The Avengers Forever: AvengerNews Archive

	AvengerNews Archive Special Event

National Film Theatre special: "The Avengers Oddities"
Thursday, 2 December 1999, 8:45 NFT1

Reported by Pete Stampede

It began and ended with a fairly close spoof of the Season Five titles from Still In Bed with Medinner (1998), a late-night, not very funny series with a fat comedian called Bob Mills, who here played both Steed and Emma, and didn't look much like either of them. Then, a clip from the film Q Planes, with Sir Ralph Richardson giving the performance Patrick Macnee says influenced Steed. Although he was wearing a trilby rather than a bowler, Richardson had an umbrella and the same sort of casual approach to solving crime, and the clip ended with him driving off in what looked like a Bentley. Then there was the French version of the Season Four titles, actually exactly the same apart from the title being different and the credits now reading "Scenario de Brian Clemens", etc. Then, a truly bizarre, unintentionally hilarious bit from Thank Your Lucky Stars, a popular 60's pop programme, being hosted that week (in 66) by Jim Dale (star of Carry On films and Barnum on Broadway). A three-man group called the Londonaires, one of whom looked about ready for retirement age, performed a song called "Darling Emma" while wearing Steedish suits, while a blonde (!) wearing one of the target-motif outfits slinked about shooting the girl backing singers, who were in the type of outfit Diana wore in The House That Jack Built (plus caps)! There's a bit about the record on Noon Doomsday, apparently it was never released.

Another weird dance-based bit followed, from The Bruce Forsyth Show (also 1966): long-chinned entertainer and latter-day game show host Brucie's attempt to conquer Broadway in the late 70's was one of the great showbiz disasters. It started with him as himself being shot, then putting on a bowler and brolly and chasing after multiple Emmas (in outfits a la What the Butler Saw) in a routine choreographed to Laurie Johnson's theme. The only bit of that theme that really goes with dancing is the middle eight, anyway. It ended with one of the Emmas pulling off a wig, revealing herself to be blonde, then shooting Brucie. Who then did a Bond impression in a routine backed by Monty Norman's theme. Well, it was the 60's and people did that sort of thing.

Then, the first of several items from Pathe News, ironic to think that these newsreels shown in cinemas were indirectly publicising a TV show. The title was Rigg's New Rigg (ouch!), covering the fashion show: Patrick being photographed with Twiggy, etc. Interesting to note that one of the people Diana was photographed with was the late racing driver Graham Hill, a smoothie who always struck me as a bit of a Steed-wannabe. The Johnson theme accompanied this, and just about all the other Pathe clips used. Then, the first colour clip (apart from the Still In Bed with Medinner titles), Diana Rigg being interviewed on Michael Parkinson's show in 1972. Just for the record, the NFT's clip began at round about the same point, Parky asking her about getting the role of Emma, and ended with her saying she didn't mind theatregoers coming to see her because of the show, as long as they accepted she could play different characters.

Next up was a commercial she did for Lux soap in 1967, in b/w: I have a terrible obsession with old commercials, and I've got one for Lux from 1966, with forgotten pop star Sandie Shaw, and this was almost identical! The same device of having a caption of the star's name at the start, the same sort of set and rather stilted script, Diana was even wearing the same sort of mini-dress. Then, a 1987 parody from French and Saunders, which started off quite well, but could just as easily have been a send-up of any 60's spy thing. Probably coincidence, but a gag about a hypnotising device working on its operators, rather than the intended victim, was rather close to a similar bit in Legacy of Death. And I hate to nit-pick about something so trivial, but Jennifer Saunders was dressed as Purdey, which was a different decade and (strictly speaking) different series altogether: to be fair she is an excellent mimic, and near the end, for one brief second, really looked like her future Ab Fab co-star.

The next clip from Pathe News was in colour, covering the location shooting at Beaulieu, for Escape in Time and The Bird Who Knew Too Much amongst others. It was clearly the same shots as used in the actual shows, the engine backfiring in Steed's face etc., the voiceover (with the inevitable Johnson theme in the background) stated that all this footage had to be shot on the same day. Interesting to see, in the shots of the crew, that there was a black man included, good thing that unpleasant rule about "No Coloureds" wasn't carried that far.

