Leonard Nimoy…on Mission: Impossible
- Thread starter Warped9
- Start date
Quoting this again because something else just hit me about it. This is actually a lot like how Mission: Impossible -- Dead Reckoning explained what the IMF was: an independent organization that intelligence agencies turned to for missions they couldn't do themselves. Although there it was created by the intelligence community for that purpose and answered exclusively to the President. (Though the movie implied that it was basically just Ethan and his team, rather than the big bureaucracy depicted in earlier movies. But I suppose maybe it could've been stripped down to that after all the scandals of the previous movies -- except that wouldn't explain how Delinger had never heard of it back when it was a big bureaucracy.)
Reposting from the Classic/Retro Pop Culture Thread
Starting with the first attempt at bringing 'Mission' back to the small screen.
In 1978 Paramount executives Arthur Fellows and Terry Keegan approached president of Paramount Television Gary Nardino with the idea of a 'Mission' reunion tv movie, which would have reunited the 'Classic' line-up with new, younger characters and served as a backdoor pilot for a possible new series.
CBS was approached, and agreed to air the movie, with a commitment to a new series, if the ratings were good; however, by the time the script was ready, there had been a regime change and CBS passed on the movie.
NBC picked up the option, and the script was retitled "Mission: Impossible 1980".
As previously mentioned, the tv movie would have opened with Phelps being released from prison. Phelps is approached by Control/The Secretary (the book doesn't mention if Robert Johnson, the voice of Control, would have appeared; or another actor would take his place).
Control/The Secretary offers Jim one last mission to clear the IMF name - recover the remains of "Peking Man", stolen from the Smithsonian by Rollin Hand and Cinnamon Carter, sold to a Chinese tycoon and hidden in San Francisco's Chinatown District. Feeling responsible for Rollin and Cinnamon being disavowed years ago, Phelps agrees to take the mission.
Phelps recruits Barney, now a professor, and his protege, an Amerasian woman to the mission, but Willy, now a successful gymnasium entrepreneur and star of his own tv show, "Workin' It Out With Willy" refuses to go. (As an aside, I can't help but think that Willy's tv show sounds like the title of an adult film.)
Once Rollin and Cinnamon are located, it is discovered that they had nothing to do with the theft, and, in fact, it was Control who had Peking Man stolen in an attempt to break down Sino-American relations.
(It appears that the theft of Peking Man is tied to a summit meeting between the President and the Chinese Premier, with the President handing over the remains as a show of good will between the two nations as it is mentioned in the book that this is what happens at the end of the movie. No bones, no meeting.)
Phelps quickly prepares a counterplot in which Control is "hospitalized" in a "car crash" and rendered unconscious for a week. Control panics, thinking that a timer set to destroy the Peking Man has gone off, and rushes to retrieve the fossil, which is what Jim intended. Control is arrested, the remains recovered, and Phelps and the IMF are cleared of any past wrongdoing.
Thanks to the substantial amount of money Phelps has hidden away over the years, Jim takes the IMF private, with the ability to pick and choose whichever mission the IMF feels best benefits the people they're helping.
NBC rejected this script and asked for a more traditional "Mission: Impossible" plot.
End Part One
Starting with the first attempt at bringing 'Mission' back to the small screen.
In 1978 Paramount executives Arthur Fellows and Terry Keegan approached president of Paramount Television Gary Nardino with the idea of a 'Mission' reunion tv movie, which would have reunited the 'Classic' line-up with new, younger characters and served as a backdoor pilot for a possible new series.
CBS was approached, and agreed to air the movie, with a commitment to a new series, if the ratings were good; however, by the time the script was ready, there had been a regime change and CBS passed on the movie.
NBC picked up the option, and the script was retitled "Mission: Impossible 1980".
As previously mentioned, the tv movie would have opened with Phelps being released from prison. Phelps is approached by Control/The Secretary (the book doesn't mention if Robert Johnson, the voice of Control, would have appeared; or another actor would take his place).
Control/The Secretary offers Jim one last mission to clear the IMF name - recover the remains of "Peking Man", stolen from the Smithsonian by Rollin Hand and Cinnamon Carter, sold to a Chinese tycoon and hidden in San Francisco's Chinatown District. Feeling responsible for Rollin and Cinnamon being disavowed years ago, Phelps agrees to take the mission.
Phelps recruits Barney, now a professor, and his protege, an Amerasian woman to the mission, but Willy, now a successful gymnasium entrepreneur and star of his own tv show, "Workin' It Out With Willy" refuses to go. (As an aside, I can't help but think that Willy's tv show sounds like the title of an adult film.)
