As I keep saying, some of the linked material isn't mine and some of the links may not work. Although the links are to open, accessible sites, sometimes the material is copyrighted and the owners pull it or have it pulled. You can, of course, go looking on YouTube, or its foreign variants, for copies. I'm sure you know how.
We are in the early 1960s with this bit of blog. 1962 to be precise.
The TV series I am about to point you to was originally broadcast back then by ATV in the U.K. It is easily recognisable as a very heavily US influenced show. From the opening credits it has the look and feel of all sorts of stuff from across the ocean.
I didn't see it when it first came out because we had no TV and back in the '62 I would have been barely 3 years old. Also, if you didn't catch it when it was shown there were no video recorders, no DVDs, no box sets to binge and you had to hope it would be repeated. When it was repeated it was usually hit and miss. No 24 hr TV channels back then.
Living where we did, we did have access to two ITV channels (Grampian and STV) so there was a slim chance that a repeat showing would be offered at some point. There was also the moot point that an under 5 wouldn't have had much say in what was watched on the box!
Before we get to the serious bit of blog, here's an odd musical intro for you :
I do like a bit of music, as you will have picked up if you've bothered to read any other bit of this blog, and I think that this piece will be familiar to some of you. The music is by Henry Mancini and is for the TV series Peter Gunn.
And? I hear some of you impatient lot.
Well Peter Gunn was an American PI show from the late 50s/early 60s and it starred Craig Stevens as our eponymous dashing lead.
He was reborn, also as a lead, as Michael Strait in another series, "Man of the World."
This new series was another from the ITC fold. The company that would bring us classics such as The Saint, Danger Man, Gideon's Way, The Champions and others as well as the children's shows, Thunderbirds, Joe90 and Captain Scarlet.
As an ITC show there is a whole raft of supporting actors that are easily recognisable from the early days of black and white television - Warren Mitchell, Patrick Troughton, Burt Kwouk, John Laurie and others.
Back to the meat and potatoes : Man of the World gets the title from the premise of the show. Michael Strait is a world-renowned photographer who carries out assignments in all corners of the globe. So, he gets about a bit and he knows his way around.
No Superheroes needed, this is just an ordinary guy doing an ordinary job and as an aside takes on the baddies. He doesn't have a employer like John Drake and NATO/MI9. Being a "world renowned" photojournalist also gets us 60s folk out of the country into all sorts of foreign locales (well, at least the Elstree Studios back-lot!) It's amazing that back then all it took to be on the Med was some stock footage of an airliner, a guy in a dodgy 'tasche and a sign saying Sangria! above a shop.
A bit of spy action, a bit of social commentary and all scattered over a limited 2 series set.
The eagle-eyed amongst you will note the B&W cover above. The pilot episode was filmed in colour but as you may be aware, colour TV wasn't introduced in the UK until late 1969, so the rest of the DVD is, indeed, in good old monochrome.
Sadly, the company that released this DVD above went out of business but there is talk amongst the internet chatterers that another company may buy up the rights to re-distribute/re-brand or upgrade to BluRay or whatever comes along.
More info can be found on Wiki and a quick search on Youtube might bring up a wealth of stuff to watch. Other internet searches amongst the Podcasts for ITC might also find ones that is well worth a listen. And the Blogosphere has some worthwhile finds too.
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