Adam Adamant Lives! (An Edwardian Avengers Shot On Videotape!)

Adam Adamant Lives! is very much a product of its time. Produced by Verity Lambert who had acted as producer on the first two seasons of 'Doctor Who' and created by 'The Avengers' creator Sydney Newman (who also created Doctor Who) the show was made on a shoestring budget by the BBC on a disorientating mixture of film and videotape, as was the industry norm at the time. With one episode being produced every week the production is understandably often shaky and rushed (demonstrated by the behind the scenes takes released as a special feature on the exemplary DVD release) but nonetheless some excellent material was produced during its short run between 1966-1967. 

A frame from the title sequence of the show, Gerald Harper starred as the lead Adam Adamant in the series

The shows central protagonist is the wonderful Adam Adamant, a hero from Edwardian times, who during an encounter with his mortal enemy 'The Face' is cryogenic-ally frozen and remains hidden in this frozen state for 64 years, eventually being re-discovered again in 1966. The casting is excellent, Gerald Harper gives a wonderful performance as Adam Adamant, a hero from the Edwardian era, unaccustomed and often outraged by the starkly different society he has been thrown into. Harper plays the character as a pure gentlemen, a charmer to the ladies despite his naivety of modern times, and they often serve as a enticement towards danger for Adamant in the series! Juliet Harmer makes an excellent sidekick in the form of Georgina Jones, a young woman who is the epitome of the swinging sixties and the wonderful Jack May as the Butler Simms who always can be relied upon to add a touch of humour to the programme.

Gerald Harper and Juliet Harper as his trendy young sidekick Georgina Jones

The show is quite rightly regarded as a cult, its premise is nothing less than inspired and certainly extremely memorable, earning the programme much following during its forty odd years existence. The opening episode 'A Vintage Year for Scoundrels' with a guest performance from the brilliant Freda Jackson is good fun and sets up the story nicely. Unfortunately the following episodes are generally quite poor, both 'More Deadly Than The Sword' and 'Allah Is Not Always With You' feature dreadful racial stereotypes which date the programme considerably. Thankfully the series improved as it went along with the excellent 'The Sweet Smell of Disaster' by Robert Banks Stewart, no doubt an influence for the classic Doctor Who story 'Terror of the Autons' and the Brian Clemens script 'The Terribly Happy Embalmers' which put the programme as close as it has ever been to 'The Avengers' territory, Clemens notably being a regular writer and later producer for 'The Avengers'. Many see Adam Adamant Lives! as a attempt to emulate the success of the aforementioned programme, and there are certainly many similarities. In terms of production values Adam Adamant Lives! could never really compete. As the programme stuck rigidly to the common practice of film and videotape production, 'The Avengers' had just premiered its fourth season with Diana Rigg's Emma Peel as the new sidekick and new glittering production values which included an extra week for production (every episode was recorded in two weeks) and with American backing behind them, 'The Avengers' team also had a lot more money behind them. Adam Adamant Lives! could never afford the slick style of 'The Avengers'. As a result of this the direction of the programme is quite often industry standard for the time, making it easily distinguishable from the polished direction of 'The Avengers' or any of the ITC action series it was competing against during its original run. However, there are some exceptions. The excellent Ridley Scott shows off some of his early talent in the only surviving episode he directed 'The League of Uncharitable Ladies' which comes complete with some slick location footage and freeze frames aplenty and the late Paul Ciappessoni also directed some memorable work, as did the excellent Moira Armstrong who helmed probably the finest existing episode 'Black Echo' an early episode from the second season with a guest appearance from legendary actress Gladys Cooper, who had recently returned to the UK from the States where she had an extremely successful career, appearing as a guest star in the original 'Twilight Zone' and 'The Outer Limits' amongst other classic series. Other notable guest stars include Patrick Troughton (soon to be the second Doctor in 'Doctor Who') television favourite T.P McKenna and John Le Mesurier from 'Dads Army'.

