Robert Conrad Vs. Gabe Kaplan: Did Battle Of The Network Stars Really Cause A Massive Feud?
We won't pretend not to secretly enjoy the piping hot tea that comes out of Hollywood on a daily basis. Our favorite celebs have a knack for butting heads with their peers, and often, their public feuds are a convenient distraction from our own problems. The 2010s saw Taylor Swift and Katy Perry's iconic feud making headlines, while the 2020s have mostly revolved around Blake Lively's many rumored feuds. But the '70s witnessed the alleged feud between actors Robert Conrad and Gabe Kaplan, which was born on the popular show "Battle of the Network Stars."
The premise was exactly what the name suggested: Stars from the major networks at the time, ABC, NBC, and CBS, battled it out in endurance sports to see which came out on top. The first episode, which aired in 1976, saw Kaplan leading the ABC Team, while Conrad captained the NBC Team. As it turned out, the two men were quite competitive. Kaplan, who starred in "Welcome Back, Kotter" (which landed on our list of top sitcom pilots of the '70s), reportedly ended up challenging Conrad to a final face-off following a dispute over which team really won the relay race.
At first glance, Conrad, who appeared in shows like "Baa Baa Black Sheep" and "The Wild Wild West" and was known for not needing a stunt double for the more daring scenes, was the obvious winner. But Kaplan won the race, and it earned him two slaps from Conrad. Naturally, this sparked rumors of an ongoing feud between the actors that refused to die for decades. But was there any truth to it? Apparently not. In a piece Kaplan penned for Emmy magazine in 2021, the actor revealed that he and Conrad met up in 2018, eager to talk about their supposed "feud."
Conrad and Kaplan's on-screen kerfuffle was real but their years-long feud was not
On his blog, "News From Me," comic book and television writer Mark Evanier chronicled what really went down on "Battle of the Network Stars" during the infamous episode where Robert Conrad smacked Gabe Kaplan — it's highly likely he was simply peeved at being played. According to Evanier, Kaplan once told him that he suggested the race because he knew it'd be an easy win for him and "Conrad couldn't refuse it without looking chicken." Still, the actor was surprised at the longevity of the brouhaha, acknowledging to ESPN in 2008, "I didn't realize at the time how big it would be. Nobody could believe I won."
In his essay for Emmy magazine, Kaplan recalled how he and Conrad "greeted each other warmly" when they finally reunited in 2018, but also confessed, "I once thought [he] might kill me on national TV." The professional poker player added that he was fully aware of the decades-long rumors about their supposed feud, but clarified that the two men had never actively hated each other. They weren't friends, but they weren't enemies either.
Conrad might have lost the race on that fateful episode, but his appearances on "Battle of the Network Stars" gave his career quite a boost. Aside from getting into a scuffle with Kaplan, Conrad also had words with the CBS Team's captain, Telly Savalas, which ended in him showing Savalas his fist in warning. This caught the president of Eveready, Bill Livingston's, attention, who subsequently hired Conrad for an ad. "Thank goodness for 'The Battle of the Network Stars,'" the actor quipped in an interview, per Brioux.TV.