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Spy fiction is a genre of literature involving espionage as an important context or plot device. It emerged in the early twentieth century, inspired by rivalries and intrigues between the major powers , and the establishment of modern intelligence agencies. It was given new impetus by the development of fascism and communism in the lead-up to World War II , continued to develop during the Cold War , and received a fresh impetus from the emergence of rogue states , international criminal organizations, global terrorist networks, maritime piracy and technological sabotage and espionage as potent threats to Western societies. As a genre, spy fiction is thematically related to the novel of adventure ( The Prisoner of Zenda , 1894, The Scarlet Pimpernel , 1905), the thriller (such as the works of Edgar Wallace ) and the politico-military thriller ( The Schirmer Inheritance , 1953, The Quiet American , 1955).

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148-550: Get Smart is an American comedy television series parodying the secret agent genre that had become widely popular in the first half of the 1960s with the release of the James Bond films. It was created by Mel Brooks and Buck Henry , and had its television premiere on NBC on September 18, 1965. It starred Don Adams (who was also a director on the series) as agent Maxwell Smart (Agent 86), Barbara Feldon as Agent 99, and Edward Platt as The Chief. Henry said that they created

296-474: A "total war" campaign to mobilise society for the war. As part of the "total war" campaign, the state warned people to be vigilant at all times for spies; alongside this campaign went a mania for spy stories, which likewise warned people to be vigilant against spies. Novels and films with a counterespionage theme became ubiquitous in Manchukuo from 1937 onward. Despite the intensely patriarchal values of Manchukuo,

444-564: A MI6 agent's attempts to uncover a mole in apartheid -era South Africa . Greene had worked as a MI6 agent in Freetown, an important British naval base during World War Two, searching for German spies who would radio information about the movements of ships to the Kriegsmarine , experiences which inspired The Heart of the Matter . Greene's case officer during World War Two was Harold "Kim" Philby, who

592-466: A Mossad spy in Greece. The book was published as a novel, but Roth insisted that the book was not a novel as he argued that the book was presented only as a novel in order to give it deniability. At the end of the book, the character of Philip Roth is ordered to publish the account as a novel, and it ends with Roth the character saying: "And I became quite convinced that it was my interest to do that...I'm just

740-520: A North Hollywood restaurant, in which fans of the show joined the cast and some of the creative talent of the series. Adams was the voice of the title character in Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales (1963–66), with his bombastic catchphrase "Tennessee Tuxedo will not fail!" Later, he voiced himself in animated form for a guest shot in an episode of Hanna-Barbera 's The New Scooby-Doo Movies , titled "The Exterminator". His most notable voiceover work

888-726: A Pale Horse (1984). Manning Coles published Drink to Yesterday (1940), a grim story occurring during the Great War, which introduces the hero Thomas Elphinstone Hambledon . However, later novels featuring Hambledon were lighter-toned, despite being set either in Nazi Germany or Britain during the Second World War (1939–45). After the War, the Hambledon adventures fell to formula, losing critical and popular interest. The events leading up to

1036-598: A Spy (1938), The Mask of Dimitrios (US: A Coffin for Dimitrios , 1939), and Journey into Fear (1940) feature amateurs entangled in espionage. The politics and ideology are secondary to the personal story that involved the hero or heroine. Ambler's Popular Front –period œuvre has a left-wing perspective about the personal consequences of "big picture" politics and ideology, which was notable, given spy fiction's usual right-wing tilt in defence of establishment attitudes. Ambler's early novels Uncommon Danger (1937) and Cause for Alarm (1938), in which NKVD spies help

1184-671: A book later in 1969. In Seventeen Moments of Spring , the story is set in the Great Patriotic War as Isayev goes undercover, using the alias of a Baltic German nobleman Max Otto von Stierlitz to infiltrate the German high command. The plot of Seventeen Moments of Spring takes place in Berlin between January–May 1945 during the last days of the Third Reich as the Red Army advances onto Berlin and

1332-491: A brain tumor, a year after Don Adams's death. His brother Richard Paul Yarmy, also known as Dick Yarmy (February 14, 1932 – May 5, 1992), was an actor. His sister Gloria Yarmy Burton was a writer. Robert Karvelas , who played the role of Agent Larabee on Get Smart , was Adams' cousin on his mother's side of the family. An avid gambler, according to his longtime friend Bill Dana, Adams "could be very devoted to his family if you reminded him about it, [but] Don's whole life

1480-541: A comic in a strip club, doing impersonations of celebrities, but he refused to do "blue" material and was fired. In 1947 he married Adelaide Constance Efantis (1924–2016), nicknamed "Dell", a singer who performed as Adelaide Adams. He decided to take her name because performers were called up for auditions in alphabetical order. Adams also worked as a commercial artist and restaurant cashier to help support his wife and three daughters. Adams' work on television began in 1954 when he won on Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts with

1628-434: A conspicuous flash) of the person eating the soup with each spoonful; a mini magnet on a belt, which turns out to be stronger than KAOS's maxi magnet; and a powerful miniature laser weapon in the button of a sports jacket (the "laser blazer"). Another of the show's recurring gags is the " Cone of Silence ". Smart would often insist on strictly following CONTROL's security protocols; when discussing highly confidential things in

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1776-565: A field agent; he reprised the role in the sequel The Cardinal of the Kremlin (1987). Other important American authors who became active in spy fiction during this period include Robert Littell , The Defection of A. J. Lewinter (1973); James Grady , Six Days of the Condor (1974); William F. Buckley Jr. , Saving the Queen (1976); Nelson DeMille , The Talbot Odyssey (1984); W. E. B. Griffin ,

1924-429: A garter, a handkerchief, and a pair of eyeglasses. Other unusual locations include a garden hose, a car cigarette lighter (with the lighter being hidden in the car phone), a bottle of perfume (Max complains of smelling like a woman), the steering wheel of his car, a painting of Agent 99, the headboard of his bed, a cheese sandwich, lab test tubes (Max grabs the wrong one and splashes himself), a Bunsen burner (Max puts out

2072-465: A good Mossadnik". Don Adams Donald James Yarmy (April 13, 1923 – September 25, 2005), known professionally as Don Adams , was an American actor and stand-up comedian. In his five decades on television, he was best known as bumbling Maxwell Smart (Secret Agent 86) in the television situation comedy Get Smart (1965–1970, 1995), which he also sometimes directed and wrote. Adams won three consecutive Emmy Awards for his performance in

2220-637: A long-haired, hashish -smoking fop in the novels The Dolly Dolly Spy (1967), The Great Spy Race (1968), The Bang Bang Birds (1968) and Think, Inc. (1971); James Mitchell 's 'David Callan' series, written in his own name, beginning with Red File for Callan (1969); William Garner 's John Morpurgo in Think Big, Think Dirty (1983), Rats' Alley (1984), and Zones of Silence (1986); and Joseph Hone 's 'Peter Marlow' series, beginning with The Private Sector (1971), set during Israel's Six-Day War (1967) against Egypt, Jordan and Syria. In all of these series

2368-444: A mixed Russian-Han heritage; the implication being that people of "pure" descent from one of the "five races" of Manchukuo would not betray it. In "A Mixed Race Woman", the villain initially appears to Mali, the eponymous character who has a Russian father and a Han mother, but she ultimately is revealed to be blackmailed by the story's true villain, the foreign spy Baoerdun, and she proves to be loyal to Manchukuo after all as she forces

2516-567: A moral human being, who remains sociable and kind to all people, including the citizens of the state that his country is at war with. Unlike Bond, Isayev is devoted to his wife who he deeply loves and despite spending at least ten years as a spy in Germany and having countless chances to sleep with attractive German women remains faithful towards her. Through Isayev is a spy for the NKVD as the Soviet secret police

