Thu 25 Feb 2021
A TV Episode Review: THE BARON “Diplomatic Immunity†(1966).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV Espionage & Spies[13] Comments
THE BARON “Diplomatic Immunity.†ITC, UK, 28 September 1966 (Season 1, Episode 1). Steve Forrest as John Mannering (alias “The Baron”), Sue Lloyd as Cordelia Winfield, Colin Gordon as John Alexander Templeton-Green, Paul Ferris as David Marlowe. Based on the character created by John Creasey. Director: Leslie Norman. Currently streaming on Britbox.
The Baron was one of the lesser known series characters created by John Creasey (writing as Anthony Morton), but when the folks at ITC decided they wanted a TV show to compete with the James Bond movies and the U.N.C.L.E. TV shows, they decided that The Baron would do very well.
The series, which lasted only one season and 30 episodes, was filmed in color, somewhat unusual in those early days of British TV. In the TV version, fairly closely to the books but with some differences, John Mannering is a wealthy antiques dealer with connections all over the world, which makes him a highly regarded person of interest to be co-opted by a secret British secret service agency to work for them undercover for them.
In “Diplomatic Immunity†Mannering is asked to go to a fictional European country to retrieve some valuable pieces of jewelry stolen by a female employee of the head of one of that country’s top governmental agencies, using her diplomatic immunity to get them back into her country.
In all-out imitation of the James Bond films, Mannering goes fully equipped with all kinds of secret gadgetry, and it is best you pay close attention, since – wouldn’t you know – he gets to use all of them whenever he needs them. The story is slight – the basic story line doesn’t need the full hour’s running time – but it’s entertaining, and Steve Forrest is hunky enough and the girls he meets all seem willing enough for viewers of either sex to have something to look at.
On the other hand, the series was picked up by ABC in this country for only part of its run, then could only be seen in syndication. It may be that “hunky†is not good enough: you need the charisma of a Roger Moore as well, and that Steve Forrest unfortunately didn’t have.
February 26th, 2021 at 1:21 pm
Not sure why Steve Forrest never quite became a bigger star. Seemed like he could only shine after the parade had passed him by: as a sturdy, experienced character actor in his later years. ‘North Dallas Forty’ for example.
February 26th, 2021 at 1:28 pm
Another fellow with a long successful career, but as you say, mostly as a character actor with lots and lots of roles. Another exception was as one of the leads in the first (only) season of S.W.A.T.
February 26th, 2021 at 1:28 pm
Lazy,
He did not have it, or if you prefer, the camera reflected his image but did not love him, and he was about half the actor his brother was. Have a look at a really good picture, Rogue Cop, and see if your eye goes to him. It does not, just someone for Robert Taylor to play against.
February 26th, 2021 at 1:33 pm
For the benefit of those who might not know, his brother was Dana Andrews.
February 26th, 2021 at 6:20 pm
I liked The Baron more than a lot of Creasey’s characters.
February 26th, 2021 at 7:04 pm
Speaking for myself, I’ve read only one, but I enjoyed it. Creasey wrote 47 of them, so I have catching up to do!
February 26th, 2021 at 8:43 pm
Forrest just didn’t have the same presence on the big screen as his older brother Dana Andrews. His few breaks in film just didn’t pan out (opposite actresses like Anne Baxter, Doris Day, and Debbie Reynolds) though he managed a good career on television.
The Baron is hardly lesser. He was the first Creasey sale in the US, as BLUE MASK for some reason, and one of Creasey’s longest running and most successful creations virtually everywhere but here. Umberto Eco even pays tribute to the Baron in his fictional memoir THE MYSTERIOUS FLAME OF QUEEN LORNA.
I’m afraid this is a case of our own provincialism coloring how we see a writer’s success. Dennis Wheatley’s career was almost over before American audiences “discovered” him, but he still sold over sixty million books without us. Frederic Dard is one of the bestselling French writers of all time but barely known here.
Peter Cheyney is barely known here, but was huge in the UK and Europe. Similarly Henri Vernes Bob Moraine books sell all over the world in huge numbers, but other than ten “Bob Moran” books published by Phoenix Press in the Fifties are unknown in this country.
Many novels by Jules Verne, Dumas, Hugo, and others are barely known here (some untranslated), but classics elsewhere. Off hand I can think of writers who rival Mickey Spillane in sales overall whose works have never seen American publication.
