With the extreme weather here in New England this weekend, I've been continuing to catch up with episodes from one of my favorite Sixties shows, the UK series ADAM ADAMANT LIVES! It ran on the BBC from June of 1966 through the Spring of 1967. It occurred to me when I got out my DVDs again last week that this show has a couple of things in common with DS. Notably the fact that the hero, a Victorian gentleman adventurer put into suspended animation in 1902, reawakens in the London of 1966 completely out of his own time and place. There are some other commonalities, down to the producer of the show demanding a specific hairstyle for the hero, and the latter occupying a home furnished in the style and manner of his own time, which was the late Victorian era. (I always thought on DS they could have done more with exploring Barnabas's less than happy adjustment to life in the 1960s as an 18th century gentleman. I wasn't at all happy with how this theme was developed in the Burton/Depp film.)
ADAM ADAMANT combined elements of The Avengers, Doctor Who, and James Bond (including a wailing theme song reminiscent of GOLDFINGER). It was more violent than would have been allowed on US television at the time. And many of the guest players also showed up on THE AVENGERS. Moreover, some of the plots were either similar, or outright recycled. A good example of all of these facets, including a scene that is definitely echoes what was to happen on DS in 1967, is this story, "The Terribly Happy Embalmers." John Le Mesurier, Jeremy Young, and Alf Joint (a popular stunt fighter), all of whom appeared in THE AVENGERS, show up in this one. It's not surprising that you keep expecting Diana Rigg or Patrick Macnee to show up since the script was written by longtime AVENGERS scribe Brian Clemens.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzWdQlG6T2ABest, G.