2664-741: A more popular level, Leslie Charteris ' popular and long-running Saint series began, featuring Simon Templar, with Meet the Tiger (1928). Water on the Brain (1933) by former intelligence officer Compton Mackenzie was the first successful spy novel satire . Prolific author Dennis Wheatley also wrote his first spy novel, The Eunuch of Stamboul (1935) during this period. In the sham state of Manchukuo , spies often featured in stories published in its government-sponsored magazines as villains threatening Manchukuo. Manchukuo had been presented since its founding in 1931 as an idealistic Pan-Asian experiment, where

2812-430: A necktie, comb, watch, and a clock. A recurring gag is Max's shoe phone (an idea from Brooks). To use or answer it, he has to take off his shoe. Several variations on the shoe phone were used. In "I Shot 86 Today" (season four), his shoe phone is disguised as a golf shoe, complete with cleats, developed by the attractive armorer Dr. Simon. Smart's shoes sometimes contain other devices housed in the heels: an explosive pellet,

2960-713: A newspaper correspondent where he met Lansdale who appears in The Quiet American as Alden Pyle while the character of Thomas Fowler, a cynical, but goodhearted British journalist in Saigon was partly based on himself. MI6 was outraged by Our Man In Havana with its story of James Wormold, a British vacuum cleaner salesman in Cuba, recruited to work for MI6 who bamboozles his employers by selling them diagrams of vacuum cleaners, which he persuades MI6 are really diagrams of Soviet missiles. MI6 pressed for Greene to be prosecuted for violating

3108-446: A novel and the TV mini-series that has offended Westerners who are more accustomed to seeing spy stories via the prism of the fast-paced Bond stories is the way that Isayev spends much time interacting with ordinary Germans despite the fact these interactions do nothing to advance the plot and are merely superfluous to the story. However, the point of these scenes are to show that Isayev is still

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3256-403: A perception for the colour of human beings: a swift, feminine sensitivity to their characters and motives. He knew mankind as a huntsman knows his cover, as a fox the woods. For a spy must hunt while he is hunted, and the crowd is his estate. He could collect their gestures, record the interplay of glance and movement, as a huntsman can record the twisted bracken and broken twig, or as a fox detects

3404-493: A reference to the slang term , meaning to forcibly eject someone, such as a patron from a bar or casino. In 1999, TV Guide ranked Maxwell Smart number 19 on its 50 Greatest TV Characters of All Time list. The character appears in every episode (though only briefly in "Ice Station Siegfried", as Don Adams was performing in Las Vegas for two weeks to settle gambling debts). Agent 99 ( Barbara Feldon ) works alongside 86 and

3552-682: A retail automobile parts establishment later sold to AutoZone . He also appeared in the film Jimmy the Kid (1982) and played a cameo role as a harbormaster in Back to the Beach (1987). Adams attempted a situation-comedy comeback in Canada with Check it Out! in 1985. Set in a supermarket, the show ran for three years but was not successful in the United States. The show also starred Gordon Clapp , an unknown actor at

3700-419: A secret elevator: a soda machine which "disappears". (A cleaning lady sits down in the open space when all of a sudden the machine pops up and knocks the woman into the ceiling.) A late episode of the 1995 series shows that just as Siegfried is leaving a room, Maxwell Smart accidentally activates an atomic bomb just before the end of the show. (The teaser for the episode shows an atomic bomb going off.) This ending

3848-413: A smoke bomb, compressed air capsules that propelled the wearer off the ground, and a suicide pill (which Max believes is for the enemy). Agent 99 had her concealed telephones, as well. She had one in her makeup compact, and also one in her fingernail. To use this last device, she would pretend to bite her nail nervously, while actually talking on her "nail phone". On February 17, 2002, the prop shoe phone

3996-510: A spy novel review column. Nevertheless, counting on the aficionado, publishers continued to issue spy novels by writers popular during the Cold War era, among them Harlot's Ghost (1991) by Norman Mailer . In the US, the new novels Moscow Club (1991) by Joseph Finder , Coyote Bird (1993) by Jim DeFelice, Masquerade (1996) by Gayle Lynds , and The Unlikely Spy (1996) by Daniel Silva maintained

4144-596: A stand-up comedy act written by boyhood friend Bill Dana . In the late 1950s, he made eleven appearances on The Steve Allen Show , where Dana was part of the writing team. During the 1961–63 television seasons, he was a regular on NBC's The Perry Como Show as part of The Kraft Music Hall Players. He had a role on the NBC sitcom The Bill Dana Show (1963–65) as a bumbling hotel detective named Byron Glick. Creators Mel Brooks and Buck Henry , prompted by producers Daniel Melnick and David Susskind , wrote Get Smart as

4292-536: A tan interior and four seats (as required by the plot) in the episodes "A Tale of Two Tails" and "The Laser Blazer". In the short-lived 1995 TV series , Smart is trying to sell the Karmann Ghia through the classified ads. In Get Smart, Again! , Smart is seen driving a red 1986 Alfa Romeo Spider Veloce . The Sunbeam Tiger, the Karmann Ghia, and the Opel GT all make brief appearances in the 2008 film. The Sunbeam Tiger

4440-513: A thinly disguised version of the CIA while posing as a journalist. Writing under the pen name Trevanian , Roger Whitaker published a series of brutal spy novels starting with The Eiger Sanction (1972) featuring an amoral art collector/CIA assassin who ostensibly kills for the United States, but in fact kills for money. Whitaker followed up The Eiger Sanction with The Loo Sanction (1973) and Shibumi (1979). Starting in 1976 with his novel Saving

4588-434: A tiny scale, at close range" and complained that he has seen too many "people cheated and misled, whole lives thrown away, people shot and in prison, whole groups and classes of men written off for nothing". Le Carré's middle-class hero George Smiley is a middle-aged spy burdened with an unfaithful, upper-class wife who publicly cuckolds him for sport. The American scholars Norman Polmar and Thomas Allen described Smiley as

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4736-626: A total of 138 episodes. The Museum of Broadcast Communications found the show notable for "broadening the parameters for the presentation of comedy on television". The series centers on bumbling secret agent Maxwell Smart (Adams)- Agent 86, and his unnamed female partner, Agent 99 (Feldon). They work for CONTROL, a secret U.S. government counterintelligence agency based in Washington, DC , fighting against KAOS, "the international organization of evil". While Smart always succeeds in thwarting KAOS, his incompetent nature and insistence on doing things "by

4884-607: A very low status. One consequence of the French influence on Russian culture was that the subject of espionage was usually ignored by Russian writers during the Imperial period. Traditionally, the subject of espionage was treated in the Soviet Union as a story of villainous foreign spies threatening the USSR. The organisation established to hunt down German spies in 1943, SMERSH, was an acronym for

5032-731: Is Siegfried's equally ruthless but often inept chief henchman, prone to silly behaviors which annoy his boss as unbecoming of KAOS. Hymie the Robot ( Dick Gautier ) is a humanoid robot built by KAOS, but in his first mission, Smart manages to turn him to the side of CONTROL. Hymie had a tendency to take instructions too literally. Agent 13 ( David Ketchum ) is an agent who is usually stationed inside unlikely, sometimes impossibly small or unlucky places, such as cigarette machines , washing machines, lockers, trash cans, or fire hydrants. He tends to resent his assignments. Agent 44 ( Victor French ) Six episodes (1965–66). French's first role

