La-La Land Records to release a Goldsmith rarity

Brian Keith in the main title of an episode of the 1975 series Archer

La-La Land Records this month is bringing out Jerry Goldsmith music to a mostly forgotten 1975 TV show, Archer.

The title Archer is best known for the satiric 2009 cartoon series featuring a spy. The short-lived 1975 Archer was about Lew Archer, the private detective created by Ross Macdonald in a series of books from 1949 to 1976.

Macdonald’s The Moving Target was the basis of the 1966 film Harper with Paul Newman. By the late 1960s and early 1970s, the novels had become popular and critical successes.

Paramount moved to get a Lew Archer TV series going. It made a TV movie of The Underground Man in 1974 with Peter Graves as Archer that aired on NBC. It included a score by Marvin Hamlisch.

Things were retooled and work began on a weekly series with Brian Keith in the role. NBC canceled the long-running Ironside and replaced it with Archer in January 1975.

It didn’t take hold. The network canceled the show and only six episodes aired. Jerry Goldsmith scored one of the episodes and did the show’s theme.

Decades later, La-La Land is releasing a CD set of Goldsmith’s music from Archer along with the film Warning Shot. It will become available on Feb. 19, according to a post on Twitter by the music company.

The Rap Sheet blog several years ago posted a copy of an Archer main title with the Goldsmith theme on YouTube. It’s from a beaten up print of an episode dubbed into Spanish. More recently, the entire episode (the show’s finale, in fact) has surfaced.

The 1978 movie that foretold the future of 007 films

Burt Reynolds and the cast of Hooper in the film’s final scene

On occasion, movies actually predict the future. One such example is 1978’s Hooper.

The film concerns an aging stunt man, Sonny Hooper (Burt Reynolds) working on a James Bond-like movie being directed by a pompous, “auteur” director, Roger Deal (Robert Klein).

The star of the fictional film is Adam, played by Adam West. Apparently West is playing himself. At one point, he is also referred to as “Mr. West.”

Flash forward a couple of decades or so, and James Bond films are being directed by “auteur” style directors such as Marc Forster (Quantum of Solace) and Sam Mendes (Skyfall and SPECTRE).

Now, if you’ve ever read the credits of any movie or TV show, there’s boilerplate how any resemblance between the characters and real people living or dead is strictly coincidental. That language is intended to avoid lawsuits.

Coincidence or not, some of Hooper’s principals (Reynolds, co-star Brian Keith and director Hal Needham) worked on Nickelodeon, a 1976 film directed and co-written by “auteur” director Peter Bogdanovich, concerning the early years of the movie business.

In Hooper, at one point, Roger Deal says how movies are “pieces of time.” By coincidence, that’s a catch phrase associated with Bogdanovich.

As the story in Hooper unfolds, Sonny — who is one stunt gone wrong from being paralyzed — comes up with one last, great stunt for the Bond-like film.

Roger Deal (Robert Klein) being a jerk while Sonny Hooper (Burt Reynolds) and Max Berns (John Marley) are on the sidelines.

Roger Deal is interested and sends out his lackey assistant director (Alfie Wise) to talk down Sonny’s asking price. After Sonny takes the assistant director on a hair-raising drive around the studio, the stuntman gets his asking price.

A subplot in the movie is how veteran producer Max Berns (John Marley) is really powerless. The “auteur” director, once production has started, holds all the cards.

In the end, despite the risks, Sonny pulls off the stunt, capping his stuntman career. Sonny also punches out Roger Deal just before the end titles.

Life rarely is as tidy as movies. Nevertheless, Hooper provided a preview of what would happen in real life.