| I Spy | |
|---|---|
| Format | Espionage |
| Developed by | David Friedkin & Morton Fine |
| Starring | Robert Culp Bill Cosby |
| Theme music composer | Earle Hagen |
| Country of origin |  United States |
| No. of episodes | 82 |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Sheldon Leonard |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | NBC |
| Original run | September 15, 1965 – April 15, 1968 |
| External links | |
| IMDb profile | |
| TV.com summary | |
I Spy is an American television secret agent adventure series. It ran on NBC from 1965 to 1968 and teamed Robert Culp as international tennis player Kelly Robinson, and Bill Cosby as his trainer Alexander Scott. In reality, they were both top agents for the Pentagon and, while ostensibly traveling as "tennis bums" (a talented amateur who plays tennis with rich people in return for food and lodging), they were usually busy chasing villains, spies, and beautiful women. The creative force behind the show were writers David Friedkin, Morton Fine, and cinematographer Fouad Said. Together they formed Three F Productions under the aegis of Desilu Studios where the show was produced. Friedkin and Fine were co-producers and head writers. Together they wrote the scripts for 16 episodes, one of which Friedkin directed. Friedkin also dabbled in acting and appeared in two episodes in the first season. Actor-producer Sheldon Leonard, best known for playing gangster roles in the 1940s, was the executive producer. He also acted in several cameo roles for the series, directed one episode, and served as occasional second unit director.
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Background
I Spy broke new ground in that it was the first American television drama to feature an African-American actor (Cosby) in a lead role. Originally an older actor was slated to play a fatherly mentor to Culp's "Kelly Robinson". But after seeing Cosby performing stand-up comedy on a talk-show, Sheldon Leonard decided to take a chance on hiring him to play opposite Culp. The concept was changed from a mentor-protege relationship to same-age partners who were equals. It was also notable that Cosby's race was never an issue in any of the stories.[1] Nor was his character in any way subservient to Culp's, with the exception that Culp's "Kelly Robinson" was a more experienced agent. As a straight-laced Rhodes scholar fluent in many languages, Cosby's "Scotty" was really the brains of the team. His partner (Culp) was the athlete and playboy who lived by his wits. Another way in which I Spy was a trailblazer was in its use of exotic international locations in an attempt to emulate the James Bond film series. This was unique for a television show, especially since the series actually filmed its lead actors at locations ranging from Spain to Japan, rather than relying on photography and stock footage. (Compare with the recent series, Alias, which also utilized worldwide settings but rarely filmed outside the Los Angeles region.) The success of the show is attributed to the chemistry between Culp and Cosby. Fans tuned in more for their hip banter than for the espionage stories, making I Spy a leader in the buddy genre. The show also coined unique phrases that, briefly, became catch phrases, such as "wonderfulness"; Wonderfulness was used as the title of one of Cosby's albums of stand up comedy released concurrently with the series. Many details of Cosby's life were also written into his character. There are frequent references to his childhood in Philadelphia, attending Temple University, and one episode has him returning home to re-visit his old neighborhood. I Spy was a main fixture in the wildly popular secret-agent genre—a trend that followed hot on the heels of the hugely successful James Bond films. After the blockbuster earnings of Goldfinger in 1964 and Thunderball (which confirmed the spy craze was more than a passing fad) in 1965, the "gold rush" was on at every studio to produce their own brand of secret agent TV shows, films, and spin-off merchandise. What set I Spy apart from its fellow programs such as The Man from U.N.C.L.E., The Avengers, and The Wild Wild West was its emphasis on realism. No fanciful 007-style gadgets, outlandish villains or campy, tongue-in-cheek humor. Although Culp and Cosby frequently exchanged breezy, lighthearted dialog, the stories invariably focused on the gritty, ugly side of the espionage business. Occasionally the series produced charming comedic episodes such as "Chrysanthemum", inspired by The Pink Panther and "Mainly on the Plains" with Boris Karloff as an eccentric scientist who thinks he's Don Quixote. However, most episodes dealt with more serious subjects (e.g., heroin addiction in "The Loser") and didn't shy away from ending on a sombre note. This is perhaps the only television drama in the Sixties to set an episode in the then-taboo region of Vietnam ("The Tiger," written by Robert Culp). While filming this episode in 1966, a romance ensued between Culp and Vietnamese guest star France Nuyen. The two were married the following year, and Nuyen went on to appear in several more episodes. Another unique feature of the series was a running gag involving a locked-room scenario. Time and again the two spys would be captured and left in a locked room, cellar, or warehouse. After much humorous banter they would improvise an ingenious escape using whatever materials were at hand. In one episode they create an explosive out of chemical fertilizer and dry ice. The series was additionally notable in that co-star Culp wrote the scripts for seven episodes (one of which he also directed), including the show's first broadcast episode, "So Long, Patrick Henry". In the Sixties it was exceedingly rare for an actor in a dramatic series to write scripts, much less direct, for their own show. After the series ended its run in 1968, Culp asked Cosby to co-star with him in the film Hickey & Boggs (1972), a downbeat and violent detective story by Walter Hill. Despite the fact that Culp was also the director, the film failed to show any of the warmth and camaraderie characteristic of I Spy. In 1994, Cosby and Culp reunited once more for the nostalgic television movie I Spy Returns, in which the aging spies have to leap into action once again to rescue their children, who are also spies for the same agency. Robert Culp also reprised the role of Kelly Robinson during a dream sequence in a 1999 episode of Bill Cosby's series, Cosby, entitled "My Spy". Prior to this, Culp made a guest appearance on The Cosby Show on April 9, 1987 in an episode titled "Bald and Beautiful" in which he plays an old friend of Dr. Huxtable's named "Scott Kelly". The duo also reunited once more for an appearance at a TV special marking the 75th anniversary of the NBC television network in 2002. Cosby was actually on stage with his Cosby Show co-stars at the time in reference to that sitcom. However, he called on Culp (who was in the audience) to join him as well and both men received a round of applause and cheers when they donned their sunglasses and tossed off a few wisecracks in a nod to their secret agent characters. A movie remake I Spy followed in 2002 with Eddie Murphy and Owen Wilson. Like most remakes, it diverged from its source material. This included reversing the character names so that Alexander Scott (Wilson) was now the experienced agent and Kelly Robinson (Murphy) the amateur, possibly in reference to Murphy's popular Mr. Robinson character on Saturday Night Live. The film was a commercial and critical flop. The original television series and the 1994 reunion movie are both available on DVD. Episodes 1-25 of the first season of the television series are also available on Joost, from the DMGI Classics channel.
