|
By
FRANK BEHRENS
Many fans of British
television series look back fondly at "Secret
Agent" with Patrick McGoohan as John Drake. Not as
many know that the British title was "Danger Man"
and that the series had started with 39 half-hour
episodes that were never shown on American TV.
Now A&E has rectified that lack over here by
issuing in a boxed set of five DVDs, the entire
first season of "Danger Man." I have just finished
watching all 39 episodes and I must admit to
having had a good time despite certain
reservations. In the longer episodes that
followed, I often had a feeling that the plots now
and then were too thin to bear the 55 minutes and
required some padding. In this set, things are so
concise that the denouements are invariably
rushed, leaving one with the feeling that there
are too many loose ends dangling at the final fad
out.
But McGoohan is always fun to watch, especially
since he plays an Irish American and often resorts
to a semi-comic accent to support his numerous
impostures. Each episode has the requisite
Beautiful Woman (one of them was to become a
regular on "Laugh In" -- guess which!), but John
Drake seems never to let them interfere with his
job -- a lesson sorely needed by James Bond. Note:
McGoohan had been offered the role of Bond and
turned it down! He also grew up in Queens, NY,
only blocks from where I taught Junior High
School.
It is a lot of fun spotting actors who are
familiar from other shows and films: Robert Shaw
("Jaws," "From Russia With Love"), Angela Browne
("Avengers," "The Prisoner"), Lois Maxwell (all
those James Bonds), Barbara Shelley ("Village of
the Damned," one of the Hammer Draculas), and so
on.
Two of the earlier episodes suffer from a shrill
soundtrack, which makes the dialogue difficult to
understand; but for the most part, the
restorations are well done and the picture is
always good. At the end of the last disc, there is
some printed information about McGoohan and the
usual photo gallery. Again, a very enjoyable 16:15
hours of no-nonsense spy stuff. |
