Deja vu: A scene from The Man From U.N.C.L.E. shows up in It Takes a Thief

The great thing about the Internet is you can sometimes see it for yourself.

Fall 1965: An early second-season episode of The Man From U.N.C.L.E., The Foxes and Hounds Affair, has agents Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin locked in the same cell with an “innocent,” Mimi, a woman who’s inexperienced in the ways of love. Solo wants her to flirt with the guard outside the cell. But she’s having trouble getting his attention.

KURYAKIN: You’re a woman, haven’t you had your basic training?

MIMI: No not me. No, I-I…I avoid…I travel a lot, instead.

A moment later…

KURYAKIN: Inxperience is not inability, young lady. And you can do anything you believe you can do.

Just then, Solo tugs here away and gives her a long kiss.

MIMI: My goodnesss!

SOLO: Forget your goodness. Now I want you to introduce that guard to the Mimi Doolitttle I just met.

Now, let’s travel three years in the future, the spring of 1968, and ABC is airing It Takes a Thief’s final first-season episode, The Lay of the Land. Alexander Mundy is imprisoned with Zizi, a young innocent woman who’s been caught up with intrigue. Mundy asks Zizi to try to flirt with a guard outside but is initially unsuccessful.

ZIZI: I told you I’m not the entricing type.

MUNDY: Well, you’re a woman, you must have had some basic training.

ZIZI: No, I always avoid…I mean to me the interest was always…

MUNDY: You’ve got to get that man’s interest.

ZIZI: I don’t know how….Don’t you understand, I just don’t know how.

MUNDY: Zizi, inexperience doesn’t necessarily mean inability.

Mundy gives Zizi a passionate kiss. As they separate:

MUNDY: Now go introduce that guard to the Zizi I just met.

The U.N.C.L.E. episode has the credit, “Teleplay by Peter Allan Fields, Story by Eric Bercovici,” While the Thief episode has the credit, “Teleplay by Richard Collins and Alvin R. Friedman, Story by Richard Collins.”

UPDATE: Friedman died in 2000, according to imdb.com. We thought Friedman might have been a pen name for Fields but the latter is still listed as being with us in imdb.com and was interviewed for extras in the 2007 DVD release of The Man From U.N.C.L.E.

Anyway, to see for yourself, here’s the start of Act IV of the U.N.C.L.E. episode:

To view the It Takes a Thief episode, you can CLICK RIGHT HERE or go to Hulu’s Web site. The scene in question starts around the 42:00 mark.