Afterlife of I Spy television series
Popular culture
A sure sign of a film or TV show's popularity is a Mad magazine parody. In the Mad version published in 1967, the show was called "Why Spy?" featuring characters called "Killy" and "Scoot". It received predictably mixed reviews: [1] In 1968 the series was also parodied in an episode ("Die Spy") of the spy-spoof television series Get Smart, in which agent Maxwell Smart (Don Adams) pretends to be an international table-tennis champion. The episode successfully duplicates the theme music and humorous banter between Robinson and Scott (with actor/comedian Stu Gilliam imitating Cosby). Robert Culp makes an uncredited cameo appearance as an inebriated Turkish waiter.
Original novels and comic books
A number of original novels based upon the series were published, most written in the mid-to-late 1960s by Walter Wager under the pseudonymous by-line John Tiger. Wager, under his own name, authored numerous thrillers, three of which were adapted into films: Telefon, Viper Three (Twilight's Last Gleaming) and 58 Minutes (Die Hard 2). His I SPY novels were "virtual first drafts" according to him, and he chose the John Tiger moniker (used also for two original Mission: Impossible novels from the same publisher) because he thought it sounded tough and because he was concerned readers might think he had created I Spy himself. When, years later, it was suggested to him that readers would have been hip enough to understand that the show had generated the books, and that he might have missed an opportunity to attract more readers to his real-name by-line (his seven I Spys were hugely popular, and among aficionados still considered classics of the tie-in genre), he took a moment to consider the point, nodded a bit, and with his usual equanimity replied, "Maybe I made a mistake." The I Spy novels were published by Popular Library:
- I Spy (1965, no book series number on cover)
- I SPY #2: Masterstroke (1966)
- I SPY #3: Superkill (1967)
- I SPY #4: Wipeout (1967)
- I SPY #5: Countertrap (1967)
- I SPY #6: Doomdate (1967)
- I SPY #7: Death-Twist (1968)
The following tie-ins, not by Wager, were also published.
- Message From Moscow (1966) by Brandon Keith. This was a hardcover novel published for young readers by Whitman.
- I Spy (2002) by Max Allan Collins - novelization of the motion picture remake
(Though the motion picture was tied to the franchise in a business and trademark sense, the filmmakers and actors went on record as admitting that its artistic ties to the series were tenuous at best -- and among I SPY-philes the feature film is considered a heretical sidebar best forgotten. That said, Max Allan Collins novelized the script entertainingly.) Gold Key Comics also published six issues of an I Spy comic book between 1966 and 1968. I Spy: A History And Episode Guide to the Groundbreaking Television Series, published by McFarland & Company, Jefferson, NC, in January 2007, examines I Spy's contribution to American television and society by being the first series to star a black and a white actor together, and also being the first weekly production to film around the world, developing the technology to make this possible. This "biography of a television series" was written by Marc Cushman and Linda J. LaRosa, with a foreword by Robert Culp. I SPY: A History to the Groundreaking Television Series
Internet
In 1999, the I Spy Forum and the I Spy - The Definitive Site were created by Dave Cole and Bob Mitsch, which carried forward the friendship theme of I Spy to the Internet.[2] At these sites, fans continue to discuss I Spy just about every day.[2]
Other uses
I Spy was also the title of a short-lived thriller series starring Raymond Massey that aired in 1956.
DVD Releases
Image Entertainment has released the complete series on DVD in Region 1 for the very first time. In addition, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released the 1994 reunion made-for-TV film on DVD in Region 1 on October 8, 2002. Unfortunately the episodes on each boxset are not in any order, containing episodes from any of the 3 seasons. These sets were compiled from the individual volume releases that Image Entertainment had put out before releasing the boxsets.
| DVD Name | Ep # | Release Date |
|---|---|---|
| I Spy- Box Set#1 | 28 | October 8 2002 |
| I Spy- Box Set#2 | 28 | October 8 2002 |
| I Spy- Box Set#3 | 26 | October 8 2002 |
| I Spy Returns | 1 | October 8 2002 |
See also
References
- ^ The November 9th, 2007 Episode of The O'Reilly Factor featured an interview with Culp. It also showed a clip of one early episode titled "Danny was a Million Laughs" in which Cosby's character was the brunt of a Shoeshine racial remark. Culp said he and Cosby went to the producers after that episode and insisted it never happen again
- ^ a b Britton, Wesley. (2004) Spy Television. Published by Praeger Publishers; Afterlife of I Spy'; Page 91. ISBN 0-27598-163-0