Once Rollin and Cinnamon are located, it is discovered that they had nothing to do with the theft, and, in fact, it was Control who had Peking Man stolen in an attempt to break down Sino-American relations.
(It appears that the theft of Peking Man is tied to a summit meeting between the President and the Chinese Premier, with the President handing over the remains as a show of good will between the two nations as it is mentioned in the book that this is what happens at the end of the movie. No bones, no meeting.)
Phelps quickly prepares a counterplot in which Control is "hospitalized" in a "car crash" and rendered unconscious for a week. Control panics, thinking that a timer set to destroy the Peking Man has gone off, and rushes to retrieve the fossil, which is what Jim intended. Control is arrested, the remains recovered, and Phelps and the IMF are cleared of any past wrongdoing.
Thanks to the substantial amount of money Phelps has hidden away over the years, Jim takes the IMF private, with the ability to pick and choose whichever mission the IMF feels best benefits the people they're helping.
NBC rejected this script and asked for a more traditional "Mission: Impossible" plot.
End Part One
Part Two - After NBC rejected "M:I '80", Keegan and Fellows approached Harold Livingston to write a new script.
"Mission: Impossible 1981" opens with the IMF having been transformed into what Phelps calls "a ponderous think tank" full of "accountants and attorneys and PhD candidates".
Phelps and Barney have been secretly training a new set of candidates reminiscent of the old team. They are called into action when billionaire D.W. Snow threatens to explode a neutron bomb in an unknown location unless the President accedes to his demands. Jim calls on Willy (again a health magnate), Cinnamon (now a physician) and Rollin (an antique dealer) plus his four young proteges.
En route to Las Vegas, Snow watches an IMF news bulletin of impending international trouble. Snow sees "Vegas" (an IMF movie) blown to bits and is rendered unconscious. Snow awakens "ten months later" in the "ruins" of Las Vegas, to find himself a prisoner of war, bearded and crippled, thanks to a Cinnamon who has implanted a device in his spine which has left him temporarily paralyzed.
The Soviet Union has "invaded" the United States and everything West of the Mississippi and East of the Rockies is under Soviet control. (Shades of 'Red Dawn' and several other Soviet invasion movies of the Cold War era.)
Snow and fellow prisoner Barney escape in an attempt to join a resistance movement outside of Vegas. Along the way they are attacked and captured by Soviet forces led by General Phelps. Barney is "killed" but Snow escapes capture thanks to the resistance. Snow tells the resistance the location of the neutron bomb, so that they might have a weapon with which to defeat the Soviets. The IMF locate the bomb, defuse it, and Snow is arrested.
NBC liked the script, but not the proposed budget; a little over two million dollars. NBC asked for a rewrite to bring the budget down, but once the revised script, now titled "Mission: Impossible 1982" was ready, there had been a regime change at NBC, and the new studio head rejected many of the proposed series commissioned by the previous management, including "Mission".
Paramount then looked to turning "Mission" from a made for tv movie into a full-length feature film.
End Part Two
"Mission: Impossible 1981" opens with the IMF having been transformed into what Phelps calls "a ponderous think tank" full of "accountants and attorneys and PhD candidates".
Phelps and Barney have been secretly training a new set of candidates reminiscent of the old team. They are called into action when billionaire D.W. Snow threatens to explode a neutron bomb in an unknown location unless the President accedes to his demands. Jim calls on Willy (again a health magnate), Cinnamon (now a physician) and Rollin (an antique dealer) plus his four young proteges.
En route to Las Vegas, Snow watches an IMF news bulletin of impending international trouble. Snow sees "Vegas" (an IMF movie) blown to bits and is rendered unconscious. Snow awakens "ten months later" in the "ruins" of Las Vegas, to find himself a prisoner of war, bearded and crippled, thanks to a Cinnamon who has implanted a device in his spine which has left him temporarily paralyzed.
The Soviet Union has "invaded" the United States and everything West of the Mississippi and East of the Rockies is under Soviet control. (Shades of 'Red Dawn' and several other Soviet invasion movies of the Cold War era.)
Snow and fellow prisoner Barney escape in an attempt to join a resistance movement outside of Vegas. Along the way they are attacked and captured by Soviet forces led by General Phelps. Barney is "killed" but Snow escapes capture thanks to the resistance. Snow tells the resistance the location of the neutron bomb, so that they might have a weapon with which to defeat the Soviets. The IMF locate the bomb, defuse it, and Snow is arrested.
NBC liked the script, but not the proposed budget; a little over two million dollars. NBC asked for a rewrite to bring the budget down, but once the revised script, now titled "Mission: Impossible 1982" was ready, there had been a regime change at NBC, and the new studio head rejected many of the proposed series commissioned by the previous management, including "Mission".