5180-437: Is a beautiful, sexy, and brilliant CONTROL scientist who develops formulas while undercover as a dancer and strip-tease artist. She remains oblivious to Smart's clearly discomfited attraction to her. The character appeared in three episodes in season 3, replaced the next season by Dr. Simon who has the same cover (played by different actresses in two episodes). In Get Smart , telephones are concealed in over 50 objects, including

5328-532: Is a metaphysical thriller ostensibly based on the infiltration of an anarchist organisation by detectives, but the story is actually a vehicle for exploring society's power structures and the nature of suffering. The fictional detective Sherlock Holmes , created by Arthur Conan Doyle , served as a SpyHunter for the British government in the stories " The Adventure of the Second Stain " (1904), and " The Adventure of

5476-462: Is another one of the top agents at CONTROL. Her actual name is never revealed. In the episode "A Man Called Smart Part 3" (S2 E30), Max calls her Ernestine and she says, "Too bad that's not my name." In another episode, "99 Loses CONTROL" (S3 E19), she uses the name Susan Hilton, but later in the same episode tells Max that it is not her real name. When 99 marries Max in Season 4, Admiral Hargrade snores when

5624-495: Is going on in the "secret world" of intelligence-gathering affected both non-fiction and fiction books about espionage. The Cold War and the struggle between Soviet intelligence-known as the KGB from 1954 onward-vs. the CIA and MI6 made the subject of espionage a popular one for novelists to write about. Most of the spy novels of the Cold War were really action thrillers with little resemblance to

5772-501: Is his highest aim, he learns to love the crowds who pass him in the street without a glance; he clings to them for his anonymity and his safety. His fear makes him servile—he could embrace the shoppers who jostle him in their impatience and force him from the pavement. He could adore the officials, the police, the bus conductors, for the terse indifference of their attitudes. But this fear, this servility, this dependence had developed in Smiley

5920-565: Is never actually named in most of them. The series was broadcast on NBC -TV from September 18, 1965, to September 13, 1969, after which it moved to the CBS network for its final season, running from September 26, 1969, to September 11, 1970, with 138 total episodes produced. During its five-season run, Get Smart broke the Nielsen Top 30 twice. It ranked at number 12 during its first season, and at number 22 during its second season, before falling out of

6068-812: Is seen in the CONTROL Museum, along with the original shoe phone, which Smart also briefly uses. The Opel GT is driven by Bernie Kopell and is rear-ended by a truck. Smart steals the Karmann Ghia to continue his escape. Get Smart used several familiar character actors and celebrities, and some future stars, in guest roles , including: Both Bill Dana and Jonathan Harris , with whom Adams appeared on The Bill Dana Show , also appeared, as did Adams' father, William Yarmy, brother, Dick Yarmy, and daughter, Caroline Adams. The series featured several cameo appearances by famous actors and comedians, sometimes uncredited and often comedian friends of Adams. Johnny Carson appeared, credited as "special guest conductor", in "Aboard

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6216-524: Is similar to a device used by the Get Smart -inspired series Sledge Hammer! at the end of its first season. Hopes for the series were not high, as Andy Dick had already moved on to NewsRadio , which premiered weeks later in 1995. With the revival series on Fox, Get Smart became the first television franchise to air new episodes (or made-for-TV films) on each of the aforementioned current four major American television networks, although several TV shows in

6364-408: Is the head of CONTROL. His first name is revealed to be Thaddeus but his surname is never revealed. On some occasions he uses the "code name" "Harold Clark" for outsiders, but this is understood among CONTROL agents not to be his real name. He is supportive of Agents 86 and 99 and considers them to be his two closest friends, but he is often frustrated with Smart. When he was a field agent, his code name

6512-439: Is usually considered the first American modern (glamour and dirt) spy thriller weighing action and reflection. Richard Helms , the director-general of the CIA from 1966 to 1973 loathed le Carré's morally grey spy novels, which he felt damaged the image of the CIA, and encouraged Hunt to write spy novels as a rebuttal. Helms had hopes that Hunt might write an "American James Bond" novel, which would be adopted by Hollywood and do for

6660-550: The Men at War series (1984–); Stephen Coonts , Flight of the Intruder (1986); Canadian-American author David Morrell , The League of Night and Fog (1987); David Hagberg , Without Honor (1989); Noel Hynd, False Flags (1990); and Richard Ferguson, Oiorpata (1990). The culture of Imperial Russia was deeply influenced by the culture of France, and traditionally spy novels in France had

6808-505: The "secrets" that he was selling them was merely information culled from the newspapers. The bumbling vacuum cleaner salesman Wormold in Our Man in Havana seems to been inspired by Herbert Greene. In The Human Factor , Greene portrayed MI6 again in a highly unsympathetic light, depicting the British government as supporting the apartheid regime of South Africa because it was pro-Western while

6956-540: The 1940s and 1950s aired on NBC, CBS, ABC and DuMont . The different versions of Get Smart did not all feature the original lead cast. Get Smart was parodied on a sketch in the Mexican comedy show De Nuez en Cuando called "Super Agente 3.1486" , making fun of the Spanish title of the series ( Super Agente 86 ) and the way the series is dubbed. Spy fiction Commentator William Bendler noted that "Chapter 2 of

7104-451: The 1950s, inspired an even more popular series of films starting in 1962. The success of the Bond novels and films has greatly influenced popular images of the work of spies even though the character of Bond is more of an assassin than a spy. Despite the commercial success of Fleming's extravagant novels, John le Carré , himself a former spy, created anti-heroic protagonists who struggled with

7252-805: The Affair, which involved elements of international espionage, treason , and antisemitism , dominated French politics. The details were reported by the world press: an Imperial German penetration agent betraying to Germany the secrets of the General Staff of the French Army ; the French counter-intelligence riposte of sending a charwoman to rifle the trash in the German Embassy in Paris, were news that inspired successful spy fiction. At least two Sherlock Holmes stories have clear espionage themes. In The Adventure of

7400-906: The Anglo–American theft of a superior Soviet jet aeroplane. Other important British writers who first became active in spy fiction during this period include Ian Mackintosh , A Slaying in September (1967); Kenneth Benton , Twenty-fourth Level (1969); Desmond Bagley , Running Blind (1970); Anthony Price , The Labyrinth Makers (1971); Gerald Seymour , Harry's Game (1975); Brian Freemantle , Charlie M (1977); Bryan Forbes , Familiar Strangers (1979); Reginald Hill , The Spy's Wife (1980); and Raymond Harold Sawkins , writing as Colin Forbes, Double Jeopardy (1982). Philip Gooden provides an analysis of British spy fiction in four categories: professionals, amateurs, dandies and literary types. During

7548-570: The Bruce-Partington Plans " (1912). In " His Last Bow " (1917), he served Crown and country as a double agent , transmitting false intelligence to Imperial Germany on the eve of the Great War. The Scarlet Pimpernel (1905) by Baroness Orczy chronicled an English aristocrat 's derring-do in rescuing French aristocrats from the Reign of Terror of the French Revolution (1789–99). But

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7696-628: The Cheka. The frequent name changes for the secret police made no impression with the Russian people who still call any secret policeman a Chekisty . Semichastny felt that the legacy of the Yezhovshchina ("Yezhovz times") of 1936-1939 had given the KGB a fearsome reputation that he wanted to erase as wanted ordinary people to have a more favorable and positive image of the Chekisty as the protectors and defenders of

7844-508: The Chief of Control as their bumbling son, Zach ( Andy Dick ), becomes Control's star agent (Zach's twin sister is never seen nor mentioned – though the new leader of KAOS, a hidden female figure, would have been revealed as the other twin if the show had continued). And 99 is now a congresswoman. The beginning teaser shows Maxwell Smart and Zach driving to Control headquarters in a car wash separately; Smart, Zach and their secretary cram themselves into

