Marshal Matt Dillon

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For other persons named Matt Dillon, see Matt Dillon (disambiguation).

Marshal Matt Dillon is a fictional character featured on both the radio and television versions of Gunsmoke. Dillon is the U.S. Marshal of Dodge City, Kansas who works to preserve law and order in the western frontier of the 1870's.

James Arness as Marshal Matt Dillon

On radio, Dillon was portrayed by William Conrad, whose booming voice helped to project a larger than life presence. In the opening of most radio episodes, the announcer would describe the show as "the story of the violence that moved west with young America, and the story of a man who moved with it." Matt Dillon would take over, saying, "I'm that man, Matt Dillon, United States Marshal -- the first man they look for and the last they want to meet. It's a chancy job, and it makes a man watchful . . . and a little lonely." Dillon narrated many of the radio episodes, and in radio and to a lesser extent on television, he often struggled with the dangers and reality of his job and the tragic results of most situations. In both versions, too, his closest friends were his deputy Chester, physician Doc Adams, and Miss Kitty Russell, the saloon girl. On radio, Marshal Dillon often referred to his good friend Wild Bill Hickock.

In a 1949 audition show (or pilot) for the radio series, the character was named "Mark Dillon," but by 1952, when the regular series aired, he had become Matt Dillon. When the program came to television in 1955, introduced by John Wayne in a brief film clip before the first episode, James Arness had been given the role that he would play for the next twenty years. The obese Conrad auditioned for it but was deemed physically too rotund by the network, and would have to wait for his own television series, Cannon (1971-1976) and Jake and the Fat Man (1987-1992).