Sun 6 May 2012
A TV Series Review by Michael Shonk: AMOS BURKE, SECRET AGENT (1965-66).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries[25] Comments
AMOS BURKE, SECRET AGENT. ABC / Four Star Productions / Barbety, 1965-66. Cast: Gene Barry as Amos Burke, Carl Benton Reid as The Man. Series based on characters created by Frank D. Gilroy. Produced by Aaron Spelling.
From Aaron Spelling: A Prime Time Life, by Aaron Spelling with Jefferson Graham: “Burke’s Law was one of my first great campy shows… Then ABC threw us a curveball with the ‘James Bond’ craze. Suddenly secret agents were in… So in 1965 Burke’s Law, the story of a millionaire L.A. detective, was forcibly changed to Amos Burke, Secret Agent. He became a debonair, globe-trotting secret agent for a United States intelligence agency. I hated it, Gene hated it, we all hated it, and ABC was very wrong to change it…â€
The series was a ratings failure from the very beginning. “Balance of Terror†(9/15/65) was the series first episode. The Arbitron ratings (Broadcasting, 9/20/65) found NBC’s I Spy at 37.6 share (first half hour) and 40.9 (last half hour) compared to CBS’s Danny Kaye at 32.3 share and 30.3 share compared to Amos Burke at 24.8 share and 25.8 share. By November the series would be cancelled (Broadcasting, 11/1/65).
Interestingly, the final episode of the series, “Terror in Tiny Town, Part Two” aired at 10pm on Wednesday, January 12, 1966, the same night ABC premiered its new spy series Blue Light at 8:30pm. Could the failure of Amos Burke have played a role in ABC picking up Blue Light and the rush to get it on the air?
So besides the audience having little interest in Amos Burke as a spy, and everyone involved hating it, the series also had a fatal creative flaw, The Man.
The Man was supposed to be Amos Burke’s “M” (Bond) or Mr. Waverly (Man from U.N.C.L.E.). Instead The Man was one of the most unlikable, heartless, mean characters ever to play a good guy on TV. While Amos could not contact The Man, The Man gave him a watch that when it buzzed, it meant Amos had to stop everything and get to the airport as fast as possible to meet The Man. The Man’s office was the inside of a DC-9 and he conducted all meetings (but one) in the air.
Amos would wait on the landing strip in his Rolls (the only other surviving character from Burke’s Law) for The Man’s plane. Once it landed, Amos would pull out what looked like a sonic pen light and point it at the plane, the sound would lower the stairs and Amos would enter and cool his heels in the outer “office†until The Man gave him permission to enter. Then Amos would use the door’s keypad (with comical beeps and boops) to open the door. This is how sidekicks get treated, not the hero.
Most episodes featured at least one beautiful woman on each side. Amos enjoyed working with women, and while much of his dialog sounds condescending today, he treated his female contacts as equals. But for Amos, women were usually interchangeable. In one episode (I won’t spoil it by naming it) Amos’s contact is a beautiful intelligent woman Amos admires, but after her death in action he doesn’t even comment on the loss. At the end, he seduces her replacement.
Production values were on the cheap side and sets and exteriors were noticeably recycled week after week. But Supervising Art Director Bill Ross and his crew did a creative job using sets to establish the style of the show, with campy odd shaped doors for the villain’s lair to menacing underground dungeons.
While few miss Amos Burke, Secret Agent, one wonders why ABC cancelled the series instead of returning to the successful police formula of Burke’s Law.
EPISODE GUIDE —
“Balance of Terror.” September 15, 1965. Writtenby Robert Buckner. Director: Murray Golden. Guest Cast: Will Kuluva, Gerald Mohr, Michele Carey * Amos takes the place of an arrested courier for a group smuggling gold from Red China into Latin America. (Part of the opening of this episode can be seen here on YouTube.)
“Operation Long Shadow.” September 22, 1965. Written by Albert Beich & William H. Wright. Director: Don Taylor. Guest Cast: Antoinette Bower, Dan Tobin, Rosemary DeCamp * A kidnapping of the son of an Algerian government official is the key to a mysterious plot. The “B†storyline involved two vacationing American tourists who knew Amos as the good guy detective and Amos proving to them he has turned into a spoiled playboy cad. In one of the more imaginative death traps of the series, Amos is locked in a moving train car filling up with gas. He escapes with the aid of the air in his Rolls tires.
