Peter Cushing Meets Steed and Mrs Peel in Return of the Cybernauts

Рет қаралды 4,123

Жыл бұрын

In watching 'The Avengers' recently, I couldn't help but notice how much Diana Rigg uses props while speaking. She'll pick something up, look at it, play with it, caress it while talking to someone. She's a very physical actress in that respect. She always seems aware of what is physically there surrounding her. She looks around a room as much as to the person to whom she is speaking... And yet this never betrays a lack of civility.
Patrick Macnee, on the other hand, also uses props but he seems comically surprised by some of the things he encounters. He seems most comfortable with a champagne, brandy or wine glass in his hand talking in just as civil a way to those with whom things may well be about to turn nasty.
Peter Cushing, as has been pointed out in many a Hammer film commentary, was renowned for his use of props. Sometimes, it has been suggested, that his entertaining handling of objects could steal focus from the actor speaking. With some actors this might be true but I always sense that Cushing, much like Rigg, always likes his characters to be physically in touch with their environment. And despite his reputation, there is a good drinking game to be had over which of them handles props more than the other. Having said that, I suspect that such a drinking game could lead to collapsing from alcohol poisoning within an hour.
On another point, I would just like to mention that this film/TV episode was directed by Robert Day. I mention it in the video but it's worth mentioning again because he's so often spoken of as a journeyman director. There is some evidence to back this up but I feel that, when given free reign, he put together some wonderful work. In fact he directed my own favourite film of all time... But I love that peculiar introductory scene before the first cybernaut attack.
There... My description is now officially longer than the video. I don't know if anyone ever reads these things...
And, yes, the original was shot in colour. I decolourised it simply because this is how most of those who saw this series would have seen it first.
Peter Cushing Meets Steed and Mrs Peel in Return of the Cybernauts
#theavengers #steedandmrspeel #emmapeel #dianarigg #patrickmacnee #petercushing #cybernauts #イギリス

Пікірлер: 29

@johntaylor6345 11 ай бұрын

3 brilliant actors in this clip. Patrick Mcnee,Peter Cushing and Diana Rigg. Music is superb too.

@dreamsofprojectedlight 11 ай бұрын

Yes. It is hard to think of a better cast.

@Kevin_Kennelly Жыл бұрын

30 years ago, we are having a problem at work. My boss tells me to call his old friend, who may be able to help. Boss tells me "This guy dated Diana Rigg. He will tell you that fact within 5 minutes of speaking to him." I call the guy. Within 5 minutes, he'd told me that he had dated Diana Rigg. I don't recall if he helped with our problem.

@Kevin_Kennelly Жыл бұрын

It's a lot like the old joke: How do you know if you are at a party with a Harvard grad? He/she will tell you.

@Kevin_Kennelly Жыл бұрын

Which reminds me: How many Harvard grads does it take to screw in a lightbulb? Just one. The Harvard grad holds the bulb and the world revolves around him.

@Kevin_Kennelly Жыл бұрын

Now I ask you! How many Diana Rigg daters does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

@marquonuk Ай бұрын

I love this episode, especially the way it begins with the throbbing, persistent staccato music emphasising the march of the cybernaut and simultaneously the heartbeat we later discover it's tuned to, and the strangely-angled jump cut images that synchronise with the music as if from the cybernaut's point of view of the journey to the victim. It's also my favourite of the three cybernaut stories, for several reasons including the appearance of Peter Cushing, and not least because the cybernaut is made to appear larger and more strong here than the ones in the first story and the oddly clunky one in the third. Here it's like an unstoppable walking tank. Marvellous! :-)

@joseffinat966 21 күн бұрын

Laten wij vanuit gaan dat het Goede het kwade altijd overwint

@roserandle6392 Жыл бұрын

I simply loved the Avengers. Emma Peale had great style and class, and Steed could weil that walking stick.

@marquonuk Ай бұрын

This was originally in colour, so it's interesting to see this extract in black & white. I sometimes feel that certain types of dramatic show are better presented in this way because you're not distracted by the colours, so it concentrates you on the nourish visuals. The bust that Diana handles (steady, matron!) Is harder to see properly in B/W, so there are downsides to showing a colour episode in monochrome (if I the episode had been filmed in B/W, the bust would have been made lighter coloured so it's details showed up better in contrast on screen). This episode, as a rare sequel in the series, might have felt more directly linked to the original B/W episode from S4 than it is by also having been filmed in B/W. The only two constants (apart from Steed and Mrs Peel!) are, from memory, the cybernauts (although the face design has been improved to be scarier: the original cybernaut face was quite bland), and the character of Benson, the late Dr Armstrong's assistant (again played by Frederick Jaeger, I think) who returns to assist a new person (played by Peter Cushing) who's now in control of the cybernauts. In case anyone hasn't seen the episode, I won't say why Peter's character is involved as it's a nice twist when revealed. What I do like with the three cybernaut stories is that there is progression each time. In the first, victims were selected by cybernauts homing on a specific object in their possession (so you could actually get the wrong victim), in the second it's a specific heartbeat, so the cybernaut would never kill the wrong person, and in the third (a New Avengers episode) the cybernaut is directed by remote control, with the operator seeing through the cybernaut's camera eyes (so it's used rather like a drone). In that third episode, there is also the clever additional twist in which the cybernetics are then melded with a human being to create a cyborg , as a nice rounding off of the concept. The cybernaut idea, therefore, constantly develops and does not just repeat its previous plots. :-)

@dreamsofprojectedlight Ай бұрын

Very interesting. I must admit that I haven't that great a memory for such details so thanks for this. I would also say, as an explanation, that my interest in posting this in black and white was simply that this was how I saw the episodes for the first time. Not only was colour TV not widely available at the time of the first broadcasting but I don't think we had a colour TV in our home until about 1978 or so. I think the colour episodes lack the visual depth of the black and white episodes as black and white allows for deep textures and shadows. I agree that the colour episodes shown in black and white don't look anywhere near as good as the black and white episodes.