7992-611: The FBI was as "coolly efficient super-cop" who always successful in performing his duties. The FBI director, J.E. Hoover , had long cultivated the American press and Hollywood to promote a favorable image of the FBI. In 1955, Edward S. Aarons began publishing the Sam Durell CIA "Assignment" series, which began with Assignment to Disaster (1955). Donald Hamilton published Death of a Citizen (1960) and The Wrecking Crew (1960), beginning

8140-509: The Hebrew Bible's Book of Joshua might count as the first Spy Story in world literature. (...) Three thousand years before James Bond seduced Pussy Galore and turned her into his ally against Goldfinger , the spies sent by General Joshua into the city of Jericho did much the same with Rahab the Harlot. " Spy fiction as a genre started to emerge during the 19th Century. Early examples of

8288-483: The KAOS informer whom he is protecting, that if anyone breaks in, to pick up the house phone, dial 1-1-7, and press the trigger on the handset, which converts it to a gun. The phone-gun is only used that once, but Max once carried a gun-phone, a revolver with a rotary dial built into the cylinder. In the episode "Satan Place", Max simultaneously holds conversations on seven different phones: the shoe, his tie, his belt, his wallet,

8436-618: The Naval Treaty , Holmes recovers the text of a secret Naval Treaty between Britain and Italy, stolen by a daring spy. In His Last Bow , Holmes himself acts as a double agent , providing Germany with a lot of false information on the eve of WWI . The major themes of a spy in the lead-up to the First World War were the continuing rivalry between the European colonial powers for dominance in Asia,

8584-511: The Nazis grew more desperate. In 1973, Semnadtsat' mgnoveniy vesny was turned into a television mini-series, which was extremely popular in the Soviet Union and turned the Isayev character into a cultural phenomena. The Isayev character plays a role in Russian culture, even today, that is analogous to the role James Bond plays in modern British culture. As aspect of Seventeen Moments of Spring , both as

8732-535: The Official Secrets Act, claiming that he revealed too much about MI6's methods in Our Man in Havana , but it decided against charging Greene out of the fear that prosecuting him would suggest the unflattening picture of MI6 in Our Man in Havana was based on reality. Greene's older brother, Herbert, a professional con-man had briefly worked as a spy for the Japanese in the 1930s before his employers realised that

8880-531: The Orient Express". Carson returned for an uncredited cameo as a royal footman in the third-season episode "The King Lives?" Other performers to make cameo appearances included Steve Allen , Milton Berle , Ernest Borgnine , Wally Cox , Robert Culp (as a waiter in an episode sending up Culp's I Spy ), Phyllis Diller , Buddy Hackett , Bob Hope , and Martin Landau . Actress Rose Michtom (the real-life aunt of

9028-596: The Palestinians, against the backdrop of continuing Cold War tensions, and the increasing use of terrorism as a political tool. The end of the Cold War in 1991 mooted the USSR , Russia and other Iron Curtain countries as credible enemies of democracy, and the US Congress even considered disestablishing the CIA . Espionage novelists found themselves at a temporary loss for obvious nemeses . The New York Times ceased publishing

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9176-489: The Queen , the conservative American journalist and former CIA agent William F. Buckley published the first of his Blackford Oakes novels featuring a CIA agent whose politics were the same as the author's. Blackford Oakes was portrayed as a "sort of an American James Bond" who ruthlessly dispatches villainous KGB agents with much aplomb. The first American techno-thriller was The Hunt for Red October (1984) by Tom Clancy . It introduced CIA deskman (analyst) Jack Ryan as

9324-467: The Red Menace, which was perceived as another "clash of civilizations". Spy fiction was dominated by British authors during this period, initially former intelligence officers and agents writing from inside the trade. Examples include Ashenden: Or the British Agent (1928) by W. Somerset Maugham , which accurately portrays spying in the First World War, and The Mystery of Tunnel 51 (1928) by Alexander Wilson whose novels convey an uncanny portrait of

9472-544: The Second World War, and the War itself, continue to be fertile ground for authors of spy fiction. Notable examples include Ken Follett , Eye of the Needle (1978); Alan Furst , Night Soldiers (1988); and David Downing , the Station series, beginning with Zoo Station (2007). The metamorphosis of the Second World War (1939–45) into the Soviet–American Cold War (1945–91) gave new impetus to spy novelists. Atomsk by Paul Linebarger (later known as Cordwainer Smith ), written in 1948 and published in 1949, appears to be

9620-429: The Soviet Union instead of torturers and killers. As such, Semichastny encouraged the publication of a series of spy novels that featured heroic Chekisty defending the Soviet Union. It was also during Semichastny's time as KGB chairman that the cult of the "hero spies" began in the Soviet Union as publications lionised the achievements of Soviet spies such as Colonel Rudolf Abel, Harold "Kim" Philby, Richard Sorge and of

9768-419: The Soviet writer Yulian Semyonov published a novel set in the Russian Civil War featuring a Cheka agent Maxim Maximovich Isaуev as its hero. Inspired by its success, the KGB encouraged Semyonov to write a sequel, Semnadtsat' mgnoveniy vesny ("Seventeen Moments of Spring"), which proved to one of the most popular Soviet spy novels when it was serialized in Pravda in January–February 1969 and then published as

9916-399: The Tiger was based, was used by customizer Gene Winfield because the Alpine's four-cylinder engine afforded more room under the hood than the V8 in the Tiger. AMT , Winfield's employer, made a model kit of the Tiger, complete with hidden weapons. It is the only kit of the Tiger, and has been reissued multiple times as a stock Tiger. Adams received the Sunbeam and drove it for 10 years after

10064-414: The United States Marine Corps. Yarmy reported to the First Training Battalion in New River, North Carolina, and then was assigned to I Company of the Third Battalion, Eighth Marines in San Diego. In May 1942, Yarmy's unit was transported to Samoa for further training, and then participated in the Battle of Guadalcanal in August 1942 in the Pacific Theater of Operations . Contrary to urban legend, he

10212-404: The United States, where the achievements of Anglo-American intelligence during the Second World War were to a certain extent publicized soon after the war such as the fact that the Americans had broken the Japanese naval codes (which came out in 1946) and the British deception operation of 1943, Operation Mincemeat (which was revealed in 1953), there was nothing equivalent in the Soviet Union until

10360-427: The Western powers were betraying their values by supporting the white supremacist South African government. Much controversy ensued when shortly after the publication of The Human Factor it emerged that such a plan had in fact been carried out, which led to much speculation about whether this was a coincidence or whether Greene had more access to secret information than he let on. There was also much speculation that

10508-407: The actual work of spies. The writer Malcolm Muggeridge who had worked as a spy in World War Two commented that thriller writers in the Cold War took to writing about espionage "as easily as the mentally unstable become psychiatrists or the impotent pornographers". The city that was considered to be the "capital of the Cold War" was Berlin, owing to its post-war status as the city was divided between

10656-527: The amateur protagonist survive, are especially remarkable among English-language spy fiction. Above Suspicion (1939) by Helen MacInnes , about an anti-Nazi husband and wife spy team, features literate writing and fast-paced, intricate, and suspenseful stories occurring against contemporary historical backgrounds. MacInnes wrote many other spy novels in the course of a long career, including Assignment in Brittany (1942), Decision at Delphi (1961), and Ride

10804-425: The beach scene from From Here to Eternity were used, with Adams directing and a celebrity guest playing the other lead in the scene. Hokey effects, bad timing, forgotten lines, prop failures and the celebrity's "ad libs" were maximized for comic effect as the audience watched "bloopers" and "outtakes" as they happened. At the end of the program, the final, serious, fully edited version of the "screen test" of each of