“Steam Heat.” September 29, 1965. Written by Marc Brandel. Director: Virgil Vogel. Guest Cast: Nehemiah Persoff, James Best, Jane Walo * Exiled Mob boss mixes business with revenge when he plans to kill the Senator who got him kicked out of the country while his gang robs New York City using a knockout gas released through the city’s steam pipes. In this episode Amos receives instructions with breakfast on a record disguised as a flapjack.
“Password to Death.” October 6, 1965. Written by Marc Brandel. Director: Seymour Robbie. Guest Cast: Janette Scott, Joseph Ruskin, Michael Pate * A dying clue ‘S Day’ leads Amos to Cornwall, England and an evil villain. One of the best episodes of the series as it featured the perfect spy plot for the series premise. It also had my favorite line of the series. After quoting Shakespeare, Amos adds “Hamlet’s Law.†(It is Janette Scott seen with Gene Barry in the two photos above and to the right.)
“The Man with the Power.” October 13, 1965. Written by Stuart Jerome. Director: Murray Golden. Guest Cast: Thomas Gomez, John Abbott, Ilze Taurins * Amos’s attempt to help a scientist defect goes wrong, leaving the unconscious scientist wired to a bomb. The Man worries about America’s image as Vienna is evacuated.
“Nightmare in the Sun.” October 20, 1965. Written by Tony Barrett. Director: James Goldstone. Guest Cast: Barbara Luna, Edward Asner, Joan Staley, Elisha Cook * The Man is concerned about an assassination attempt of a Mexican Government official by two Americans because it might prevent the approval of a treaty between America and Mexico. Flawed by its predictability and many moments that make little to no sense.
“The Prisoner of Mr. Sin.” October 27, 1965. Teleplay: Gilbert Ralston and Marc Brandel. Story: Gilbert Ralston. Director: John Peyser. Guest Cast: Michael Dunn, France Nuyen, Greta Chi * Code breaking genius Waldo Bannister is replaced by a machine, rather than find something else for his “brilliant brain†to do, the American government places him under house arrest for a year. When he escapes, Amos is assigned to find Waldo. The trail leads to ruthless mercenary Indian (Michael Dunn) who ‘helps’ people on the run then sells their secrets and drains their bank accounts.
“Peace, It’s a Gasser.” November 3, 1965. Written by Palmer Thompson. Director: James Goldstone. Guest Cast: Henry Jones, Ruta Lee. Brooke Bundy * Evil Mastermind demands the end of war or he will use his gas that turns adults into self-obsessed children. His minions are teenagers who, all but one, are willing to kill for peace. This episode got dumber with every twist. In one scene The Man taunted Amos for going soft when Amos objected to The Man using him as an executioner of one of the agency’s own men.
“The Weapon.” November 10, 1965. (not viewed)
“Deadlier Than the Male.” November 17, 1965. (not viewed)
“Whatever Happened to Adriana, and Why Won’t She Stay Dead?” December 1, 1965. Written by Warren Duff. Director: Seymore Robbie. Guest Cast: Albert Paulsen, Jocelyn Lane, Joan Patrick * A drug dealer attempts to smuggle missiles into Latin America. Flawed by a weak villain (who runs at any hint of danger) and twists that needed to be treated more seriously.
“The Man’s Men.” December 8, 1965. Written by Albert Beich & William H. Wright. Director: Jerry Hopper. Guest Cast: Nancy Gates, Vaughn Taylor, Norman Alden * Bad guys break into MX3’s cover station, the American Bison Society, and steal a list of the agency’s agents. Great visual clue, shown more than once, that is harder to notice than figure out who done it. Gadget of the week featured a safe that when broken into lets out a radioactive gas that makes the back of the thieves’ ears glow.