Paramount then looked to turning "Mission" from a made for tv movie into a full-length feature film.
End Part Two
Part Three
In 1984, new Paramount producer Ed Feldmen had the idea to update "Mission" as a theatrical feature. Sy Salkowitiz, writer of two season two episodes, was brought in to write and produce the film. After 18 months the script entitled "Good Morning Mr. Phelps (Mission: Impossible - The Movie)", was delivered to Paramount executives, with a planned summer 1986 release date.
The mission, this time, is to rescue a kidnapped nuclear scientist and his family from Middle Eastern terrorists and prevent him from building enough reactors that would melt the polar ice caps, raising the sea level and flooding coastal cities.
Again, Phelps chooses Barney, Rollin, Cinnamon, and Willy plus four proteges for the mission. They include a mimic, an expert on nuclear reactors, a black strongman, and an electronics genius.
The action ranges from Istanbul, where the IMF liberate the scientist and his family; to the jungles of Bangkok, where they destroy the nuclear assembly facility; to the palace of the South American country Mantiqueira, where the IMF steal the nuclear fuel canisters from a vault located at the bottom of a swimming pool.
Leonard Nimoy, fresh off of his directorial debut in "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock" was approached to direct; but, studio indecision about whether or not to use the old cast, bring in young faces to portray the old cast, use a mix of both; along with a projected budget of $15 million (a rewrite, along with a proposal to shoot the film entirely in England, bringing the budget down to $10 million) sent the script into "development hell".
There "Mission" would remain until the Writers Guild Strike of 1988.
The mission, this time, is to rescue a kidnapped nuclear scientist and his family from Middle Eastern terrorists and prevent him from building enough reactors that would melt the polar ice caps, raising the sea level and flooding coastal cities.
Again, Phelps chooses Barney, Rollin, Cinnamon, and Willy plus four proteges for the mission. They include a mimic, an expert on nuclear reactors, a black strongman, and an electronics genius.
The action ranges from Istanbul, where the IMF liberate the scientist and his family; to the jungles of Bangkok, where they destroy the nuclear assembly facility; to the palace of the South American country Mantiqueira, where the IMF steal the nuclear fuel canisters from a vault located at the bottom of a swimming pool.
Leonard Nimoy, fresh off of his directorial debut in "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock" was approached to direct; but, studio indecision about whether or not to use the old cast, bring in young faces to portray the old cast, use a mix of both; along with a projected budget of $15 million (a rewrite, along with a proposal to shoot the film entirely in England, bringing the budget down to $10 million) sent the script into "development hell".
There "Mission" would remain until the Writers Guild Strike of 1988.
Man, they seemed to really like that "trick the bad guy into thinking the time-sensitive event has already happened" device that the original show used at least twice (and that also appeared in M:I --Fallout, I think it was).
Reading these, I think I'm kind of glad that the nature of the '88 revival's origin meant that it basically just continued the standard format instead of trying that "the IMF has changed into something else" approach. Just picking up where they left off and doing more of the same seems more appropriate.
I also kind of regret that that '80s feature film revival didn't happen. The Ethan Hunt series (from III onward) is an excellent action franchise in its own way, but it's radically different from the series it shares a title with, rarely doing more than paying lip service to its tropes. I would've liked to see an M:I film series that was true to the original caper/heist procedural format, more in the vein of the Ocean's movies.
Reading these, I think I'm kind of glad that the nature of the '88 revival's origin meant that it basically just continued the standard format instead of trying that "the IMF has changed into something else" approach. Just picking up where they left off and doing more of the same seems more appropriate.
I also kind of regret that that '80s feature film revival didn't happen. The Ethan Hunt series (from III onward) is an excellent action franchise in its own way, but it's radically different from the series it shares a title with, rarely doing more than paying lip service to its tropes. I would've liked to see an M:I film series that was true to the original caper/heist procedural format, more in the vein of the Ocean's movies.
What I find interesting is that Leonard Nimoy was approached to direct the movie. If one looks at the timeline, Paramount was hoping to have 'M:I' in theaters in the summer of 1986; 'The Voyage Home' premiered in November 1986. If Nimoy had chosen to direct 'M:I', then he would have been unavailable to write/direct/act 'The Voyage Home.' If that's the case, what does Paramount do? Who do they turn to, to work on 'The Voyage Home'? Do they go back to Nicholas Meyers or do they give William Shatner his 'favored nations' clause and have him write/direct the movie? Does Nimoy only appear in a glorified cameo as Spock at the beginning/end of the movie and does Robin Curtis as Saavik take his place. Is it even the same movie that Nimoy proposed?