10952-453: The book" invariably cause complications. The enemies, world-takeover plots, and gadgets seen in Get Smart were a parody of the James Bond film franchise. "Do what they did except just stretch it half an inch", Mel Brooks said of the methods of this TV series. Talent Associates commissioned Mel Brooks and Buck Henry to write a script about a bungling James Bond-like hero. Brooks described

11100-520: The book's protagonist, the MI6 officer Maurice Castle, married to a black South African woman, provides information to the KGB to thwart MI6 operations. Much of the plot of The Human Factor concerned a secret plan by the British, American and West German governments to buy up South African gold in bulk in order to stabilise the economy of South Africa , which Greene presented as fundamentally amoral, arguing that

11248-424: The box office. Adams had been typecast as Maxwell Smart and was unable to escape the image, although he had success as the voice of the title character of Inspector Gadget . He earned most of his income from his work on stage and in nightclubs. As Adams had chosen a low salary combined with a one-third ownership stake in Get Smart during the show's production, he received a regular income for many years due to

11396-734: The character of Maurice Castle was inspired by Philby, but Greene consistently denied this. Other novelists followed a similar path. Len Deighton 's anonymous spy protagonist of The IPCRESS File (1962), Horse Under Water (1963), Funeral in Berlin (1964), and others, is a working-class man with a negative view of " the Establishment ". Other notable examples of espionage fiction during this period were also built around recurring characters. These include James Mitchell 's 'John Craig' series, written under his pseudonym 'James Munro', beginning with The Man Who Sold Death (1964); and Trevor Dudley-Smith 's Quiller spy novel series written under

11544-483: The chief's office, he would insist on speaking under the Cone of Silence—two transparent plastic hemispheres which are electrically lowered on top of Max and Chief and are supposed to prevent their conversation from being heard outside. It invariably malfunctions in various ways, making it difficult for the two to communicate. People outside the cone could often hear them better than they could hear themselves. The Cone of Silence

11692-429: The comedic answer to the successful 1960s spy television dramas such as The Man from U.N.C.L.E. , The Avengers , I Spy and others. They were asked to write a spoof that combined elements from two of the most popular film series at the time: James Bond and The Pink Panther (Inspector Clouseau). Get Smart was written as a vehicle for Tom Poston , to be piloted on ABC ; when ABC turned it down, NBC picked up

11840-487: The counter-spy campaign targeted women who were encouraged to report anyone suspicious to the police with one slogan saying, "Women defend inside and men defend outside". The spy stories of Manchukuo such as "A Mixed Race Woman" often had female protagonists. In "A Mixed Race Woman", it is two ordinary women who break up the spy ring instead of the Manchukuo police as might be expected. The South Korean scholar Bong InYoung noted stories such as "A Mixed Race Woman" were part of

11988-678: The early 1960s. Soviet novels prior to the 1960s to the extent that espionage was portrayed at all concerned heroic scouts in the Red Army who during the Great Patriotic War as the war with Germany is known in the Soviet Union who go on dangerous missions deep behind the Wehrmacht's lines to find crucial information. The scout stories were more action-adventure stories than espionage stories proper and significantly always portrayed Red Army scouts rather than Chekisty ("Chekists") as secret policemen are always called in Russia as their heroes. The protagonists of

12136-402: The end of the show. It was wrecked and repaired several times, and its current whereabouts are unknown. In the black-and-white pilot episode only, Smart drives a 1961 Ferrari 250 GT PF Spider Cabriolet. In the opening credits, the Tiger was used for seasons one and two. In seasons three and four, Smart drives a light blue Volkswagen Karmann Ghia , because Volkswagen had become a sponsor of

12284-482: The espionage novel are The Spy (1821) and The Bravo (1831), by American novelist James Fenimore Cooper . The Bravo attacks European anti- republicanism , by depicting Venice as a city-state where a ruthless oligarchy wears the mask of the "serene republic". In nineteenth-century France, the Dreyfus Affair (1894–99) contributed much to public interest in espionage . For some twelve years (ca. 1894–1906),

12432-431: The ethical issues involved in espionage and sometimes resorted to immoral tactics. Le Carré depicted spies as living a morally grey world having to constantly make morally dubious decisions in an essentially amoral struggle where lies, paranoia and betrayal are the norm for both sides. In le Carré best known novel, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold (1963), the hero Alec Leamas views himself as serving in "...a war fought on

12580-428: The fictional spy most likely to be successful as a real spy, citing le Carré's description of him in A Murder of Quality : "Obscurity was his nature, as well as his profession. The byways of espionage are not populated by the brash and colorful adventurers of fiction. A man who, like Smiley has lived and worked for years among his country's enemies learns only one prayer: that he may never, never be noticed. Assimilation

12728-480: The film ended with disillusioned British spy Alec Leamas and his lover, the naïve young woman Liz Gold being shot down while trying to cross the Berlin Wall from East Berlin into West Berlin. With Secret Ministry (1951), Desmond Cory introduced Johnny Fedora , the secret agent with a licence to kill , the government-sanctioned assassin . Ian Fleming , a former member of naval intelligence, followed swiftly with

12876-408: The first espionage novel of the dawning conflict. The "secret world" of espionage allowed a situation when writers could project anything they wanted onto the "secret world". The author Bruce Page complained in his 1969 book The Philby Conspiracy : "The trouble is that a man can hold almost any theory he cares to about the secret world, and defend it against large quantities of hostile evidence by

13024-526: The first head of the Secret Intelligence Service , Mansfield Smith-Cumming , the original 'C'. In the book Literary Agents (1987), Anthony Masters wrote: "Ashenden's adventures come nearest to the real-life experiences of his creator"'. John Le Carré described Ashenden stories as a major influence on his novels as praised Maugham as "the first person to write anything about espionage in a mood of disenchantment and almost prosaic reality". At

13172-524: The first. Brooks and Henry proposed the show to ABC, where network executives called it "un-American" and demanded a "lovable dog to give the show more heart", as well as scenes showing Maxwell Smart's mother. Brooks strongly objected to the second suggestion: They wanted to put a print housecoat on the show. Max was to come home to his mother and explain everything. I hate mothers on shows. Max has no mother. He never had one. The cast and crew contributed joke and gadget ideas, especially Don Adams, but dialogue

13320-455: The flame anytime he pronounces a "p"), a plant in a planter beside the real working phone (operated by the dial of the working phone), and inside another full-sized working phone. Other gadgets include a bullet-proof invisible wall in Max's apartment that lowers from the ceiling, into which Max and others often walk; a camera hidden in a bowl of soup (cream of Technicolor ) that takes a picture (with

13468-642: The glamorous James Bond , secret agent 007 of the British Secret Service, a mixture of counter-intelligence officer, assassin and playboy. Perhaps the most famous fictional spy, Bond was introduced in Casino Royale (1953). After Fleming's death the franchise continued under other British and American authors, including Kingsley Amis , Christopher Wood , John Gardner , Raymond Benson , Sebastian Faulks , Jeffery Deaver , William Boyd and Anthony Horowitz . The Bond novels, which were extremely popular in

13616-630: The growing threat of conflict in Europe, the domestic threat of revolutionaries and anarchists, and historical romance. Kim (1901) by Rudyard Kipling concerns the Anglo – Russian " Great Game ", which consisted of a geopolitical rivalry and strategic warfare for supremacy in Central Asia , usually in Afghanistan . The Secret Agent (1907) by Joseph Conrad examines the psychology and ideology motivating

