I just discovered a whole slew of these posted on YouTube. The earliest ones I’ve seen (InterpolCalling) date back to around 1959, but I initially thought they were made later, around the time of Roger Moore’s version of The Saint (1962). Series include The Protectors (not the color version with Robert Vaughn, at least I don’t think so), Man of the World, Ghost Squad, and Man in a Suitcase, none of which I’ve ever heard of before. They all seem to be full-length and in good monochrome condition.
Best of all, they include early episodes of The Avengers (“Toy Trap,” “Girl on the Trapeze,” and a surviving bit of the 1961 pilot “Hot Snow”) and a collection of other goodies about the series.
There are also a couple of episodes of that ‘60s classic Honey West (!), and color shows extending into the ‘70s, like Jason King.
I’m including a link to the show I’m watching now, which should lead you to the long list of selections. Browse and enjoy!
A bunch of those titles appeared on a local UHF channel when I was a kid. Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) AKA My Partner the Ghost was the only one in color.
I love watching old shows like these just to hear all those clipped British accents. They’re so much more classy than the colloquial American crap I have to endure today.
I just now tried to figure out what the ITC era was. Apparently there was something called the Independent Television Commission in the U.K. It lasted from 1 January 1991 to 28 December 2003. It licensed and regulated all television services in the U.K. apart from the BBC. Is that what you mean?
I was referring to the period in which shows from ITC (Lord Lew Grade’s production company) pretty much dominated British TV (and exports to places like the US). I grew up watching a lot of these (my favorite was The Saint with Roger Moore), so it lasted at least from the 1960s through the ‘70s.
In the US, a lot of shows like The Protectors (the color version with Robert Vaughn) and The Champions were usually aired late at night on local stations as fillers.
When Danger Man switched from monochrome to color in 1965 or ‘66, it was retitled Secret Agent and aired under that name in the US, with the accompanying theme by Johnny Rivers. It was, of course, followed by The Prisoner, also with Patrick McGoohan.
While we’re on the topic of ITC’s productions I’m hoping someone can flesh out a vague childhood memory …
I recall a kids’ space SF series that aired in the USA from the early 1960s that I think was made by ITC or someplace similar. It was absolutely positively not the Thunderbirds. And IIRC was a couple years before Thunderbirds came out, or at least before it came to the USA. I also know it was not Stingray or Space:1999 from @Peter_Morris’s wiki list upthread.
I think it was a British, not US, production. I think it was marionettes, not animated or live humans but I’m not sure. The name of the series or their spaceship might have been alphanumeric gibberish akin to RFX-3456. Anyhow every episode the heroic Captain and crew had space adventures and always defeated the bad guys or evaded the previously unknown space danger.
What I recall most clearly, because I got the toy and played with it endlessly (for a couple months) was the ship vaguely resembled the Seaview from Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea, which series was then still several years in the future. So my memory is not from VttBotS. So the ship was long and thin, flared front end sorta kinda phallic with fins. Not that a 5yo notices that connection. And of course details along the length of the hull and more fins and propulsion pods or whatever at the back end.
The big feature of the show (and toy) was that the forward control room area (front ~15%-ish) could detach and operate independently from the main ship. And often did.
So actually, sorta like the way a SpaceX Starship payload unit and Super Heavy booster look, but with lots more exterior detail and doodads sticking out.
Does this ring a bell w anyone? Bueller?
ETA: After 10 minutes of writing this up which triggered a subconscious trawl through my dusty musty memories the words “XL-somenumbers” and “fireball” magically popped up. Then “Fireball XL-5”. A quick Google and here we are:
Looking down thread, I also see @Peter_Morris knew it straight away. Thank you!
The first ITC series I remember seeing was Supercar, in the summer of 1963 or ‘62. I was in Joliet. IL, with my dad at the time, so it was probably broadcast out of Chicago as part of the early Saturday morning kids’ show lineup.
I thought the Supermarionation was weird but kinda cool, and I picked up the catchy theme song right away: Supercar! It travels on land, it travels on sea, it can journey anywhere…..
I adored The Avengers with Diana Rigg and Patrick MacNee when I was in high school, and I was mesmerized, as only a virginal schoolgirl could be, by the chemistry between Emma Peel and John Steed. (Steed? Why not go ahead and call him stud, with his cane and his bowler?) Would they or wouldn’t they? Had they or hadn’t they? You never knew for sure, but there was such a spark between them that I decided they had and they did. Often.
I was living in England when The New Avengers debuted in early ‘77. I had a copy of the commemorative Sunday supplement that was issued, in which Patrick Macnee said they took it for granted that Steed and Emma were sleeping together and thus never dwelled on the topic.
In at least one episode, Emma had to prove she was not an impostor by whispering something only she would know into Steed’s ear. If you watch very carefully, it’s clear that she says “We sleep together.”
You’ll probably also be satisfied to know that this younger boy had exactly the same thoughts as you were having. But about the oh-so-sexy Mrs. Peel.
Upon some research just now the odd thing to me is that Diana Rigg / Mrs. Peel was with Steed for just 2 years of the original Avenger’s 8 year run. And she was his third sidekick and the second female one of the eventual three women he worked with.
New Avengers still had Macnee / Steed but during that show’s 2-year run Steed had two new sidekicks: one male, one female.
So all told two men and four women accompanied Steed on his decade of adventures.
But to me Rigg/Peel is the one and only. The rest are at best pale imposters and at worst, just a waste of screen time and space. If asked I’d have said she appeared in 75+% of all episodes. Not the actual ~20%.
Steed had another female sidekick before Cathy Gale was firmly established: nightclub singer Venus Smith, played by Julie Stevens. She figured prominently in six episodes, but she never really seemed to do much.
After Ian Hendry left the series, Steed was paired with a replacement, Dr Martin King, but that lasted only three episodes.
Everything you probably want to know about The Avengers can be found at this website:
