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Over the past week, some of the actresses of the 1960s spy craze celebrated notable birthdays.
Barbara Feldon (b. 1933): She is best known for co-starring in Get Smart (1965-70). Agent 99 was, well, smarter than CONTROL’s Maxwell Smart (Don Adams). But she loved the guy and eventually, 99 and Max got married. Feldon has had a long career.
The TV season before Get Smart, Feldon was a guest star on The Man From U.N.C.L.E. in The Never-Never Affair. Feldon played an U.N.C.L.E. employee who yearned for adventure. The episode, written by Dean Hargrove, was one of the best episodes of the 1964-68 series.
Nancy Kovack (b. 1935): The actress appeared on The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (two episodes, different characters), The Silencers, Batman, Get Smart, The Secret Life of Henry Phyffe (a situation comedy with Red Buttons who looks identically alike to a recently deceased spy), Hawaii Five-O, and The FBI (including one episode where her character was part of a spy ring).
Leslie Parrish (b. 1935): She played the doomed girlfriend in The Manchurian Candidate (1962) as well as characters in The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and The Wild Wild West.series, including the first Dr. Loveless story.
Matt Helm and Gail Hendricks (Dean Martin and Stella Stevens) in Matt’s Mercury station wagon equipped with a bar.
Stella Stevens, a versatile actress whose many credits included the first Matt Helm movie, has died at 84, according to Variety.
Variety cited actor Andrew Stevens, son of Stella Stevens. Andrew Stevens said his mother was suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease.
The Silencers (1966) was the start of the Matt Helm film series. The movies were based on serious novels by author Donald Hamilton.
Producer Irving Allen, Albert R. Broccoli’s one-time partner, turned the Helm stories into comedies. Allen made star Dean Martin into a partner for the Helm films. As a result, Dino made more money than Sean Connery got for Bond films such as Thunderball.
Stella Stevens’ IMDB.COM ENTRY lists more than 100 acting credits, including the likes of The Poseidon Adventure, The Ballad of Cable Hogue, and The Nutty Professor
A scene from the first Matt Helm movie, The Silencers
The blog was reminded earlier today about how two classic villainous organizations (SPECTRE and Thrush) traded in their classic logos for newer (uninspired) designs with thunderbolts.
The thing is, the Matt Helm movies produced by Irving Allen (Albert R. Broccoli’s one-time partner) featured a villainous organization called BIGO (the Bureau of International Government and Order). It’s logo was a thunderbolt through a capital O.
The Helm movies were out of production by 1969. But apparently other spy entertainment franchises may have remembered it.
In the 1971 James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever, SPECTRE has traded its classic octopus logo in for a thunderbolt.
For example, thanks to the Behind the Stunts feed on Twitter, here’s an image of the same stunt performer who appeared in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and Diamonds Are Forever. With the latter image, his helmet has SPECTRE’s new logo.
More than a decade later, we got The Return of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV movie in 1983. Instead of the classic Thrush logo, the villainous organization also went in for a thunderbolt logo. The one exception was a scene at desk of a Thrush chieftain played by Anthony Zerbe. Mostly viewers saw spiffy new orange uniforms for thugs with a thunderbolt logo.
Thrush thugs in their new orange uniforms with the (boring) thunderbolt logos
Well, you can’t win them all. Nevertheless, the thunderbolt logo may have been Irving Allen’s main contribution to spy entertainment.
UPDATE: Reader Ricardo C Cantoral reminds me that the original SPECTRE logo is on Blofeld’s mini-sub in Diamonds Are Forever. That’s true. I’ve seen that mini-sub up close. It’s in the custody of the Ian Fleming Foundation. Likewise, the original Thrush logo can be seen briefly in The Return of the Man From U.N.C.L.E. Robert Short, technical adviser for the TV movie, managed to get it on the desk of Anthony Zerbe’s character. Regardless, the filmmakers intended the thunderbolt logo to be the symbol of the revamped SPECTRE and Thrush.
Sean Connery, the original film James Bond, has died at 90. His death was confirmed by Nicola Sturgeon, Scotland’s first minister, in a post on Twitter.
Jason Connery, the actor’s son, told the BBC that his father “has been unwell for some time.”
The Scottish actor took on the role of James Bond with Dr. No, when he was 31. By doing so, he became one of the major icons of the 1960s, along with The Beatles and the Rolling Stones.
Connery enjoyed a long career, which extended into the early 21st century. His last live-action performance was 2003’s The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Connery also did voice work for a 2005 video game that adapted the 007 film From Russia With Love and a 2012 animated film, Sir Billi. The actor’s honors included an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 1987’s The Untouchables.
Despite all that, his seven Bond films — six for Eon Productions as well as the non-Eon production of 1983’s Never Say Never Again — defined his career and made him a star.
Dr. No producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, working with a modest budget, decided on Connery relatively early in pre-production. United Artists, the studio that would release 11 Bond films before it was absorbed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, initially was skeptical.
Eventually, UA executives were sold. It was a decision they would profit from handsomely. The 007 series was UA’s major asset in the 1960s, a decade when the studio also released such films as West Side Story, In the Heat of the Night and low-cost but profitable films featuring The Beatles.
Jack Lord and Sean Connery during Dr. No filming
Connery’s Bond was both sophisticated and ruthless. The actor was tutored in the former trait by director Terence Young, who helmed three of the first four 007 movies. It was Young who polished the rough diamond of an actor who came from a working-class background in Scotland.
Audiences adored the combination. The first four Bond films were mostly faithful adaptations of Ian Fleming novels. For the American market, Connery’s Bond was a more macho hero than audience members probably expected.
The actor stayed busy with non-Bond projects, including The Hill, a World War II drama. But the conversation kept coming back to Bond, like in an Oct. 3, 1965 episode of What’s My Line?
Connery, the first of two mystery guests, was present because The Hill was opening in New York later that week. He was also in New York filming A Fine Madness, directed by Irvin Kershner, who’d later work with Connery on Never Say Never Again.
But panelist Martin Gabel, one of Connery’s co-stars in the Alfred Hitchcock film Marnie, cited Bond in deducing the actor’s identity.
What’s more, Connery’s relationship with Broccoli and Saltzman became troubled. As the budgets and scope of the movies expanded, Connery felt cheated with his share of the enterprise.
In 1966, Columbia Pictures released The Silencers, a spoofy version of Donald Hamilton’s very serious Matt Helm novels. The producer was Broccoli’s former partner, Irving Allen.
To secure the services of star Dean Martin, Allen had to make Dino a partner. That ensured the actor, who received a share of the proceeds, would get a bigger payday than Connery got for 007 films. From then on, Connery would be at odds with his Bond employers.
Connery quit the series after 1967’s You Only Live Twice (the first 007 venture than dispensed with the plot of an Ian Fleming novel).
UA, unhappy with the box office of 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, lured Connery back for 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever with a big payday, including a $1.25 million fee (which the Scottish actor donated to a trust he founded). Connery also received a percentage of the box office.
After Diamonds, Connery said he was done with Eon for good. But he went back into Bondage one more time with Never Say Never Again.
Connery had more behind-the-camera power than he ever had with Eon. He brought in scribes Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais to do an uncredited rewrite of Lorenzo Semple Jr.’s script. The actor also recruited Michel Legrand to score the movie.
Both the script and the music would be among the most criticized aspects of Never Say Never Again. But many Bond fans, happy to see Connery one last time, overlooked the actor’s role as de facto producer.
Sean Connery in 2003’s The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen
Regardless, Connery was the building block for Eon’s 007 film series that has lasted more than a half century.
The series, of course, had many talented contributors including director Young, production designer Ken Adam and composer John Barry. However, Connery provided a popular Bond for audiences. All future Bond actors would be compared to Connery.
Some fans and critics have argued that Connery has been surpassed in the 21st century by Daniel Craig. But without Connery at the start, that’s almost a moot point. All of Connery’s 007 successors had the opportunity because of the Scot’s original work.
Movie channel TCM will present all four of Dean Martin’s Matt Helm films on Sept. 26. It’s part of a month-long salute to Dino, with Martin movies being shown on Wednesdays.
The Helm movies were produced by Irving Allen, former partner of Albert R. Broccoli. That partnership ended, in part, because Broccoli wanted to make movies based on Ian Fleming’s 007 novels. Allen wasn’t enthusiastic about the idea.
After the early Bond films, produced by Broccoli and his new partner, Harry Saltzman, had become a success, Allen searched for his own spy property to pursue.
He ended up with Donald Hamilton’s Matt Helm series of serious spy novels. But Allen got Dean Martin to participate as a partner. So the movie adaptations took a much lighter tone and, in effect, were spy versions of Martin’s variety show.
The Silencers will be shown at 8 p.m. ET, followed by Murderers’ Row at 10, The Ambushers at midnight and The Wrecking Crew at 2 a.m., Sept. 27.
Dean Martin (1917-1995), a lover not a fighter in The Ambushers (1967).
Today, June 7, is the 100th anniversary of the birthday of Dean Martin. Dino, in his day, was the epitome of cool and charm. For many, he still is.
His contribution to spy entertainment was starring in the four-film Matt Helm series produced by Irving Allen, former partner of Eon Productions co-founder Albert R. Broccoli.
To entice Dino, Allen made the actor his partner. As a result, Martin enjoyed a bigger pay day for the first Helm film, The Silencers, than Sean Connery got for Thunderball. Connery noticed and wanted to be a partner in the Bond franchise..
The Helm series doesn’t get respect in the 21st century. Many who like the movies refer to their affection as a “guilty pleasure.”
One of the movies, Murderers’ Row, even had a plot point where Matt gives his boss Mac (James Gregory) a clue by deliberately misstating his alcohol preference. (“Matt Helm never drank a glass of bourbon in his life!” Mac says as he tries to figure out the traitor in his organization.)
For the record, this blog would greatly appreciate a new Helm movie that faithfully adapted the Hamilton novels. At the same time, the Spy Commander discovered the novels *because* of the Dean Martin films. Speaking strictly for myself, I’m very fond of both, despite the flaws of the movies.
Regardless, today is a day of celebration. Bottoms up, Dino.
Lavi also appeared in Some Girls Do and The Spy With the Cold Nose.
In 1966’s The Silencers, Lavi played Tina, a character actually in the first Matt Helm novel, Death of a Citizen.
While the movie was done as a spoof, the basic dynamic was retained from the serious original story. Helm thinks Tina is on his side when she’s really working for the other.
The ’66 movie, starring Dean Martin, took the basic plots of two serious Donald Hamilton novels and went in an outlandish direction.
Lavi’s career extended from the 1950s into the late 1990s. She was born in Palestine. The former actress died May 3 in Asheville, North Carolina, according to an obit published by the Asheville Citizen-Times.
That obit says her “funeral and interment will take place in her native Israel.”
Over on The Spy Command’s Facebook page, reader Bill Groves shared a 1991 letter he received from Matt Helm creator Donald Hamilton.
In the letter, Hamilton commented about the four 1960s Matt Helm movies starring Dean Martin.
The films took Hamilton’s very serious novels and made them into comedies that incorporated bits from Dino’s variety show. The hero supposedly drank heavily (like Dean on his show) and was frequently surrounded by beautiful women. The Ambushers (1967) even had a joke referencing Martin’s birthplace of Stubenville, Ohio.
Poster for The Silencers
As it turns out, Hamilton wasn’t upset about the changes. Groves gave us permission to do a post about the letter. What follows is a portion of the text. The word is boldface was underlined by Hamilton in the original.
Dear Mr. Groves:
With respect to the Helm movies, my philosophy is that I write to entertain and once I’ve done a book or story to my satisfaction, anybody who can use my material entertainingly, and is willing to pay me for the privilege, is welcome, even if he doesn’t stick very closely to my original vision (if I may use a fancy word for it).
From this standpoint, I found the movie of THE SILENCERS enjoyable even though the playboy character played by Dean Martin was pretty far from the grimmer character I’d visualized. So it wasn’t my SILENCERS; it was still a fun movie, and I had no objections. (Of course a writer would always prefer to see his work brought to the screen the way he wrote it, but that happens so seldom, it’s only a dream.) The other Helm movies, unfortunately, were pretty mechanical and I didn’t like them much, not because they treated my ‘vision’ disrespectfully, but simply because they were not very enjoyable as movies.
