters, messages through friends. Blocker answered none of them. The silence hurt more than any insult. To Roberts, it wasn’t disagreement. It was complete abandonment. Then came 1972. Dan Blocker died suddenly at just 43. Roberts drove to the funeral, staying in the back, trying to honor what they once were.

Before the service started, Michael Landon approached him and said quietly but firmly, “Dan didn’t want you here.” Roberts left immediately, tears filling his eyes on the way home. That chapter stayed open for the rest of his life. Blocker wasn’t just a friend who disagreed. He was the friend who disappeared the moment Roberts needed him most.

Number three, Lorne Greene. Lorne Greene, known as America’s father, sits firmly in the third position on Roberts’ list. And the reason isn’t just disappointment. It’s betrayal through silence, which to Roberts was worse than an outright enemy. People saw Greene as the moral center of Bonanza, but behind the scenes, he was the one who watched Roberts get torn apart and never lifted a finger.

Greene had the kind of authority on set that Roberts never had. When he spoke, NBC listened. When he asked for something, the producers made it happen. That’s why Roberts leaned on him in the early years, believing Greene could help fight the racism baked into so many scripts. And for a while, Greene nodded sympathetically, playing the role of the wise elder even off camera.

The mask cracked during a second season script meeting. Roberts challenged a scene portraying a Paiute tribe as mindless attackers. Greene sat right beside him, arms folded, eyes down. When Roberts finished, everyone waited for Greene to back him up. He didn’t. Instead, he cleared his throat and said, “The audience understands it’s just a story.

” Roberts looked at him like he’d been slapped. Greene wouldn’t meet his eyes. It got worse. A few months later, NBC executives summoned Roberts for what was essentially a warning disguised as a meeting. They pressured him to stop causing friction. Greene entered the room halfway through, nodded to the executives, sat down, and stayed quiet while they threatened Roberts’ future.

 Not a word in his defense, not even a glance of support. That moment haunted Roberts. He later said, “I didn’t need him to fight for me. I needed him not to abandon me.” But Greene’s silence became a pattern. Every time Roberts raised concerns, Greene excused himself from the conversation, avoided eye contact, or made neutral comments like, “Everyone’s just trying to do their job.

” Eventually, he stopped acknowledging Roberts entirely in discussions that involved conflict. It wasn’t disagreement. It was surrender. Worse, it was telling him to surrender, too. When Greene died in 1987, Roberts didn’t attend the funeral. He said privately, “He chose comfort over courage.” And for Roberts, there was no greater sin.

Number four, David Dortort. Sliding into the final position on Roberts’ private list is the man no one expected him to resent this deeply. David Dortort, the creator of Bonanza, the architect of the Cartwright empire. Fans imagined Dortort as a visionary, a fatherly storyteller, the man who assembled one of television’s most iconic families.

But for Roberts, Dortort represented something far more brutal. The betrayal of a promise he believed in. Their relationship started with optimism. Dortort pitched Bonanza to Roberts as a groundbreaking Western that would tackle real issues. Prejudice, morality, justice. He told Roberts privately, “We’re going to push boundaries.

” Those words hooked him. Roberts signed on because he believed they were building something that mattered. The first cracks appeared early. NBC executives demanded lighter, safer, more comfortable storylines. Dortort caved without hesitation. Scripts that once aimed for complexity were scrubbed clean, replaced with paint-by-number morality tales.

Roberts confronted him after reading an especially degrading script involving native characters being portrayed as obstacles rather than humans. Dortort looked up from his desk, sighed, and said, “It’s what the network wants.” Roberts wasn’t satisfied. He pushed harder. That led to the tension-filled showdown people on set still whispered about years later.

Roberts marched into Dortort’s office with a script in his hand. The one where Adam falls in love with a native woman only for the story to treat their love as a tragic mistake that must end in death. Roberts slammed the script on the desk and said, “This is poison.” Dortort stood up, slammed his palms against the table, and snapped, “You’re the one poisoning this show.

” That was the moment Roberts realized the man who once preached about integrity was now chasing ratings like everyone else. When NBC asked Dortort whether Roberts was disruptive, he didn’t defend him. Instead, he told them, “He’s difficult. He slows us down.” Those words gave NBC exactly what they needed to justify pushing Roberts out.

They contributed directly to the years he spent blacklisted, scrambling for any job he could find. He never forgave the lie, not the scripts, not the surrender, but that early promise whispered like a bond. The man who created the show also helped destroy Roberts’s place in it. So, now that the truth is out, whose name shocked you the most? And do you think Pernell Roberts was justified in his hatred? Tell us your thoughts below, and don’t forget to like, subscribe, and hit the bell so you never miss the next hidden

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