Then there were two sketches, from different editions, of The Lily Savage Show (1997): Lily Savage is a female impersonator with a strong Liverpudlian accent, and that's about his/her only gag. In these parodies (vaguely derived from The Master Minds, A Touch of Brimstone and The Gravediggers) he/she was Emma and then Tara, Simon Williams (ex-Upstairs Downstairs) was Steed and the less said about it all, the better. There were then three brief, edited-together pieces from Pathe News, in monochrome this time. The first was titled Dressed to Kill, and was of the 65/66 crop of Emmapeelers being unveiled on a catwalk, complete with stuntmen to be thrown about (it looked like Ray Austin, balding and all in black, was the first), as well as the inevitable sexist shots of the model's rear end (wearing the outfit from The Danger Makers), the voiceover kept saying "this is Diana Rigg" when clearly none of the several models were! Patrick was there, though.

The next bit, untitled, was of the then Minister with responsibility for films visiting Elstree Studios, and trying to look interested while being shown sets in construction and the like. I'm not sure of the date, none was given for any of the Pathe News bits, but there was a quick shot of what looked like either Two's a Crowd or The Correct Way to Kill being made. After a quick shot of the Minister meeting Roger Moore, he was shown meeting Patrick and Diana, who had a cigarette in her hand throughout, interestingly enough! As with a lot of the Pathe News clips, the chauvinistic voiceover constantly referred to the show's worldwide sales and status as a "top dollar earner."

Linda Thorson being unveiled to the press was the next clip, with Linda in the curly blonde hairstyle. It started with her sitting at a table with Patrick, both sipping champers; frankly, she looked like she'd had quite a bit of it by that point, in one close-up anyway. There was then the promo video for the notorious "Kinky Boots," which as I'm sure you know was an accidental hit here in 1991: the promo used clips from the Gale eps, including bike riding from Build a Better Mousetrap and that fight from Mandrake, but other than that, mucking about with shots of Patrick and Honor to make it look like they were singing, and superimposing captions of the lyrics, made it almost as irritating as the record itself.

Unquestionably the worst clip followed, however: The Benny Hill Show from 1977. Just as Henry Ford could do a car in any colour as long as it was black, so Benny Hill could do any accent as long as it was Southampton. He barely even attempted an Old Etonian sound, and when it came to trying to look like Patrick, only went as far as wearing a suit and a bowler. The sketch as a whole was truly pathetic, sliding off into cheap sexism and ancient visual gags; whatever I said about the earlier parodies, at least they'd tried to pay some attention to actual Avengers content. One of Hill's bimbos was playing Purdey—I can't be bothered to find out her name but I think it's mentioned in The Avengers and Me. I seem to recall that Patrick regrettably made some of the usual noises in that book about Hill being dropped for being too old and sexist; actually, IMHO, he was dropped because the Thames executives finally noticed he hadn't come up with any new jokes for twenty years.

Luckily, we then got the most fascinating material of the evening, courtesy of Canal+. It began with the Chessboard intro. Then, a promo film designed to introduce Tara King, starting with the American credits for Season Six, including "The Avengers in Color" over the easel. It was a package of clips from various episodes—I tried to make notes as to which ones but they were all very quick! I'm fairly certain they were all 6A eps though, including the fights with Ken Cope from The Curious Case of the Countless Clues and Lubin from Get-A-Way!, and various car chases. It was narrated by Patrick Macnee, saying things like, "Linda Thorson... a girl of today," etc., and included her "introducing" billing from The Forget-Me-Knot.