13764-401: The gun out of Baoerdun's hand at the story's climax. However, Ding's story also states that Baoerdun would not dare to have attempted his blackmail scheme against a Han woman and that he targeted Mali because she was racially mixed and hence "weak". When Japan invaded China in 1937 and even more so in 1941, the level of repression and propaganda in Manchukuo was increased as the state launched

13912-573: The heroic Scotsman Richard Hannay . In France Gaston Leroux published the spy thriller Rouletabille chez Krupp (1917), in which a detective, Joseph Rouletabille , engages in espionage. After the Russian Revolution (1917) , the quality of spy fiction declined, perhaps because the Bolshevik enemy won the Russian Civil War (1917–23). Thus, the inter-war spy story usually concerns combating

14060-487: The image of the CIA what Fleming's Bond novels did for the image of MI6. In the 1970s, former CIA man Charles McCarry began the Paul Christopher series with The Miernik Dossier (1973) and The Tears of Autumn (1978), which were well written, with believable tradecraft. McCarry was a former CIA agent who worked as an editor for National Geographic and his hero Christopher likewise is an American spy who works for

14208-472: The local concerns in order to defeat the Communists until the modernization process was completed. The Nick Carter-Killmaster series of spy novels, initiated by Michael Avallone and Valerie Moolman, but authored anonymously, ran to over 260 separate books between 1964 and the early 1990s and invariably pitted American, Soviet and Chinese spies against each other. With the proliferation of male protagonists in

14356-519: The men and women who served in the Rote Kapelle spy network. Seeing the great popularity of Ian Fleming's James Bond novels in Britain and the United States, Soviet spy novels of the 1960s used the Bond novels as inspiration for both their plots and heroes, through Soviet prurience about sex ensured that the Chekisty heroes did not engage in the sort of womanising that Bond did. The first Bond-style novel

14504-491: The minister says her name, making it inaudible. Several instances refer to her high level of professionalism; in one episode the Chief says an assignment requires extreme bravery and competence but since 99 isn't available, Max could do it. According to Feldon, 99 is deeply in love with Max and either overlooks or understands his quirks, while he is clueless about her affection yet often demonstrates his care through his concern for her well being. The Chief ( Edward Platt )

14652-532: The most widely read and most successful British writers of spy fiction, especially of invasion literature. Their prosaic style and formulaic stories, produced voluminously from 1900 to 1914, proved of low literary merit . During the War, John Buchan became the pre-eminent British spy novelist. His well-written stories portray the Great War as a "clash of civilisations" between Western civilization and barbarism . His notable novels are The Thirty-nine Steps (1915), Greenmantle (1916) and sequels, all featuring

14800-424: The novel La Mal Jaune (1965) by the French writer Jean Lartéguy . The Ugly American was written as a rebuttal to The Quiet American under which the idealistic Colonel Barnum operating in the fictional Vietnam-like Southeast Asian nation of Sarkhan shows the way to defeat Communist guerillas by understanding local people in just the same way that Lansdale with his understanding and sympathy for ordinary Filipinos

14948-408: The officially designated "five races" of the Japanese, Han Chinese, Manchus, Koreans and Mongols had come together to build a utopian society. Manchukuo also had a substantial Russian minority who initially been considered as the "sixth race", but had been excluded. The spy stories of Manchukuo such as "A Mixed Race Woman" by the writer Ding Na often linked the willingness to serve as spies with having

15096-411: The pop fervor for Agent 86 was because Don did such an extreme portrayal of the character that it made it easy to imitate." Adams created many popular catchphrases (some of which were in his act before the show), including "Sorry about that, Chief", "Would you believe ...?" , "Ahh ... the old [noun] in the [noun] trick. That's the [number]th time this [month/week]." (sometimes the description of

15244-433: The premise for the show that they created in an October 1965 Time magazine article: I was sick of looking at all those nice, sensible situation comedies. They were such distortions of life. If a maid ever took over my house like Hazel , I'd set her hair on fire. I wanted to do a crazy, unreal, comic-strip kind of thing about something besides a family. No one had ever done a show about an idiot before. I decided to be

15392-1065: The pseudonym 'Adam Hall', beginning with The Berlin Memorandum (US: The Quiller Memorandum , 1965), a hybrid of glamour and dirt, Fleming and Le Carré; and William Garner 's fantastic Michael Jagger in Overkill (1966), The Deep, Deep Freeze (1968), The Us or Them War (1969) and A Big Enough Wreath (1974). Other important British writers who first became active in spy fiction during this period include Padraig Manning O'Brine , Killers Must Eat (1951); Michael Gilbert , Be Shot for Sixpence (1956); Alistair MacLean , The Last Frontier (1959); Brian Cleeve , Assignment to Vengeance (1961); Jack Higgins , The Testament of Caspar Schulz (1962); and Desmond Skirrow , It Won't Get You Anywhere (1966). Dennis Wheatley 's 'Gregory Sallust' (1934-1968) and 'Roger Brook' (1947-1974) series were also largely written during this period. Notable recurring characters from this era include Adam Diment 's Philip McAlpine as

15540-491: The scout stories always almost ended being killed at the climax of the stories, giving up their lives up to save the Motherland from the German invaders. In November 1961, Vladimir Semichastny became the chairman of the KGB and sent out to improve the image of the Chekisty . The acronym KGB ( Komitet Gosudarstvennoy Bezopasnosti -Committee of State Security) was adopted in 1954, but the organisation had been founded in 1917 as

15688-475: The series (1967–1969). Adams also provided the voices for the animated series Tennessee Tuxedo and His Tales (1963–1966) and Inspector Gadget (1983–1986) as well as several revivals and spinoffs of the latter in the 1990s. Adams was born Donald James Yarmy in Manhattan , New York, a son of William Yarmy and his wife, Consuelo ( née Deiter) Yarmy. His father was of Hungarian Jewish descent and his mother

15836-476: The series after the first season, but Henry served as story editor through 1967. The crew of the show included: Maxwell "Max" Smart , Agent 86 , ( Don Adams ) is the central character of the series. Despite being a top-secret government agent, he is absurdly clumsy. Yet Smart is also resourceful, skilled in hand-to-hand combat, a proficient marksman, and incredibly lucky; all of this makes him one of CONTROL's top agents. Brooks decided on Smart's code number, 86, as

15984-706: The series featuring Matt Helm , a CIA assassin and counter-intelligence agent. Major General Edward Lansdale , a charismatic intelligence officer who was widely credited with having masterminded the defeat of the Communist Huk rebellion in the Philippines inspired several fictional versions of himself. Besides for The Quiet American , he appeared as Colonel Edwin Barnum in The Ugly American (1958) by William J. Lederer and Eugene Burdick and as Colonel Lionel Teryman in

16132-468: The show and cast Adams in the role because he was already under contract. When Get Smart debuted in 1965, it was an immediate hit. Barbara Feldon co-starred as Max's young and attractive partner (later wife) Agent 99. They had great chemistry throughout the show's run, despite a 10-year age difference, and they became best friends during and after. Adams gave the character a clipped speaking style borrowed from actor William Powell . Feldon said, "Part of

16280-436: The show at the request of Daniel Melnick to capitalize on James Bond and Inspector Clouseau , "the two biggest things in the entertainment world today". Brooks described it as "an insane combination of James Bond and Mel Brooks comedy". The show generated a number of popular catchphrases during its run, including "sorry about that, Chief", "...and loving it", "missed it by that much ", and "would you believe...". The show