I was thinking more that maybe Nimoy could've done the M:I movie after TVH. Movie schedules get pushed back all the time for various reasons, so it's conceivable that it could've been delayed until '87 or so. I wonder if that would've affected the '88 TV revival in any way, since that was a response to the strike.
Okay, let's say Paramount decides to bump 'M:I' to summer 1987-1988 - are they going to be willing to fund an action/adventure/caper movie with tv stars in their late-50s/early-60s? That was one of the issues discussed upthread - go with the original 'M:I' cast, younger actors playing the iconic roles or new characters, or a mix of both original and new/younger characters. Today, audiences can accept actors like Tom Cruise (in his sixties) and Harrison Ford (in his eighties) in the roles that they've created; would that have been the case in 1987-88? Something else that we discussed in the 'Classic Retro/Pop' thread, was 'M:I' even airing in re-runs at this time and what did audiences know about the show. They were probably more familiar with the tropes associated with 'M:I' than with the show itself. Also, if the movie were to have come out in the summer of 1988, it more than likely would have lost out to the blockbusters of that year, "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", "Coming to America" and "Die Hard".
Considering that you were the one who brought up that it would've been contemporaneous with the original-cast Star Trek movies, I find that a very strange question. The M:I cast was in the same age range as the TOS cast, and even the oldest, Graves, was 6 years younger than Kelley or Doohan.
Indeed, M:I lends itself more easily than ST to introducing new cast members, so a movie could've easily featured returning original cast members while also phasing in a couple of new young leads (which is what Harve Bennett tried to do with Saavik and David, though it didn't take). In a way, that's similar to what DePalma's M:I did, starting with Ethan Hunt as a junior member as an established team and then phasing out the old team, although what I'm suggesting would've been nowhere near as drastic a transition.
Besides, back then, studios didn't yet have the modern mentality that a movie had to cost fifty gajillion dollars to succeed. There were plenty of mid-budget movies. And an M:I movie done in the vein of the series, rather than the action-movie franchise we have now, wouldn't have needed a lot of expensive VFX and stunts, because the series was more of a caper procedural than an action show. An M:I movie could've been in the vein of The Sting or Sneakers.
The DC comics run between Treks II and III gave a kind of glimpse into what that could have looked like, although in a grander, comic book plotted way. I was never tied to the notion Spock necessarily being the key to Trek's success, so I was fine with the possibility of new blood going forward, until Nimoy decided he wanted back in and then the status quo had to be restored.
Although, to this day, I feel there was room for Saavik. At least enough to give her a better send off than they did.
Which was pretty much what all of the adventure show reunions were doing: bringing back the classic favorites while acting as backdoor pilots for new shows/movies with a younger cast. None of them worked. I don't think any of us wanted new shows with new characters.
Although, I give The Return from the Man from UNCLE props for not bringing in the kids of Solo and Ilya like I Spy Returns did. But I Spy Returns was still better written, at least in the Culp/Cosby scenes, thanks to those guys.
Sneakers was a perfect M:I movie, and it was terrific. It was one practically in every way but name. Much like, to me, Disney's The Black Hole could have been a Lost in Space movie with some character name changes and some tweaks.
Hmm, I dunno. Lost in Space was basically a sci-fi reimagining of The Swiss Family Robinson, while The Black Hole was basically a sci-fi reimagining of Disney's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
More to the point, the Jupiter 2 was humanity's first attempt at an interstellar colony ship, so it would be inconsistent to posit that a huge ship like the Cygnus could've existed 20 years before it. I don't see any way to reconcile TBH's 2130 setting with LiS's 1990s setting.
I always cite Sneakers as my favourite MI movie
To be honest, the Space Family Robinson aspect was fairly eroded by the time they got to the end of the first year and by the third, they were just a family having various adventures in space. And they ran into space light houses and colonies that were well beyond the capabilities of 1997ish. Irwin Allen didn't care about that. Also, they did establish in the first couple of episode that the hyperdrive they experience at the climax of the first episode could have launched them through space and time into any part of the galaxy. Smith also thought the giant derelict ship was from Earth, even if the Robinson's didn't.
You can't really hold Lost in Space to strict rules when Irwin never did.
I was more thinking of the characters, they had Dan Holland and Charlie Pizer, who resembled John and Don in personality and even somewhat in appearance. Kate Macrae could easily be retooled as Maureen, and Harry Booth had some pretty clear traits shared by Dr. Smith. Remove Durant and replace him with the kids and you have your characters. And they had a robot.
