Updated: April 23, 2026

Green Acres is an American television absurdist sitcom starring Eddie Albert and Eva Gabor as a couple who move from New York City to a country farm. Produced by Filmways as a sister show to Petticoat Junction, the series was first broadcast on CBS, from September 15, 1965, to April 27, 1971.

Although it received solid ratings during its six-year run, Green Acres was cancelled in 1971 as part of the "rural purge" by CBS. The sitcom has been in syndication and is available on DVD and VHS releases. A reunion movie aired in 1990.

In 1997, the two-part episode "A Star Named Arnold Is Born" was ranked No. 59 on TV Guide's 100 Greatest Episodes of All-Time.

Radio origins:

Green Acres derives from Granby's Green Acres, a comedy show aired on the CBS radio network from July 3 to August 21, 1950. The eight-episode summer series was created by Jay Sommers, who also wrote, produced, and directed.

The principal characters, a married couple played by Bea Benaderet and Gale Gordon, were based on similar characters played by the two on Lucille Ball's My Favorite Husband. The Granby's premise sees a big-city banker fulfill a lifelong dream by moving his family to a rundown farm, despite knowing nothing about farming. The nearby feed store is operated by the absent minded Mr. Kimball, and the Granbys hire an older hand named Eb ( Voiced by Parley Baer, who guest-starred in several episodes of the television series ), who often comments on their incompetent management. Benaderet later played Kate Bradley, a main character in Petticoat Junction, which was in the same fictional universe as Green Acres.

Adaptation to Television:

Following the success of The Beverly Hillbillies and Petticoat Junction, CBS offered producer Paul Henning another half-hour slot on the schedule, without requiring a pilot episode. Faced with running three shows, Henning encouraged Sommers to create a series for the time slot. Sommers later wrote and produced about one-third of the episodes.

In pre-production, proposed titles were Country Cousins and The Eddie Albert Show.

Premise:

Green Acres is about Oliver Wendell Douglas ( Eddie Albert ), a prominent and wealthy New York City attorney, fulfilling his dream to be a farmer, and Lisa Douglas ( Eva Gabor ), his glamorous Hungarian wife, uprooted unwillingly from an upscale Manhattan penthouse apartment to a dilapidated farm in Hooterville that Oliver purchases from the ever hustling Mr. Haney, to the disbelief of the residents.

The debut episode is a mockumentary about their decision to move to a rural area, anchored by former ABC newscaster John Charles Daly. Daly was the host of the CBS game show What's My Line, and a few weeks after the show's debut Albert and Gabor returned the favor by appearing on What's My Line as that episode's Mystery Guests, and publicly thanked Daly for helping to launch their series.

Although many Green Acres episodes were still standard 1960s sitcom fare, the show developed a regular undercurrent of surrealism and satire. The writers soon developed a suite of running jokes and visual gags, and characters often broke the fourth wall, such as looking around to try and figure out where the fife music is coming from when Oliver launches into one of his frequent "American dream" monologues.

The show is set in the same television universe as Henning's Petticoat Junction, featuring such towns as Hooterville, Pixley, Crabwell Corners, and Stankwell Falls, as well as sharing characters such as Joe Carson, Fred and Doris Ziffel, Sam Drucker, Newt Kiley, and Floyd Smoot.