16428-453: The show's executive producer Leonard Stern) appeared in at least 44 episodes—usually as a background extra with no speaking role. In the season-one episode "Too Many Chiefs", when she is shown in a photograph, Max refers to her as "my Aunt Rose", but the Chief corrects Max by saying that she is actually KAOS agent Alexi Sebastian disguised as Max's Aunt Rose. Fans refer to her as "Aunt Rose" in all of her dozens of appearances, though her character

16576-432: The show's popularity in reruns. Don Adams' Screen Test was a syndicated game show which lasted 26 episodes during the 1975–76 season. The show was filmed in two 15-minute segments, in each of which a randomly selected audience member would "act" to re-create a scene from a Hollywood movie as accurately as possible. Such moments as the bar scene from The Lost Weekend , the duel scene from The Prisoner of Zenda or

16724-399: The show. The Volkswagen was never used in the body of the show. In season five (1969–1970), Buick became a show sponsor, so the Tiger was replaced with a gold 1969 Opel GT , which also appears in the body of the show. In season four (1968–1969), Adams uses a yellow Citroën 2CV in the wedding episode "With Love and Twitches", and a blue 1968 Ford Shelby Mustang GT500 convertible with

16872-559: The signs of danger". Like Le Carré, former British Intelligence officer Graham Greene also examined the morality of espionage in left-wing, anti-imperialist novels such as The Heart of the Matter (1948), set in Sierra Leone , the seriocomic Our Man in Havana (1959) occurring in Cuba under the regime of dictator Fulgencio Batista before his deposition in the Cuban Revolution (1953–59), and The Human Factor (1978) about

17020-465: The simple expedient of retreating behind further and further screens of postulated inward mystery. Secret services have in common with Freemasons and mafiosi that they inhabit an intellectual twilight-a kind of ambiguous gloom in which it is hard to distinguish with certainty between the menacing and the merely ludicrous. In such circumstances the human affinity for myth and legend easily gets out of control". This inability to know for certain about what

17168-656: The socially marginal men and women of a revolutionary cell. A diplomat from an unnamed (but clearly Russian) embassy forces a double-agent, Verloc, to organise a failed attempt to bomb the Greenwich Observatory in the hope that the revolutionaries will be blamed. Conrad's next novel, Under Western Eyes (1911), follows a reluctant spy sent by the Russian Empire to infiltrate a group of revolutionaries based in Geneva . G. K. Chesterton 's The Man Who Was Thursday (1908)

17316-476: The spy fiction genre, writers and book packagers also started bringing out spy fiction with a female as the protagonist. One notable spy series is The Baroness , featuring a sexy female superspy, with the novels being more action-oriented, in the mould of Nick Carter-Killmaster. Other important American authors who became active in spy fiction during this period include Ross Thomas , The Cold War Swap (1966). The Scarlatti Inheritance (1971) by Robert Ludlum

17464-461: The spy novel in the post– Cold War world. Other important American authors who first became active in spy fiction during this period include David Ignatius , Agents of Innocence (1997); David Baldacci , Saving Faith (1999); and Vince Flynn , with Term Limits (1999) and a series of novels featuring counter-terrorism expert Mitch Rapp. In 1993, the American novelist Philip Roth published Operation Shylock , an account of his supposed work as

17612-458: The state's campaign to take over "...the governance of private and family life, relying on the power of propaganda literature and the nationwide mobilization of the social discourse of counterespionage". At the same time, she noted "A Mixed Race Woman" with its intelligent female protagonists seemed to challenge the patriarchal values of Manchukuo which portrayed women as the weaker sex in need of male protection and guidance. However, Bong noted that

17760-549: The term "spy novel" was defined by The Riddle of the Sands (1903) by Irish author Erskine Childers . The Riddle of the Sands described two British yachtsman cruising off the North Sea coast of Germany who turned amateur spies when they discover a secret German plan to invade Britain. Its success created a market for the invasion literature subgenre, which was flooded by imitators. William Le Queux and E. Phillips Oppenheim became

17908-491: The time, who developed a rapport with Adams. In 1995, Adams reprised his Maxwell Smart role one last time on Get Smart for Fox ; it co-starred Barbara Feldon and rising star Andy Dick as Max and 99's son. Unlike the original version, this show did not appeal to younger viewers, and it was canceled after just seven episodes. One of Adams's last public appearances was at the Get Smart Gathering on November 7, 2003, at

18056-475: The top 30 for its last three seasons. The series won seven Emmy Awards , and it was nominated for another 14 Emmys and two Golden Globe Awards . In 1995, the series was briefly resurrected starring Adams and Feldon with Andy Dick as Max's and 99's son Zack Smart and Elaine Hendrix as 66. Four feature-length films have been produced following the end of the NBC/CBS run of the TV series: In October 2008, it

18204-449: The trick was simply, "Ahh... the old [noun] trick."), and "Missed it by 'that much'". Adams also produced and directed 13 episodes of the show. He was nominated for Emmys four seasons in a row, from 1966 to 1969, for Outstanding Continued Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Comedy Series. He won the award three times. The show moved to CBS for its final season, with ratings declining, as spy series went out of fashion. Get Smart

18352-471: The true heroine of "A Mixed Race Woman", Shulan is presented as superior to Mali as she is Han and the story is one "...of female disempowerment in that Mali is completely subordinate to the racial order Shulan sets". The growing support of fascism in Germany, Italy and Spain , and the imminence of war, attracted quality writers back to spy fiction. British author Eric Ambler brought a new realism to spy fiction. The Dark Frontier (1936), Epitaph for

18500-411: The two German states while Britain, France, the Soviet Union and the United States all had occupations zones in Berlin. As a result, Berlin was a beehive of espionage during the Cold War with the city full of American, British, East German, French, Soviet and West German spies; it was estimated that there was an average of about 8,000 spies in Berlin at any given moment during the Cold War. Because Berlin

18648-460: The two contestants would be played, with audience reaction determining the winner, who would receive a trip to Hollywood and a real screen test for a motion picture. Adams resurrected the Maxwell Smart character for a series of television commercials for Savemart, a retail chain that sold audio and video equipment. He also did a series of audio/radio commercials in the 1980s for Chief Auto Parts,

18796-736: The voice of Brain the Dog in the end credits for the 1999 film version of Inspector Gadget . At the time of his enlistment in the U.S. Marines, he listed "none" on the section of the form asking about religion. During his difficult recovery from blackwater fever, he returned to his Catholic faith as he prayed to survive. Adams divorced Adelaide in 1960 and married Dorothy Bracken, an actress. He left Bracken in 1977 to marry actress Judy Luciano, with whom he had one child. That marriage also ended in divorce. He had seven children: Carolyn, Christine, Cathy, Cecily , Stacey, Sean and Beige. Cecily died of lung cancer in 2004 and his son Sean died in 2006 at age 35 of

18944-563: The war E. Howard Hunt wrote his first spy novel, East of Farewell (1943). In 1949 he joined the recently created CIA and continued to write spy fiction for many years. Paul Linebarger , a China specialist for the CIA, published Atomsk , the first novel of the Cold War, in 1949. During the 1950s, most of American spy stories were not about the CIA, instead being about agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) who tracked down and arrested Soviet spies. The popular American image of

19092-444: The wartime slogan Smert shpionam! ("Death to Spies!"), which reflected the picture promoted by the Soviet state of spies as a class of people who deserved to be killed without mercy. The unfavorable picture of spies ensured that before the early 1960s there were no novels featuring Soviet spies as the heroes as espionage was portrayed as a disreputable activity that only the enemies of the Soviet Union engaged in. Unlike in Britain and

