Well that was a bit of a shock. I remembered I used to enjoy this series. Settled down for a cosy watch and right at the very beginning there’s my Dad being murdered! I didn’t remember he was in this.
Absolutely wonderful ...it is so emotive...and brings back so many memories.. Gerald Harper is still alive bless him and is 94 in February this year (2025)
I remember enjoying this series as a teenager. Now, it seems like a relic of a previous century. Not better or worse for that - just something from a very long time ago.
It could all have been so different… A quote from Wikipedia: “Adam Adamant Lives! was a quick replacement for the show he had actually intended, an adaptation of the adventures of literary detective Sexton Blake. When the rights to the character suddenly became unavailable, it fell to writers Cotton and Harris, along with script editor Tony Williamson, to come up with an alternative idea.”
As a youngster, I found Gerald Harper rivetting in the role of Adam Adamant. Along with (for some reason) _The girl from UNCLE_ these were the two things we used to play at, my friends and me, jousting with primitive, branch-based, sword sticks. I think sometimes Adam Adamant would rescue April Dancer... (I wonder if the programme makers knew sword sticks were illegal???)
Britain had this, U.S. had Gilligan's Island. There was Mission Impossible, but most U.S. television of the time was utterly lacking of intellectual stimulation.
007 swept the planet. U.S. television was about to change, they got rid of Green Acres, Petticoats & Hillbillies for MTM & Lear (though he remade British).
When the singer sang the first word; "gold...", I automatically finished it..." Goldfinger" from James Bond. The singer sounds like the woman who sang the Goldfinger song; in a softer tone, but very similar, and the tune also sounds very similar to the Goldfinger song. I had to look up who sang the Goldfinger theme song. It was Shirley Bassey. Another singer, Kathy Kirby, sang the song for this movie.
I was born in 1961 and only remember my parents talking about it, together with Maigret (Rupert Davies version). I do remember Gerald Harper in Hadleigh (💕).
1962 , but I remember the opening credits showing him falling through a trap door , then being frozen in a block of ice. Perhaps this is a later series ? , or am I getting confused. By the way , I remember the Yeti from Dr Who , when Hartnell's Doctor was stranded on the Moon , and the silver ball appearing from it's stomach.
I was ten when this was on the telly. It was pretty weird, this barking aristocratic crime fighter. The predecessor of "The Avengers". What the hell! The womanoids are taking over the world from a former Gentleman's club in London, (swinging London back then), led by a man, who seems to be the butler. It's all crazy! Miss Jones, the beautiful Juliet Harmer, five years earlier was my teacher at Hill House School in Knightsbridge. Anybody out there remember her? Nick Bell.
Skipping through this I haven’t got the faintest idea what the bloody hell is going on! It’s like a cross between some ancient Doctor Who episode and The Avengers but with a Bond theme song!
I have the DVD collection of all the existing episodes. It’s a shame that this series wasn’t brought back like some others (“Doctor Who” , for example) I really enjoy Kathy Kirby’s rendition of the theme song.
I havn't watched it yet but the reviews here are great reading already. I last saw aa 50 yrs ago in black + white, so this'll be a bit of time travel ha ha
I like TV series that have an interesting 'scenario' like this, but the problem i find is that the writers often don't think up suitable scenes and ideas to go with it; they can't comprehend what the character is and what they can do.( ie; The Champions, and super powers/ Randle and Hopkirk, one of them's dead/ The Proffessionals, unrestricted legal powers etc.) Many shows just seem to 're-use' story ideas that have been used previously.
@marchuws4993 There's a lot of proffs episodes which just seem to be 'dusted off' stories from the 1960's and don't really take in the 'remit' of what C.I.5 is about. ie; they can go outside of the law to get results.
Interesting you should mention 16mm ! I think this size was quite adequate to be viewed on British television sets right up to 2000 ! I don't know the reason why many other programmes are on 35mm or high definition video tape.( surely they weren't thinking of future re-runs when people had better telly's ? Or did they imagine them being shown at the cinema ?)
@@AbelMcTalisker Yes, that's right. On UK tv a few years ago it showed how they did this ( there was a 'booth' with a 'high definition tv screen in it with a 16mm camera pointing at it. This was in a program about colouring in an episode of Dad's Army, that had been recorded onto 'hi-def' colour video tape, where only a 16mm Black and white copy remained. ) There were TV series that were filmed on 16mm though; i read that 'The Protectors' was the last series on UK tv to do this.
I never saw this series because my mother detested Gerald Harper. The other kids talked about it at school and sang the song, so I had to pretend I had seen it too. “No hiding place” was another series, with Raymond Francis who my mother didn’t like.
Was Ridley Scott responsible for the several characters smiling into the camera, up close, and the blurry 'movement' scenes of 'Swinging London'? And he's a genius, right? That was much less than genius, even for then.
Easy, by never mentioning that he ever directed episodic television. In most of his interviews I've come across, Scott only mentions getting his start doing commercials.
Avengers was moving 🎯, pretty much every season different, cast, filming, studio, location, production values. Took Laugh-In to bring 'em down. This resembles Mrs. Gale era, which didn't even get global distribution.