“Or No Tomorrow.” December 15, 1965. Written by John & Ward Hawkins. Director: Virgil Vogel. Guest Cast: Abbe Lane, Lee Bergere, Ziva Rodann * Spoiled Prince gets his hands on a fungus that could destroy the world’s rice crop. He wants the U.S. to turn over two spies they have in prison so he can sell their secrets. Filled with pointless scenes like a William Tell contest between Amos and the Prince. Dumbest opening in series, Amos is greeted with a bomb in his room. His cover blown, Amos continues on the case with a bad guy following him to Amos’s local contacts.
“A Little Gift for Cairo.” December 22, 1965. (not viewed)
“A Very Important Russian Is Missing.” December 20, 1965. Teleplay: Tony Barrett. Story: Samuel A. Peeples and Tony Barrett. Director: Virgil Vogel. Guest Cast: Phyllis Newman, Donald Harron, Nina Shipman * The Russians and Americans join forces to find a kidnapped Russian official before the Chinese can. Nice plot, twists, and sets but weaken by series campy premise.
“Terror in a Tiny Town.” Part One: January 5, 1966. Part Two: January 12, 1966. Written by Marc Brandel. Director: Murray Golden. Guest Cast: Robert Middleton, Kevin McCarthy, Lynn Loring * Brainwashed by local radio station, a town with Atomic research plant becomes violently paranoid about the threat of outside influences on their way of life. Heavy-handed morality tale against the evils of bigotry and the 50s “Red Scare.â€
May 6th, 2012 at 11:56 pm
Never seen Amos Burke Secret Agent, but I do have a dvd copy of the original Burke’s Law pilot with Dick Powell in the lead. Same formula, but Powell towers above the other guy. Originally broadcast as part of The Dick Powell Show.
May 7th, 2012 at 12:51 am
Barry
That’s an interesting bit of trivia. If I’d known that before, I’d forgotten it completely.
According to IMBD, Dick Powell died after making the pilot and before the series went into production:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0559663/
May 7th, 2012 at 1:02 am
Getting back to AMOS BURKE, the spy series, I don’t remember ever watching it. Apparently a lot of other people didn’t watch it either. I SPY, the show it was on opposite, was a huge hit. If I watched anything during that time slot, I SPY would have been what it was, and I often did. It was fresh and new, and the fact that Bill Cosby was the first black actor to (co)star in a TV series made headlines across the country. The show was in color, too, as I recall, and BURKE was not. Not that Judy and I had a color TV back in 1965, but other viewers did.
May 7th, 2012 at 10:29 am
The title of the pilot Barry mentioned in #1 was “Who Killed Julie Greer?” and according to IMDb aired as first episode of DICK POWELL SHOW September 26, 1961.
Before BURKE’S LAW aired, “Broadcasting” magazine called the series AMOS BURKE. It was around a month or so before it aired that the magazine called it BURKE’S LAW.
There was a remake I plan to review in the future. It was called BURKE’S LAW, done by Aaron Spelling, starred Gene Barry and Peter Barton (as his sidekick son), and aired on CBS 1994-95.
AMOS BURKE – SECRET AGENT would return in reruns during the summer and win the Wednesday 9:30 time slot with an average of a 32 share vs NBC’s Movie rerun vs CBS’ original program OUR PRIVATE WORLD (a soap opera).
VCI has released two DVDs – Part One and Two of Season One of BURKE’S LAW. I have not heard about any plans for season two or for AMOS BURKE – SECRET AGENT. I watched AB-SA on collector to collector disc (which is why I didn’t see three episodes). The CBS sequel is also currently only available in the collector to collector market.
May 7th, 2012 at 11:44 am
I’ll have to check my TV Guide archive at home, so this is from my hit-&-miss memory bank:
Dick Powell and Aaron Spelling were using the Dick Powell Reynolds Aluminum Show (to give it its full title) as a part-time seed pool for Four Star pilot properties.
When the first Amos Burke show proved popular, it was put into series development, but the intention was always to put someone else in the lead (as Powell had handed off his Richard Diamond character to David Janssen for TV). My recollection is that when ABC bought Burke, the attached star was Jackie Cooper. This situation was still in force when ABC announced Burke as a series, but when production started up, suddenly Cooper was out and Gene Barry was in (if there was an official explanation, I can’t recall it just now).