Patrick Troughton guest stars in the classic episode 'D for Destruction', the final episode from the first season

The show ran for two seasons and 29 episodes before being cancelled in 1967 after it failed to continue with any considerable success. Verity Lambert would later consider the show as a bit of a failure and it's a shame that it was never given the chance to grow on audiences, and perhaps more importantly that it was never given a bigger budget. Certainly the 17 episodes that remain are a mixed bag of the brilliant, to the quirky to the downright awful. Other than the episodes already mentioned, essential viewing includes 'The Last Sacrifice', 'Sing a Song of Murder', 'The Village of Evil' and 'A Sinister Sort of Service'. It is a tragic shame like so many other series that 12 episodes of Adam Adamant Lives! are missing, only two episodes exist from the Second Season and seeing as they are two of the best it is a great disappointment that more does not exist. Despite its flaws Adam Adamant Lives! is a fascinating piece of 60's television, one which brilliance often lies with its fantastic premise and solid performances from the lead actors rather than its execution. Not a classic, but worth a watch. To use that old cliché 'They don't make them like this anymore!'.

NOTE: All production stills and photographs used in this review are copyrighted to BBC Television. The first seven of my Screenprick reviews are edited and embellished versions of reviews I have previously published on IMDb (Internet Movie Database) under the account name 'The Valeyard'. Review Eight will be a brand new review posted on this blog first! The next review will focus on 'Star Maidens'. 

Star Trek: The Animated Series (A Curio of the Star Trek Franchise)

Star Trek The Animated Series came about in 1973 following the cancellation of the original live action series in 1969. Produced by Filmation under the direction of animator Hal Sutherland the series closed a gap in between the cancellation of the original series and Star Trek: The Motion Picture which was produced in 1979. The show was born due to Star Trek's increasing popularity following its repeats through syndication in the early 1970's. With a considerable potential audience the Animated Series of Star Trek was a smart move at the time, with Paramount unwilling to finance a brand new live action series. William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and later George Takei, James Doohan, Nichelle Nichols and Majel Barrett were all keen to return to voice the characters they had played in the original series and original series writer and script editor D.C Fontana was brought in to ensure a knowledgeable hand had control over the scripts brought in for the series. Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry acted as a 'Executive Consultant' and original series writers including David Gerrold, Samuel A. Peeples and Margaret Armen wrote for the programme. Walter Koenig was not able to return as Chekov due to budgetary restrictions, but he did pen the excellent episode 'The Infinite Vulcan'.

The crew of the Starship Enterprise as seen in Star Trek: The Animated Series

Theoretically the animated series allowed the production team to be more imaginative in its creation of monsters and alien worlds, achieving results that would be impossible for a live action series. The show is certainly atmospheric, the limited animation is generally used to great effect and the layout artists do a fantastic job of conjuring unearthly settings. The writing is generally top notch, the stories rarely simplified for the younger audience it was largely intended for, with many adult themes running throughout. The fantastic 'Yesteryear' the only script contributed by D.C Fontana for the series is truly brilliant, a fascinating insight into Spock's childhood which one could imagine as an Original Series episode. The programme is often harshly criticised for its crude animation (an industry trait at the time) which admittedly is very repetitive. The reuse of certain monsters does become noticeable, certainly the usage of monsters is considerable, countering the limitations the series had experienced in its live action format and certainly a good monster or two will keep the children entertained. Another criticism usually levelled is at the music in the series. I consider that criticism to be particularly unfair, the incidental cues (although recycled ad nauseum) are generally excellent, and the theme is a worthy homage of Alexander Courage's iconic original. Worthy of note is the initial unease of William Shatner and DeForest Kelley in the first few episodes with the voice-over format. Both fail to inject much emotion and enthusiasm into the performances initially but greatly improve by later episodes. DeForest Kelley later acknowledged that he found the voice work very difficult, not being able to interact with other actors. 