@TheSpiralnotebook Жыл бұрын

You should make a video called "On Her Majesty 's Secret Service " in which we revisit all the instances of implied intimacy between Steed and M.

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

Yes... Definitely.

@kbc163 3 ай бұрын

This would be a long video. 🎉

@hcu4359 Жыл бұрын

Those are the most scientifically executed cocktails I have ever seen. I've occasionally wished Hammer Frankenstein had to match wits with a femme fatale on his own level in Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed, instead of abusing some generic (if well-acted) damsel in distress. Clearly that femme fatale should have been played by Ms. Rigg.

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

Yes. That would have been interesting. It is great to see him here with someone who does have a tendency to dominate scenes just as he did. In fact, he is doing slightly less than her here. I do enjoy seeing them together. I like her with Vincent Price in Theatre of Blood but Cushing is so close to her stylistically that they seem a match made in heaven.

@hcu4359 Жыл бұрын

@@dreamsofprojectedlight well, the scene seems to be more about her character than his, and he is a mere guest star here. When people talk about him stealing scenes, they're usually talking about a case where he's playing a lead level character who might be expected to pull focus (Like Sherlock Holmes), or he's up against lead actors (Van Johnson in End of the Affair, for instance) who just aren't on his level.

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

@@hcu4359 True. I don't think he was ever stealing focus. Not really. He was simply making what might be leaden in other hands seem vital. There are some actors who, when playing Holmes, feel the need to display the eccentricity of the character by having exaggerated twists and turns, leaps and poses. Cushing actually shows the nature of the character in a much deeper and subtler way by having his attention digging deeper and examining things that normal people would never look at. Rigg does the same. Every prop she picks up is looked at and handled as if it might reveal a secret.

@jayturner3397 Жыл бұрын

Great stuff uk 🇬🇧, remember this like yesterday 👍

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

Yes. Time can disappear. It seems impossible to think of these people as no longer being with us.

@jayturner3397 Жыл бұрын

@@dreamsofprojectedlight true, always think of Diana from this RIP to all

@HootOwl513 Жыл бұрын

Enough folderol about Props, and Motivation, and Animal Chemistry and all that between Cushing and Rigg -- I want to know what they're drinking. Manhattans, or Rob Roys?? 🍸

@hcu4359 Жыл бұрын

Only see two ingredients, so I assume Rob Roys.

@HootOwl513 Жыл бұрын

@@hcu4359 I concurr. No dashes of Bitters seen. Rob Roy being made with Scotch Whisky is more logistically probable in a UK setting.

@EJP286CRSKW Жыл бұрын

Re Macnee's reaction, that's a separate shot, they weren't playing with the props at the time. This is not how movie or TV making works.

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

You're quite right of course. I was trying, and failing perhaps, to use a bit of poetic licence. Having said that, you are not entirely correct about TV making as a whole. At the time this was made and earlier (and especially with live broadcasts) where there would be multi-camera set up and a vision mixer in a separate room editing live under the direction of... the director. One of my lasting memories, as a child, was spending a day during the camera rehearsal for 'Dr Who' at the old television centre. Patrick Troughton, Wendy Padbury and Frazer Hines. This was not a live broadcast but for those sequences shot in a studio they used a multiple camera set up. There was a lot of thought, at the time, amongst actors that this way of filming gave dramas a presence and an urgency. It was definitely less boring for them, if you've ever been on a film set, most of the time most people are waiting for what seems like an eternity. As a lover of the texture that comes from film and great lighting, I prefer film. Were I an actor waiting around for an age between lighting set ups, I might have preferred working with the multiple cameras. Now that film has pretty much reached its end (with only a handful of directors and producers insisting on shooting on film), a number of film and TV directors are returning to shooting scenes with multiple cameras again so that scenes can be performed in one take. They couldn't do this with outside broadcast because those old studio cameras shooting video were massive bulky things. That's why there would be outside sequences shot on film cut together with studio sequences shot on video. I've never seen the early episodes of 'The Avengers' but knowing that many of them were live broadcasts, they probably used this combination of filmed exterior with multi-camera set ups for interiors. By season four, however, we are looking at a series of 26 movies. This is why it still looks so great.

@user-vj2wt7jh7j Жыл бұрын

I was always puzzled by the bronze "Portrait of the Artist as a young Man". This was a James Joyce novel I have never found a bronze with that name was this an "Avengers" joke? They did like odd jokes.

@dreamsofprojectedlight Жыл бұрын

There is always a playfulness in 'The Avengers'. Light as air, full of wit and intelligence, and yet never making a show of it. It's just there in the air they breathe.

@user-vj2wt7jh7j Жыл бұрын

@@dreamsofprojectedlight Diana Rigg was a wonderful actress with wit and great comedic timing. She is so serious about the bronze, she makes it seem like it was a real work of art, but just playing with us.