19240-535: The writing is literary and the tradecraft believable. Noteworthy examples of the journalistic style and successful integration of fictional characters with historical events were the politico-military novels The Day of the Jackal (1971) by Frederick Forsyth and Eye of the Needle (1978) by Ken Follett . With the explosion of technology, Craig Thomas , launched the techno-thriller with Firefox (1977), describing

19388-580: Was The Zakhov Mission (1963) by the Bulgarian writer Andrei Gulyashki who had commissioned by Semichastny and was published simultaneously in Russian and Bulgarian. The success of The Zakhov Mission led to a follow-up novel, Zakhov vs. 007 , where Gulyashki freely violated English copyright laws by using the James Bond character without the permission of the Fleming estate (he had asked for permission in 1966 and

19536-458: Was "Q." Agent Larabee ( Robert Karvelas , Don Adams' cousin) is the Chief's assistant, even more slow-witted and incompetent than Max. Ludwig Von Siegfried ( Bernie Kopell ) is a recurring villain, and the vice president in charge of public relations and terror at KAOS, though his title does vary. Despite his gruff and proper demeanor, he is as incompetent as Max. Starker (Often pronounced by Siegfried as Shtarker ) ( King Moody )

19684-589: Was Irish American. Donald and his brother Dick Yarmy were each raised in the religion of one parent: Don in the Catholic faith of their mother, and Dick in the Jewish faith of their father. The brothers had an elder sister, Gloria Ella Yarmy (later Gloria Burton), a writer who wrote an episode of Get Smart . Dropping out of New York City's DeWitt Clinton High School , he worked as a theater usher. He later remarked that he had "little use for school". Late in 1941, he joined

19832-411: Was a center of espionage, the city was frequently a setting for spy novels and films. Furthermore, the construction of the Berlin Wall in 1961 made the wall into a symbol of Communist tyranny, which further increased the attraction for Western writers of setting a Cold War spy novel in Berlin. Perhaps the most memorable story set in Berlin was The Spy Who Came In From The Cold which in both the novel and

19980-402: Was canceled in 1970 after 138 episodes. Following this, Adams then wanted to move on to other projects. His efforts after Get Smart were less successful, including the comedy series The Partners (1971–72), a game show called Don Adams' Screen Test (1975–76, see below), and three attempts to revive the Get Smart series in the 1980s. His movie The Nude Bomb (1980) was unsuccessful at

20128-438: Was credited with defeating the Communist Huk guerrillas. The Ugly American was greatly influenced by the modernization theory, which held Communism was something alike to a childhood disease as the modernization theory held that as Third World nations modernized that this created social-economic tensions which a ruthless minority of Communists exploited to seize power; what was required from the United States were experts who knew

20276-509: Was denied). In Zakhov vs. 007 , the hero Avakoum Zakhov defeats James Bond, who is portrayed in an inverted fashion to how Fleming portrayed him; in Zakhov vs. 007 , Bond is portrayed as a sadistic killer, a brutal rapist and an arrogant misogynist, which stands in marked contrast to the kindly and gentle Zakhov who always treats women with respect. Zakhov is described as a spy, he more of a detective and unlike Bond, his tastes are modest. In 1966,

20424-656: Was focused around gambling." Adams died on September 25, 2005, at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. He suffered from lymphoma and a lung infection. His health had declined after the death of his daughter Cecily. Before his death, Adams had joked about not wanting a mournful funeral, preferring, he said, to have his friends get together "and bring me back to life." Among his eulogists were his decades-long friends Barbara Feldon , Don Rickles , James Caan , Bill Dana and his son-in-law, actor Jim Beaver (widower of Adams' daughter Cecily). His funeral Mass

20572-496: Was followed by the films The Nude Bomb (a 1980 theatrical film made without the involvement of Brooks and Henry) and Get Smart, Again! (a 1989 made-for-TV sequel to the series), as well as a 1995 revival series and a 2008 film remake . In 2010, TV Guide ranked Get Smart ' s opening title sequence at number two on its list of TV's top 10 credits sequences as selected by readers. The show switched networks in 1969 to CBS . It ended its five-season run on May 15, 1970, with

20720-646: Was included in a display titled "Spies: Secrets from the CIA, KGB, and Hollywood", a collection of real and fictional spy gear that exhibited at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, California . Flinders University in South Australia has researched medical applications for shoe phone technology after being inspired by the show. Gag phones also appear in other guises. In the episode "Too Many Chiefs" (season one), Max tells Tanya,

20868-518: Was known from 1934 to 1946, it is stated quite explicitly in Semnadtsat' mgnoveniy vesny (which is set in 1945) that he left the Soviet Union to go undercover in Nazi Germany "more than ten years ago", which means that Isayev was not involved in the Yezhovshchina . The June 1967 Six-Day War between Israel and its neighbours introduced new themes to espionage fiction - the conflict between Israel and

21016-472: Was later revealed in 1963 to be a long time Soviet spy, who had been recruited by Soviet intelligence in the early 1930s while he was an undergraduate at Cambridge. Greene's best known spy novel The Quiet American (1955), set in 1952 Vietnam featured a thinly disguised version of the real American intelligence officer, Major General Edward Lansdale as the villain. Greene had covered the Vietnam war in 1951-52 as

21164-545: Was not wounded in combat, but did contract blackwater fever , a serious complication of malaria, known for a 90% rate of fatality. Yarmy was evacuated and then hospitalized for more than a year at a Navy hospital in Wellington , New Zealand. After his recovery, Yarmy served as a Marine Drill Instructor in the United States, holding the rank of corporal. He was an expert marksman and was noted for his competence. After his discharge in 1945, Yarmy went to Florida and worked as

21312-413: Was rarely ad-libbed. An exception is the third-season episode "The Little Black Book". Don Rickles encouraged Adams to misbehave, and he ad-libbed. The result was so successful that the single episode was turned into two parts. The first four seasons on NBC were filmed at Sunset Bronson Studios , while the final season, shown on CBS, was filmed at CBS Studio Center . Brooks had little involvement with

21460-475: Was reported that Warner Bros., Village Roadshow Pictures and Mosaic Media Group were producing a sequel . Carell and Hathaway were set to return, but the status of other cast members had not been announced. As of 2019, Get Smart 2 is no longer in development Get Smart, Again! eventually prompted the development of a short-lived 1995 weekly series on Fox also titled Get Smart , with Adams and Feldon reprising their characters with Maxwell Smart now being

21608-473: Was that of the title character in Inspector Gadget . He voiced the character in the original television series (1983–85) and a 1992 Christmas special, as well as in subsequent 1990s spinoffs Gadget Boy and Inspector Gadget's Field Trip . He retired from voicing Inspector Gadget in 1999. His last roles were the character of Principal Hickey in the late-1990s/early-2000s Disney cartoon Pepper Ann and

21756-498: Was the idea of Buck Henry, though it was preceded in an episode of the syndicated television show Science Fiction Theatre titled "Barrier of Silence", written by Lou Huston, that first aired on September 3, 1955, 10 years ahead of Get Smart . The car that Smart is seen driving most frequently is a red 1965 Sunbeam Tiger two-seat roadster. This car had various custom features, such as a machine gun, smoke screen, radar tracking, and an ejection seat . The Sunbeam Alpine , upon which

21904-454: Was the insurance man in "Too Many Chiefs", and subsequent episodes as Agent 44. He is the predecessor to Agent 13 in season 1. Agent 13 takes over the function of Agent 44 for seasons 2 to 4, but Agent 44, now played by Al Molinaro , returns in season 5. Carlson ( Stacy Keach Sr. ) is a CONTROL scientist and inventor of such gadgets as an umbrella rifle (with a high-speed camera in the handle) and edible buttons. Dr. Steele ( Ellen Weston )

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