The Persuaders!
The Persuaders! is a British action comedy television series starring Tony Curtis and Roger Moore, produced by ITC Entertainment, and initially broadcast on ITV and ABC in 1971. The show has been called 'the last major entry in the cycle of adventure series that began 11 years earlier with Danger Man in 1960', as well as 'the most ambitious and most expensive of Sir Lew Grade's international action adventure series'.[1] The Persuaders! was filmed in Britain, France, and Italy between May 1970 and June 1971.
This article is about the 1971 TV series. For other uses, see The Persuaders.The Persuaders!
United Kingdom
English
1
24
Robert S. Baker
Roger Moore
Tony Spratling
49 mins
Television Reporters International
Tribune production
17 September 1971 –
25 February 1972
Despite its focus on the British and American markets, The Persuaders! became more successful elsewhere.[2] It won its highest awards in Australia and Spain, and Roger Moore and Tony Curtis were honoured in Germany and France for their acting.
The Persuaders! used many of the resources of Moore's previous show, The Saint. These included locations, and the idea of reusing many of the visible vehicles from episode to episode. The series' synth-laden theme music was composed by John Barry.
Reception[edit]
UK and US[edit]
Although the series was placed in the Top 20 of most-viewed television series in Britain throughout 1971,[15] Lew Grade wanted it to do well in the profitable American television market. It followed his earlier series such as Man in a Suitcase, The Champions and The Baron.[1] But The Persuaders! made little impact in America, airing on ABC on Saturday nights opposite Mission: Impossible.[1] In an interview given in 2007, Curtis attributed the lack of success in the US to the ABC network failing to screen it at prime time.[16]
ITC subsequently sought to repackage and re-release The Persuaders! in the American market, by editing eight of the episodes together and releasing them as four 90-minute TV movies (each comprising two episodes from the series, typically missing only their original opening and closing title sequences). These were:
Home media[edit]
The entire series was remastered for DVD release in Europe in 2001.
In 2006, because of its popularity in Britain, a nine-disc DVD special edition boxed set was released, with extra material to the complete, uncut, re-mastered 24-episode series.
In September 2011, the Region B Blu-ray box set containing all remastered, restored episodes of The Persuaders! was released to considerable praise from reviewers.
In Region 1, A&E Home Video, under license from Carlton International Media Ltd., released the entire series of the classic '70s British cult adventure series on DVD in two volume sets in 2003/2004.
On 10 September 2014, it was announced that Visual Entertainment had acquired the rights to the series in Region 1 and would re-release all 24 episodes on DVD on 4 November 2014.[22]
Remake[edit]
A motion picture was announced in 2005 with Steve Coogan and Ben Stiller.[23] In 2007 Hugh Grant and George Clooney were later announced as the stars with Stiller attached as producer. The film was slated for a December 2008 release,[24] but was never completed.
In popular culture[edit]
The iconic John Barry theme tune was also used as the walk on music by British Two-Tone pioneers The Specials. The series' theme song was sampled in the video for the single "Lavender" by Snoop Dogg. It was also used diegetically in the movie Nocturama, directed by Bertrand Bonello