Parenthetically, has anyone ever written a history of Four Star Television? That company outlasted most of the big independent TV companies, and its #1 producer Aaron Spelling carried on its style even longer.
Just askin’ …
May 7th, 2012 at 12:13 pm
The Spelling autobiography I quoted above (and available to read parts at google books (or whatever they are calling it now), discussed his time at Four Star and more importantly with Dick Powell.
“I (Spelling) left Four Star in 1966 after some idiot decided to wipe Dick Powell’s name off the masthead.” He would quickly be hired by United Artist.
#5. Mike, I didn’t bump into anything about Jackie Cooper, but it would not surprise me.
May 7th, 2012 at 2:46 pm
I’ve got the Aaron Spelling book.
What I’m asking for here is a full history of Four Star, going back to when Dick Powell, Charles Boyer, and David Niven formed the company, and spent years trying to get a fourth star on board (Joel McCrea was an early candidate; Ida Lupino ultimately filled the spot on Four Star Playhouse, but the whole situation was way more complicated).
If such a book exists, put me down for a copy.
May 7th, 2012 at 3:02 pm
Is there a biography of Dick Powell?
There is a website with a short history of the production company worth reading (but I suspect my fellow Mike has read it all before).
http://www.fourstarproductions.com
May 7th, 2012 at 9:07 pm
Burke’s Law was so much fun (and episodes written by Harlan Ellison)…
Amos Burke, Secret Agent – was no fun at all.
Gene Barry deserved better.
May 7th, 2012 at 9:40 pm
There were moments, but they were too short and too few. When I do a review it usually takes me a few days to watch a dozen or more episodes of a series. It took me three weeks to force myself to watch all of these. Some I liked despite their flaws (“Passport To Death” and “Whatever Happened To Adrianna, and Why Won’t She Stay Dead”), most were mediocre, and “Peace, It’s A Gasser” ranks as one of the worst episodes of TV I have ever survived.
As for Barry, you are right. I am a fan of his work in BAT MASTERSON and BURKE’S LAW, but was less than impressed with THE ADVENTURER (a British series he did).
May 8th, 2012 at 1:13 am
BURKE’S LAW did air in the UK, but as far as I’m aware it has never been repeated since. A lot of this has to do with the fact that it’s B&W rather than colour, but it’s also the case that it’s a series that has left little impact on the collective memory (I couldn’t find anyone in my family who remembered watching it,and it isn’t really referenced in books about ‘Cult TV’ in the way that other series of a similar vintage have been).
Poor old Gene Barry. The only other series of his that’s generally available on DVD over here is THE ADVENTURER. Michael is being generous in being less than impressed with the series–it was awful! Repeated a few years ago on satellite, I couldn’t believe quite how awful it was. Already in his 50s, Barry was playing what seemed to be a far younger character who was not only tough as nails but a babe-magnet to boot. He was a good actor, but he was horribly miscast here. On top of this the scripts were dire. The DVD has one of those making-of extras where the supporting cast basically spend the whole time saying how much they disliked him. Anyone who likes Barry should probably avoid this.
Didn’t BURKE’S LAW make some sort of comeback in the 90s, with Barry and an actor playing his son?
May 8th, 2012 at 8:51 am
BURKE’S LAW did come back in the mid-1990’s but was not a success. The original show had some of the best guest stars ever seen on TV. I’ve read that they were paid good money to come in and shoot scenes in a day. It was very easy money, at least $1,000 and maybe as high as $5,000.
The TV show HONEY WEST starring Anne Francis was a spinoff from BURKE’S LAW. I never could stand the secret agent change over.
May 8th, 2012 at 9:21 am
Seems like people would rather talk about Burke’s Law than Amos Burke, Secret Agent. Who Killed Julie Greer? is available for viewing in the Paley Center archives. It established the paradigm for the Burke’s Law series by featuring well-known, older stars in cameo roles (as the suspects) — a formula that Spelling later rode to fame in such shows as Love Boat and Fantasy Island. I’m surprised no one has mentioned that Ronald Reagan, a good friend of Powell’s, was among the guest stars.