Finding a mysterious Earth ship in space, unsure of how it got there, poised at the edge of a black hole and the climax sending the ship to a far side of the galaxy is right in Lost in Space's wheelhouse. Could be a third season episode and it wouldn't take much to reconfigure the script into a Lost in Space movie.
Except Maureen didn't have a telepathic link with the Robot.
I'm not gonna tell Anthony Perkins he's out of a job. I've seen Psycho.
But seriously, the movie's tone is a bit dark for LiS, what with the lobotomized crew and the other scary stuff. The Black Hole was one of Disney's attempts to break out of its kids'-movie reputation and do something more edgy and adult. (They eventually created the Touchstone imprint for such films when they proved unable to escape the stigma of the Disney name.) There's also the fact that Harry is killed and the Palomino is destroyed. So you'd have to change a lot to make it fit LiS, in which case it isn't really the same story.
Yes. And I've always wondered why there was a flurry of new scores written at the end of Lost in Space's third season ("Space Beauty," "The Great Vegetable Rebellion," "Junkyard in Space").
Did one of the music unions finally say "Enough Already" to re-using Williams' scores so much? (It was unusual for a 1960s TV series to get multiple original scores at the end of a season.)
I doubt that would've made a difference if the show didn't have the budget to hire composers and musicians. Maybe they freed up some money in the budget, or got more allocated.
Don't remove Durant. Have Will take his role with identical results and waste him at the halfway point. Then eliminate Smith and Harry Booth the same explosive way in turn. This is not your grampa's LOST IN SPACE, this is LOST IN SPACE with the guts to sideline two talented actors while eliminating their ultra-annoying characters' show-hogging tendencies once and for all. Make it canon with extra dramatic glue. Also, ask Angela Cartwright if she'd like to play the newly-voiced Maximilian for empowering robotic agency while Marta Kristen voices Old Bobbi.
You won't have to, if my 1992 Variety back issue obits are to be believed.
That's easily written out, I'm not saying it is a scene for scene LIS episode, but there's enough about that that would make it work. The ESP thing was a goofy 70's touch that was useful but not vital to the story.
Well that depends on when in the series you mean. The first 5 episodes were very dark for 60's family TV. Smith programmed the robot to murder everyone but Don - even the kids. The show was frequently scary in the first season. Yes, CBS decided that's not what they wanted for this series, but Irwin was fine with dark and chilling programming. Death was no stranger to the Irwin Allen Quartet of SF (the Voyage body count was incredibly high). But, again, the story thrust of The Black Hole was a lone spaceship finding a large, long thought destroyed Earth ship poised at the edge of a black hole. The crew, with their bravado spewing coward friend and their robot, discover the captain is a barking mad genius who wants to enter black hole to see what's on the other side. He has an even robotoid assistant. Action and betrayal ensue and the crew gets off the ship before it blows but finds themselves drawn into the black hole.
That's the actual story, not the easily arranged details and character deaths; Durant is killed because Reinhart is insane which would have been shown another way - sci-fi torture would be fine). Booth is killed when he tries to get away in a ship he can't pilot, but a few strokes of the keyboard makes it Smith who tries the same thing but can't figure out how to lift off until Don runs in, delaying the departure until everyone comes aboard.
There are enough qualities about the basic story and the characters to remind me of the series enough to say "this would work as a LIS movie with some rewriting."
Having said that, your point of darkness is well taken, which was one criticism of the LIS movie: "what happened to the fun?"
I mean, I loved it, but I tend to like movies most people hate (ask me about Alien 3 sometime).
Irwin Allen did that with Voyage and Land of the Giants also. He held back a lot of new music until the end of the season for those shows. Voyage had new music for 6 of the last 7 episodes of the series. Unlike the first season of LIS and Voyage which blow that wad up front because they needed music to start with. It's just odd that when LIS and Voyage had a look of being on austerity, Irwin had money enough to spring for new scores.
I reject the premise that depicting the threat of death or violence was abnormal for family TV. Guy Williams's Zorro was a family show, from Disney no less, but it was hardly devoid of threatened or depicted violence. Batman '66 was a family show, a sitcom no less, but the villains tried to murder Batman & Robin on a weekly basis, and characters did occasionally die.
Also, of course, you're glossing over the fact that the Robot didn't actually harm anyone, just damaged the ship, because Smith found he couldn't go through with hurting the children. It doesn't count if the threatened violence is averted. What made The Black Hole a PG-rated movie (back when PG meant more like what PG-13 means today) was that there was actual onscreen violence, death, and intense, frightening scenes, as well as darker overall themes and tone.
I don't see any similarity at all. And rewriting the story to that extent would make it a different story anyway, just as TBH is a different story from its inspiration 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
