A Tribute to the Greatest 60's TV Spy
Show
The Man from
U.N.C.L.E.
In the mid sixties, a phenomenon
burst upon the world and in America....James Bond.
007 mania struck full fledged with the release of
"Goldfinger"...and American TV had to get a piece of
that action. What to do? The answer was the spy
series...The Man from U.N.C.L.E.! At first,
the
title was a joke...UNCLE was a reference to the UN
and stood for nothing. Once the show premiered and
began to build an audience, the producers had to
provide words to go with the letters...
the
United Network
Command
for Law and
Enforcement
was
born...starting a fan craze for one of the
characters, and a rack of spy television
programming.
DOSSIER:
Napoleon
Solo
Chief
Enforcement Agent, Section
2
Portrayed by
former westerns badguy Robert Vaughn, the character
of Napoleon Solo was meant to carry the show. Suave,
smooth, and deadly Solo was meant to be America's
answer to the British superspy 007. Played tongue-in
cheek, Solo was meant to be the lone agent facing the
dangers of
the cold war and THRUSH armed with gadgets and his
wits...with the initially occasional assistance of a
certain Russian U.N.C.L.E. agent.
Illya
Kuryakin
Enforcement Agent, Section
2
Since U.N.C.L.E. was a
world-wide agency
dedicated to peace and law enforcement, a Russian
agent was paired up with Solo. Portrayed by the
English actor David McCallum, Kuryakin was the cool,
calculating side of what finally developed as the duo
of spies. This came about chiefly thanks to
Kuryakin's appeal to the female fans of the show...a
point even acknowledged in an episode of the program
("I'm not a member of Illya's fan club." - Solo).
The fandom for McCallum's Kuryakin even went so far
that when each of them hosted the rock TV show
"Hullabaloo", Robert Vaughn appeared as himself...but
McCallum appeared AS Kuryakin!
Now, someone had to
send our heroes out to risk life and limb, and that
job fell to...
Alexander
Waverly
Head of Operations, Section
1
Experienced, tough, wise
and no-nonsense
Mr. Waverly directed the efforts of U.N.C.L.E.
against threats to the world...with particular
attention paid to assignments for his two top agents:
Solo and Kuryakin. Portrayed by British veteran actor
Leo G. Carroll (who came to the show after a
successful TV ghost comedy, "Topper"), Waverly was
the ever cool and mysterious secret organization head
honcho. Normally running the show from the hidden
U.N.C.L.E. headquarters in New York, Waverly was
often very willing to go into the field if needed and
was able to still take care of
himself.
THRUSH
No one ever really knew what
THRUSH
was...except for it's ruthless dreams of world
domination. THRUSH, like Bond's SPECTRE, had a
structure that our U.N.C.L.E. agents only guessed at:
Was it one person? Was it a committee? It too had
its agents...normally out to permanently end the
careers of Solo and Kuryakin. The word THRUSH itself
was a mystery...did the letters stand for something
or was it of some significance to it's founder(s)?
The show never said...although one of the MFU-based
books offered this possible solution:
Technological Heirarchy for the
Removal of Undesirables and the
Subjugation of Humanity. We may never
know, but rest assured...if we find out, THRUSH will
have to kill us!
<
img src="http://www.geocities.com/scfifreak/gfu.jpg"height=70>U.N.C.L.E.
Spinoffs and Followers
The Girl from
U.N.C.L.E.
The MFU craze did indeed
inspire it's own spin-off show. Starring Stephanie
Powers as April Dancer and Noel Harrison as partner
Mark Slade, the GFU was the worst of the MFU's silly
season...multiplied. While dealing with man-eating
toasters and the like, Slade did the heavy lifting
while Dancer posed. This program mercifully died
after one season.
The Return of
the Man from U.N.C.L.E.: The Fifteen Years Later
Affair
This TV revival movie
featured Vaughn and McCallum as retired agents Solo
and Kuryakin called back to service after a resurgent
THRUSH gains nuclear weapons. The movie, meant as a
theatrical film but lack of funding reduced it to a
TV movie, was an exercise in nostalgia...even
feauring a cameo by George Lazenby as a British agent
identified only as "JB" who gives Solo some
assistance. It is fun to watch,
though.
Other spy TV shows
thank
their U.N.C.L.E.
*I
Spy
*Mission:
Impossible
*Blue Light
*The Man that Never
Was
*The Secret Life of Henry Fife
*Get
Smart!
*The Wild, Wild
West
*Alias
Here's hoping that the powers that be in Hollywood eventually get around to making a "Man from U.N.C.L.E." movie for the big screen - given how movie spies are making a comeback!
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