I had always thought that Burke’s Law was modeled after John Huston’s The List of Adrian Messenger, withe George C. Scott as a retired MI-5 officer looking into a series of mysterious deaths, which featured cameos by Tony Curtis, Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster, Robert Mitchum, and Frank Sinatra, but the dates don’t mesh: the film was released in 1963, two years after Julie Greer.
Michael, I have to say that I get a kick out of your description of The Man (played by Carl Benton Reid, whose TV credits went all the way back to 1949). It seems rather ingenious to me to name a character on the side of good after the mythical figure who is conventionally associated with oppression, particularly on the cusp of the cultural and political revolution this country was about to experience, although of course no one has ever accused Spelling — a man whose life style was the very epitome of decadence and wasteful spending — of having a social conscience.
May 8th, 2012 at 9:48 am
#11. Bradstreet, Barry was basically playing Amos Burke in THE ADVENTURER but without the humor or charm or youth.
#12. Walker, I have the remake series and, when I recover from this one, hope to review it.
May 8th, 2012 at 10:09 am
#13. David, comments are always interesting since I have a talent for picking shows no one remembers.
One of the noticeable differences between BURKE’S LAW and AMOS BURKE – SECRET AGENT is the guest cast. I am not sure why Spelling didn’t continued the “special” guest star with AMOS, it might have grabbed some eyeballs away from I SPY and DANNY KAYE.
I don’t think they really thought out The Man as a character let alone his name.
The end of “Peace, It’s A Gasser” showed how this series was going to handle the youth movement. Spoiler! Amos saves the day. The young girl who believes in peace and not violence walks away from a war protest line. And in a shot that has Amos and the girl standing with an American flag flying in the background, Amos tells her not to give up and continue to fight for what she believes in. She grabbed a protest sign and rejoined the line. All that was missing was Francis Scott Key. But it was better than how Perry Mason handled the youth movement.
As for Spelling, in his book he mentions his special quality time he spent with the “Burke’s Girls,” the six women in the opening of BURKE’S LAW.
May 8th, 2012 at 10:23 am
I mention at the end of my review I wondered why ABC did not bring back BURKE’S LAW. Today, it would have probably happen. There was a reason to squeeze one more season out of the series.
One of the problems facing BURKE in syndication was there were only 64 episodes (100 is the magic number for syndication success) and 17 AMOS. At first, Four Star sold the two separately but then combined them as BURKE’S LAW to make 81 episodes. It makes me wonder how the audience reacted when the syndicated reruns shifted to AMOS for a little over two weeks and back to BURKE.
But one more season, with Amos outed as a spy (his cover was never very secure), he would return as hero and rich guy who likes to play cops and killers.
May 8th, 2012 at 10:59 am
Once again, this is from memory:
The practice of ‘stripping’ – running shows five days a week – didn’t really take hold until the late ’60s. Before that, almost every series that had had any network exposure would be offered for syndication, and most of those would be snapped up to fill primetime slots on independent stations (like WGN ch9 here in Chicago) or fringe slots on network stations (the nets were still leaving early mornings, late afternoons, and late nights to the affiliates).
Back then, it was the shows that had short network runs (2-3 seasons or less) that were most readily available for local use. The longer-running series were almost always exclusive to the networks, excpt in rare instances where the oldest episodes were syndicated under a different title (while Dragnet was still on NBC, its earliest eps were syndicated as Badge 714; this was rare, but it did happen).
The majority of syndication offerings (including originals from Ziv and such) were still seen only once a week; Burke’s Law, with 64 weeks worth of episodes, was a good choice for a station with many slots to fill.
Those days are now gone; they disappeared when long-running series (the ones with the magic 100 episodes) became available, and station managers found that five-a-week saved them four days of thinking. Thus, many of the shorter series were crowded out of the marketplace.
This is the digest version, of course; perhaps others of you can fill in my many blanks.
David Bushman’s mention of The List Of Adrian Messenger brought to mind the recent exposure of that film as a kind of Hollywood hoax: two of the advertised “guest stars” didn’t really appear (except in the unmasking at the end) and one other wasn’t the one we were seeing most of the time. This has been written up extensively elsewhere, if anyone’s interested.
Anyway, it doesn’t really apply to Burke’s Law, because all the famous faces were right out front.