The three original Star Trek leads, William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and the late DeForest Kelley at a script read through for Star Trek The Animated Series 

The show is also noteworthy for its sequels to Original Series episodes, most notably the excellent 'More Tribbles, More Troubles' and 'Mudd's Passion'. Star Trek The Animated Series ran for two seasons between 1973 - 1975 with 22 episodes being produced. It remains a considerable curio in the Star Trek universe, finally being released on DVD in full in 2006. Generally the short twenty minute episodes are of excellent quality, if less developed than the original series episodes. Favourites include 'Yesteryear', 'More Troubles, More Tribbles', 'The Survivor', 'The Infinite Vulcan', 'The Magicks of Megas-Tu', (featuring a rare Stateside voice-over from 'Captain Scarlet' & 'UFO' actor Ed Bishop) 'The Abergris Element', 'Bem' and 'The Pirates of Orion', but the whole series makes a truly enjoyable watch.

It is a great shame that Gene Roddenberry would later 'decanonize' the animated series, as he did for a couple of the later Star Trek feature films. In many ways it is far better than later Star Trek spin-offs and features some truly excellent stories and visuals. More recently it has been remembered with greater affection and has become something of a cult. It is, despite its flaws a good piece of television and in my view a worthy addition to the Star Trek franchise. 

The Star Trek crew wearing their life support belts which premièred in the animated series 

Hal Sutherland, who directed the Season 1 episodes of Star Trek: The Animated Series. A fine animator, he started work with Disney and notably worked as an animator on 'Sleeping Beauty' in 1959. He was a founding member of Filmation and worked on many of its series. In semi retirement from the mid 1970's onwards, Sutherland concentrated on fine art painting and his work appeared in many galleries across the United States. He died on 16th January this year, aged 84. This blog entry is dedicated to him. 

NOTE: All production stills and photographs used in this review are copyrighted to Filmation & Paramount Pictures. The first seven of my Screenprick reviews are edited and embellished versions of reviews I have previously published on IMDb (Internet Movie Database) under the account name 'The Valeyard'. Review Eight will be a brand new review posted on this blog first! The next review will focus on  the classic BBC series 'Adam Adamant Lives'. 

Sapphire & Steel (A British Television Classic)

Sapphire and Steel follows a long line of great creativity in 1970's programming. The series had an incredibly short run, was shown on the rapidly dying ATV Network at a crisis time and was made on an very small budget. However, this never stopped it becoming one of the most memorable science fiction series ever made. There are so many reasons for this, and I will attempt to explain some of them in this brief summary. P.J Hammond was and is an incredibly intelligent and skilled writer, never one to talk down to his audiences, Hammond had contributed scripts to the highly successful Ace of Wands series and the anthology series Shadows before pitching the idea of Sapphire and Steel - or as it was originally known 'The Time Menders'. The idea took some time to catch on, but eventually it was picked up by ATV and filming began in January 1979. The series would run on ATV from 1979 to 1981 with Assignment Six being broadcast under the new 'ITV' name in 1982, although it had been filmed 18 months prior. At this stage ATV Productions were being amalgamated into the much larger Central Television Network, whose title cards appeared in replacement of ATV's when the final four episodes of the series were broadcast. 

Joanna Lumley as Sapphire and David McCallum as Steel

The appealing factors for ATV concerning Sapphire and Steel was the fascinating concept, the idea of two time travellers (elements from the stars) called to solve dangerous breaks in time, no one knows who they are and where they really come from, but they simply appear when they are needed. The other factor is that P.J Hammond was happy with the show being a low budget production, this in many ways was always the original intention. The strength of this lies in the nature of the material written by P.J Hammond and later writers Anthony Read and Don Houghton in Assignment Five. No major special effects were needed, sets could be small and few in number, the beauty of the concept is that it actually relied upon small, claustrophobic, poky settings to work and that's why in so many ways the series has stood the test of time. Throughout its three year run, the programme was (despite the restrictions) extremely well made, the excellent sets and wonderful low key lighting standing out as making the production particularly creepy and mysterious, in an era when television lighting tended to be hideously over-lit (you only have to look at early 1980's episodes of Doctor Who to realise that!) P.J Hammond's strength was working with the power of suggestion. No violence and very little blood is ever seen and yet the series was (and is) extremely frightening to audiences.