In England, Italy, and Germany Francis Durbridge work in radio and television as well as literary circles is almost as well known as Agatha Christie and Edgar Wallace. Ernest Dudley’s Dr, Morrelle and Armchair Detective were hugely popular in English speaking countries other than our own.
TINTIN was one of the most popular creations in the world translated in dozens of languages (including English) and in my youth almost unknown in this country.
I understand why they made the Baron an American oil man, with the idiot logic that governs such things, but it was a damn silly thing to do to one of the best amateur cracksman characters in the genre. Why he just couldn’t have been an American jewel thief who owned a Sotheby’s style auction house I will never know, though I guess his wife had to go either way.
A few episodes of the book rise to the level of lesser entries of the Saint (from the last season when they ran out of original Charteris material), and that cast has a certain charm, especially Lloyd, but boy was this an opportunity missed.
February 26th, 2021 at 9:08 pm
I bet they probably have computer software these days that will imbue ‘It’ to an up-and-coming star when they don’t naturally have it. Some algorithm which probably adds dimples to cheeks, gleam to the eye, and cruel twist to the mouth.
February 26th, 2021 at 9:49 pm
Lazy, they probably don’t, but are the kind of people, did David call them idiots, who would embrace the concept.
And speaking of that, no doubt before any of us were born, I was working for Rainbow Productions and coordinating a project with an outfit call Filmex. Perfectly nice people, but the boss had just come in from meeting at Columbia Pictures and was all enthused about a computer that would tell you when a story or film script was run through the program, just where and how many love scenes, known as sex scenes at the time, and/or action sequences needed inclusion.
My heart sank, still does.
February 27th, 2021 at 12:23 am
I applaud anyone who follows a career goal. Many people don’t even try. Many people don’t even know what a ‘goal’ is. This country is big enough to hold all our dreams, but the worst morass is never having ambition and never aiming as high as one can. We all contribute big, if we try.
Computer corruption of basic principles -it’s in more places than we’d like to think:
https://tinyurl.com/yd66c8kq
Let’s say that this article can’t be corroborated. It’s digital, it’s invalid. I agree. It’s just internet, it’s not fact. But I bet it would ‘ring true’ if a Woodstein was around to pin down the facts.
Just my opinion: no computer can create a fable, or a fantasy, or a passion.
“When you cannot love or hate anymore, then where is the charm of life?” –Schnitzler
February 28th, 2021 at 6:33 pm
It’s remarkable how much John Creasey is forgotten now, but he was one of Britain’s most prolific writers and consistently popular for the best part of fifty years.
He had many irons in the fire – Department Z, Patrick Dawlish, The Toff, Inspector West, sundry romances and westerns under various other names – and The Baron was among his most popular.
A shame that the TV series didn’t focussed on Manning’s later career as an antique dealer, but I suppose the censors wouldn’t allow have allowed it.
The television series is notable for being produced by Monty Berman, who had produced The Saint with Bob Baker until a less-than-amicable parting of the ways. Baker followed the halo and Berman made this.
It’s a very good series – sometimes even excellent – though Forrest lacks charisma. He’s masculine, but that’s about all that can be said for him. He has that square-jawed toughness which was common in American television and film of the ’40-60s.
Lloyd is better as Cordelia, a sort of sultry and more self-consciously posh Emma Peel, while the reliably excellent Colin Gordon appears all too briefly as Templeton-Green.
March 2nd, 2021 at 3:15 am
For The Record:
SWAT went on ABC in January of 1975 (mid-season).
Initially it was fairly successful in Monday night ratings, but TV crickets bitched about “violence”, which led the network to panic.
SWAT made it to season two, but ABC threw it away by moving it to Saturday night, which was the net’s equivalent of witness protection (CBS comedy block + NBC’s Emergency and Movie = Oblivion).
SWAT managed the full season, but everything else ABC put in there came and went.
It happens (and on ABC it happened a lot).
March 3rd, 2021 at 10:40 pm
Much of Creasey’s output is available in e-book form, the Toff, Baron, West, Gideon, Palfrey, and Dept. Z. So far Dawlish, and the Kyle Hunt and Michael Halliday books aren’t.
I enjoyed the Baron series, but it was no SAINT. It was too often predictable, and would have benefited greatly if they at least borrowed a few of Creasey’s plots since they didn’t always turn on his former career a criminal though those skills were common.
I suspect they didn’t make him an ex crook to avoid being compared to the Saint or being accused of just doing a low reant Saint, though the books are nothing like Charteris.