May 8th, 2012 at 11:39 am
#17. Thank you, Mike. When I wrote the comment about the magic number for syndication I wondered if those rules applied to the sixties TV. I also knew there were enough smart people out there to correct me if needed.
May 8th, 2012 at 1:11 pm
And a special thanks to Ed Gorman for posting a link to this review. If you are not reading his blog, you should.
http://newimprovedgorman.blogspot.com
September 28th, 2012 at 11:46 pm
I wondered if the last two episodes of Amos Burke might have been filmed in color for the purposes of editing them together into a movie for overseas release? This was done in 1966 with two episodes of the CBS Peter Falk series, The Trials Of O’Brien, guest starring Leonard Nimoy as a hitman, and the final two episodes of the ATV Patrick McGoohan series Danger Man (aka Secret Agent), Though these were broadcast originally on television in black and white, they were shown cinematically in color. Regarding Four Star, their only regular color series was The Big Valley (abc 1965-69).
September 29th, 2012 at 11:05 am
Neil, Terror In Tiny Town two-part story was in black and white.
That does not mean they were not filmed in color for the reason you gave. The history of color TV is one of the sillier parts of TV history.
In the forties, CBS and RCA (NBC) had developed different color TV systems. The FCC had to choose one to become the nation’s standard. It chose RCA, and William Paley of CBS pouted and kept his network off that system until the mid-sixties.
In the beginning, it didn’t matter. There was not enough home TV sets capable of seeing color for local stations to invest in the equipment needed to air color TV.
NBC of course promoted the color system as it made RCA rich selling TV sets.
AMOS network was ABC. By the sixties, ABC was interested in color though some series such as AMOS were still in b&w. ABC was still trying to upgrade the network’s ability to air color when in January 1966 (as AMOS went off) ABC made a big deal of their new shows being in color (BATMAN in color!).
I have a copy of DANGER HAS TWO FACES, a movie created from episodes of the ABC spy series THE MAN WHO NEVER WAS. The series was in b&w and despite that some places claim it was in color, it was in b&w. Black and white movies were not uncommon in movie theaters, especially drive-ins, during the sixties. It is also possible my copy was made off a TV station that did not have the ability to air color.
I am doing research on a 1950s series PARIS PRECINCT that was offered in color and b&w, and I think the color version was never made as it was sold as b&w to the stations.
If you are interested in the TV series edited into a film shown in movie theaters check out my post about I DEAL IN DANGER (BLUE LIGHT).
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=16348
June 24th, 2013 at 11:01 pm
Someone, Michael I think, asked if there was a Dick Powell biography and the answer is yes…written by Tony Thomas and quite okay.
June 24th, 2013 at 11:53 pm
#22. Thanks, Barry. I’ll keep an eye out for it.
July 14th, 2013 at 7:27 am
Did It Have The 1965-66 Four Star Jingle By Joseph Mullendore I Like To Know
That It Did
Please Send Me A Message Then
That’s On ME-TV
Burke’s Law Should Have Gone To Color In September 1965 As Amos Burke,Secret Agent Did It Have The 1965-66 Four Star Jingle Composed By Joseph Mullendore.I Like That Jingle Very Much. Please Put That On Club Four Star On Yahoo. Joseph Mullendore Composed The 1965-66 Four Star Signature Heard On Most Of The Episodes Four Star’s Only Color TV Series The Big Valley Please Name The Shows That Had The 1965-66 Four Star Mullendore Jingle.
As Well As Three Black & White Shows Such As
Amos Burke,Secret Agent,Honey West And The Smothers Brothers Show.
August 8th, 2014 at 6:50 pm
Apparently, there is an interview with a TV historian about Four Star (audio only) that is included as an extra on VCI’s DVD of Zane Grey Theater, the first season. Speaking of which, the second season of Zane Grey Theater is coming out soon, but from Timeless Media…I’m wondering if they’ll do the second and maybe third seasons of Burke’s Law? I asked VCI on their Facebook page about the possibility of their releasing the second season of Burke’s Law, and they told me they’d need releases from all the actors! Nice trick, considering how many of them have passed away… 😛