(snip)
PS: For a much more satisfactory job, from the writer’s standpoint, try to catch a rerun of the movie made by William Wyler from my book THE BIG COUNTRY.
The Silencers, released in 1966, was the first film in the Helm series. It actually took material was from both 1960s’s Death of a Citizen, the first Helm novel, and 1962’s The Silencers, the fourth.
The four movies used varying amounts of Hamilton content from the books. For more details, read this 2000 article, which includes updates from 2006 and 2015.
Meanwhile, for those unfamiliar with it, The Big Country was an epic 1958 film with Gregory Peck, Charlton Heston, Burl Ives and Chuck Connors. Ives won an Oscar as best supporting actor.
Matt Helm as he appeared on Fawcett paperbacks, circa 1963
The Man From U.N.C.L.E., after a long hibernation, arrives in movie theaters in less that two weeks. If U.N.C.L.E. can stage a comeback, any character can. So who should be the next ’60s spy to be revived from “suspended animation”?
How about Matt Helm, code name Eric?
Strictly speaking, Helm wasn’t a spy. He was a “counter assassin,” taking out various murderous threats to the United States. Created by author Donald Hamilton (1916-2006), Helm was the star of 27 paperback novels, published from 1960 until 1993.
Of course, the general public has, at best, a hazy memory of that. Helm is mostly remembered for four movies starring Dean Martin, which turned Hamilton’s very serious novels into light romps, which resembled a spy version of Dino’s 1965-74 variety show on NBC.
As this blog has noted before, that film series probably affected the 007 films the most. To get Dean Martin involved, he was made a partner in the enterprise. When Dino made more money from The Silencers than Sean Connery got from Thunderball, the Scotsman’s relationship with Bond producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman soured.
In any case, like U.N.C.L.E. (which, after decades in the wilderness, arrives in movie theaters on Aug. 14), Helm has been “in development” in Hollywood for quite some time.
The last word this blog had was in 2012, when The Hollywood Reporter had a story that Helm still was on Paramount’s to-do list. If there’s been Helm news since, The Spy Commander missed it.
Regardless, you won’t find a Matt Helm movie on any list of scheduled movie releases in the near future.
Fans of Hamilton’s novels have long wished for a serious Matt Helm movie. In the jaded 21st century, audiences are more than ready for Helm’s rough stuff.
Still, Hamilton’s novels would be hard to replicate on film. The stories are told in the first person. Hamilton’s prose is so engaging, the reader gets sucked in. When Helm kills somebody, you almost find yourself saying, “Of course. What else was Matt to do?”
The beauty of Hamilton’s novels is they’re told in a gritty way (not unlike Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer novels), but the author could come up with plots as fanciful as anything Ian Fleming devised. It’s a delicate balancing act, but one that many readers enjoyed over more than three decades.
Perhaps the operative with the code name of Eric will never make a screen comeback. Still, if Solo and Kuryakin can return to the screen…..
The Year of the Spy (in the United States, anyway) shifts into another gear this month with the debut of Kingsman: The Secret Service.
The movie, directed by Matthew Vaughn, strives for a return of the escapist spy film in a century known mostly for the grim and gritty, first popularized by Jason Bourne and then by a rebooted James Bond franchise with Daniel Craig.
Kingsman’s emphasis on escapism even extends to the movie’s ad campaign, which involves a meme that’s been around for decades.
In the ads, members of the Kingsman’s cast, including star Colin Firth, are depicted striding toward a woman with prosthetic feet (a character in the film) who’s holding a drink and a rifle.
A poster for Kingsman: The Secret Service
The image evokes the 1981 James Bond film For Your Eyes Only, in which Roger Moore’s Bond is standing before a swimsuit-wearing Melina, holding a crossbow.
But 007 wasn’t the first spy character to use such an image.
Fifteen years earlier, The Silencers — produced by Irving Allen, former partner of co-founding 007 producer Albert R. Broccoli — had an illustration of a woman in a similar pose. Matt Helm (Dean Martin) isn’t standing in front of her but his presence is noted regardless.
In any case, Kingsman already is out in Europe. The R-rated movies arrives in U.S. theaters on Feb. 13.
The Spy Command 