The next bit was truly bizarre—an interview with Patrick and Diana for German TV, conducted by someone (no credits of any type) who must be the most gormless interviewer I've ever seen, in any language! Shot on the set of what looked like The Positive Negative Man, and beginning with a shot of the Houses of Parliament (clearly stock footage), it started with Patrick and Diana coming into a study, finding the interviewer lying on the floor, and saying something along the lines of "that's how we usually start, with a dead body." Unfortunately, the interviewer then got up and began asking the two of them long-winded questions, which he then translated into German. There were also endless, repeated shots of the camera crew during his translations; I had a word with organiser Dick Fiddy afterwards, and he said these were probably intended as covering shots, the film having turned up unedited in the Canal+ vaults. There was a lot of unintentional laughter from the NFT audience at the pair just sitting there during these bits, especially as Patrick seemed to be staring into space with an utterly blank expression, and a huge laugh when the German prat said, "Diana, am I right in thinking that before the series, you were an actress?" She looked understandably bemused, luckily assuming that he meant she'd played other roles. Reference was made to a visit the pair had made to Germany, Patrick mentioned having been in Bavaria (with the Old Vic, I think) in 1949. Interesting that when asked, "for how long will we see you in Mit Schirm, Charme und Melone?" Diana didn't mention leaving the series at all, but just said how many episodes of the current batch they'd made so far, Patrick saying it was 21. The gommo interviewer then asked them to introduce "this week's play"—they each said something into the camera in German which I'm afraid I couldn't understand at all! A lovely fade out/close up of Diana giggling, though.

Then, a promo film for The New Avengers, beginning and ending with shots of Concorde; all the clips were from The Eagle's Nest, apart from a brief shot of Joanna, with dark curly hair, having a fight with a stuntman, clearly the same test shot that was used under her credit in the early titles. There was also a shot of her, in the same circular thing used over The New Avengers caption in those titles (no sign of the animated titles here), curled up showing her suspenders—oh dear, very 70's. It was narrated by a deep, transatlantic voice growling things like, "They're coming... they're back," declaring at the end, again over Concorde shots, that the series was "a French-British production" and "as new as... the newest thing in this modern world." I asked Fiddy who the voiceover was (it sounded to me like the late Alexis Korner, a musician and disc-jockey who did loads of voiceovers in the 70's); he said he didn't know but he'd try to find out. He thought it was John Hurt, which intrigued me as I've always thought that excellent actor would make a fine Avengers villain.

And then, The Strange Case of the Missing Corpse. Funnily enough, as with some of the other Canal+ items, a caption from the laboratories appeared beforehand, and this gave its running time as 3:09. This version began at about the same point as the one on this site, funnily enough: the words "In Color" were stickered over a board with "The Avengers: The Strange Case of the Missing Corpse" on it, but that was in the background, with the conversation about "a body?" already in full swing. No explanation was given for Emma's change into leather and back again, either. Yes, the "body" is definitely Valerie Van Ost from Dead Man's Treasure (and Carry On Doctor, I hasten to add!); she had a close-up, winking at Steed. And at the very end, Emma got out a pair of socks and started knitting, but there was then a cut to the title card previously mentioned, while the theme played out. As I said to Fiddy afterwards, this was unlike the US advert version, as there was no "The Avengers" caption superimposed, and no "The Avengers are back/Good show!" voiceover. He was quite intrigued when I told him that, by the way, and he said that the rumoured 20-minute version apparently begins in b/w, then they snap their fingers and it goes into colour. He also said that Dave Rogers (who was supposed to be at the NHT event but didn't turn up) and Brian Clemens are both convinced that the Elizabeth Shepherd material does exist, and will turn up "one day." He added that the problem is that a lot of material at Canal+ has simply not been properly filed, and is therefore assumed to be lost; he said their primary aim is making money (no surprise here!). A very tenuous connection is that he said one of the NFT's TV seasons for early next year is of Peter Cushing's work, and will include Return of the Cybernauts and The Eagle's Nest, as well as his BBC series as Sherlock Holmes.

I also chatted to someone from Pathe's archive who said that some of the news items included outtakes, one of which was a rather cute one of Diana playing with a poodle. One of the dodgy German films Diana made in the late 60's was listed in the programme notes but didn't appear, likewise with the trailer for the rotten film—no loss there. End of report.