On September 8, 1965, Daily Variety ran an advertisement calling for "Folk & Rock Musicians-Singers" and "4 Insane Boys, Age 17-21" for "Acting Roles in a New TV Series." The 437 young hopefuls who auditioned for producers Bob Rafelson (Five Easy Pieces) and Bert Schneider included Paul Williams, Harry Nilsson, and Steven Stills, but not Charles Manson, even though that urban legend persists. The goal was to find four lads who embodied the joie de vivre exhibited by the Beatles in their early celluloid romps, A Hard Day's Night (1964) and Help! (1965). That Liverpool quartet was already reinventing itself, but there were those who wished that the moptops would stay giddy and innocent forever.

That is what the creators of The Monkees (even the name was similar to The Beatles) were banking on. The television show/rock band was made up of Micky Dolenz, Davy Jones, Peter Tork, and Mike Nesmith, who...