David Collings portrayed 'Silver' in the series.

Cyril Ornadel's marvellous music is also a highpoint. Subtle, often beautiful and deeply sinister, the music was a key ingredient that complimented the other qualities of the series perfectly. Another essential ingredient was the excellent casting. The programmes ITC connections allowed the series to hire two leads that many low budget shows would never have dreamt of. David McCallum is excellent as the cold and ruthless Steel, playing all of his scenes with astonishing conviction and subtlety, complimented by the excellent Joanna Lumley as Sapphire, a more compassionate character, but equally as sinister and unnerving in many instances. The series most sinister and alluring aspect is its consistent ambiguity! 

With two very solid lead actors at the helm, performances throughout the series are exceptionally good (the only exception being the woeful child actress playing the little girl in Assignment One). The supporting artists were never big names like the leads but they still gave tremendous performances. The excellent David Collings as Silver, a superb, quirky actor (now also known for his terrific performances in Doctor Who and Blake's 7) John Golightly, Edward De Souza and the particularly excellent Gerald James, who plays Tully in Assignment Two (one of the finest stories). The final sequence where Steel gives up Tully for sacrifice is a highlight of the series. The scene is heart wrenching, tense and poignant, with actor Gerald James easily matching the marvellous acting talents of David McCallum as he has an inkling of his impending fate. Beautifully directed and acted, with exceptional music, the audience have a real sense of sympathy for Tully, by all accounts a nice individual, an ordinary man who is ultimately consumed by darkness. Steel watches and listens emotionless as Tully gives a final wave, and screams. Probably the most memorable scene (that and Sapphire's mind being taken over by Darkness - in Assignment Two) in the entire series.

Our protagonists in Assignment Two 'The Railway Station'

Generally speaking every story is memorable, thought provoking incredibly complex and intelligent, and therefore deserves a huge amount of respect. The writing and the excellent direction (often the supremely talented Shaun O'Riordan) is top notch. From a modern day perspective the series is admittedly very slow in its pacing, but this is part of the overall style, the laboured realisation of ideas adds to the suspenseful tension and intrigue of the story lines. This is also not a series to watch if you want answers (much is left to the imagination) the lead characters are an enigma themselves, and to this extent the series can be likened to the equally excellent 'The Prisoner' or 'Children of the Stones'. But if you want intelligent, memorable and thought provoking drama, with wonderful elements of science fiction and fantasy, Sapphire and Steel is the one for you. Essential watching includes Assignments Two, Three, Four and Six, but all have something to offer.

On location on a rooftop in London! The only outside broadcast footage to feature in the normally studio bound series. This still comes from 'Assignment Three'. 

Assignment One suffers from its toned down nature (the programme was originally scheduled in a 5pm timeslot!) Assignment Five (penned by Anthony Read & Don Houghton) is more standard fare than the P.J Hammond episodes but all beat the hideously generic, repetitive and self obsessed drama that is modern day television. P.J Hammond has more recently written for Torchwood (which is a fine showcasing of all of those negative qualities). 

Because of its very nature many of the episodes stand up better now than some Doctor Who stories (which always tried to be more ambitious with a similar budget) in production value terms and equally well in the script writing quality as say Doctor Who or Blake's 7. Like the latter series Sapphire and Steel had a poignant downbeat ending. A remarkable, well acted series, a fine example of television of its era, an era we may sadly never see again.

NOTE: All production stills and photographs used in this review are copyrighted to ITV Television. The first seven of my Screenprick reviews are edited and embellished versions of reviews I have previously published on IMDb (Internet Movie Database) under the account name 'The Valeyard'. Review Eight will be a brand new review posted on this blog first! The next review will focus on 'Star Trek: The Animated Series'.