@@ShotDrawnCut I've only just started watching these and was wondering if he tackles more 'real' crime and criminals of the 1966 ? The type of 'wrong doing' here is of the 'fantasy' sort as seen in The Avengers.
@@unowen-nh9ov True, though its success was bound to create imitation. I understand they still do re-runs of The Avengers on American cable, which just goes to prove the quality and immortality of the story lines and character construction.
@@tonkatsu007 I've noticed that some British TV start using video cameras for outdoor filming from 1970 ? ( On The Buses, but i don't know exactly what the camera was like.)
![Lp. Сердце Вселенной #60 РОЖДЕНИЕ ЛОЛОЛОШКИ [Финал] • Майнкрафт](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/YoR0pAV9FVQ/mqdefault.jpg)
Well that was a bit of a shock. I remembered I used to enjoy this series. Settled down for a cosy watch and right at the very beginning there’s my Dad being murdered! I didn’t remember he was in this.
Larry Noble was your dad? A fine actor--I never saw a poor performance from him, and he had a variety of differing roles.
@@tombeveridge1330thank you very much!
Loved him in the Whitehall Farces.Such great memories.
Woah, your dad was an excellent actor. No words needed to be spoken in this scene, he did it all with facial expressions. Brilliant.
@ thank you!
Absolutely wonderful ...it is so emotive...and brings back so many memories..
Gerald Harper is still alive bless him and is 94 in February this year (2025)
Fabulous
I loved this series , Adam Adamant was frozen and woke up 80 or so years later it was a great concept and as an 11 year old at the time fascinating.
I saw this series when I was 12. It was completely amazing in terms of concept, plots and acting.
Loving (most of) the comments folks! If anyone happens to have the 2 lost episodes of ‘Adamant’ directed by Ridley please do get in touch.
I used to watch this series as a kid, & I even had his swordstick courtesy of Woolworths.
This was delightful. Had a sort of "Avengers" feel to it. Thank you!
🎯
Brilliant series, Bring it back.
I loved this series as an 11 year old. I remember someone came out with a parody called Cedric C(S)ediment.
Well thanks for this. No one I know has any memory of this series and give me sympathetic looks if I describe it.
I believe the BBC wiped most of them.
I remember enjoying this series as a teenager. Now, it seems like a relic of a previous century. Not better or worse for that - just something from a very long time ago.
Thanks for this.I used to watch it as a kid.Gerald, would've made an excellent Holmes!
It could all have been so different…
A quote from Wikipedia:
“Adam Adamant Lives! was a quick replacement for the show he had actually intended, an adaptation of the adventures of literary detective Sexton Blake. When the rights to the character suddenly became unavailable, it fell to writers Cotton and Harris, along with script editor Tony Williamson, to come up with an alternative idea.”
He wouldn’t have stood out in the King’s Road dressed like that in the mid-1960s, but his good manners would have.
Just superb. Thanks for uploading
And to think only 13 or so years later something extraordinarily surprising burst forth from John Hurt's chest.
R.I.P. John Hurt...his voice, appearance. acting and his memory to not be forgotten.
My concept of time is completely flipped right now!
SPOILER! Rolling Stone did back in the day.
Something small and fast soon to grow into something dark and terrifying.
Brilliant, I would of been nine or ten years old. My Mum used to let me stay up and watch them. Happy days, better times than now.
Brilliant, stylish ‘60’s nonsense…Adam Adamant needs a revival!!
I Loved Adam Adamant. Great.😊
Wow. The simalarities in both looks and style of Gerald Harper and Jeremy Brett are uncanny.
Masterful work.
I was visiting relatives in 66 and watched the premier episode which was just a fun show.
truly amazing. thank you from manhattan ©2025
As a youngster, I found Gerald Harper rivetting in the role of Adam Adamant. Along with (for some reason) _The girl from UNCLE_ these were the two things we used to play at, my friends and me, jousting with primitive, branch-based, sword sticks. I think sometimes Adam Adamant would rescue April Dancer...
(I wonder if the programme makers knew sword sticks were illegal???)
Absolutely brilliant 👌 ❤
Britain had this, U.S. had Gilligan's Island.
There was Mission Impossible, but most U.S. television of the time was utterly lacking of intellectual stimulation.
We also had The Man From U.N.C.L.E. and for laughs, Get Smart.
007 swept the planet. U.S. television was about to change, they got rid of Green Acres, Petticoats & Hillbillies for MTM & Lear (though he remade British).
this just shows how much camera work has improved since things like this were made.
Kathy Kirby in full Bond-gear singing the theme.
Defo Goldfinger vibes goung on.
Well done that man! I've always remembered this from when i was a nipper. Never forgot the theme tune. Thanks.
I'm a thousand. Far as I knew... don't drink don't smoke was original.wow
I watched this as a kid... ☝️😎
When the singer sang the first word; "gold...", I automatically finished it..." Goldfinger" from James Bond. The singer sounds like the woman who sang the Goldfinger song; in a softer tone, but very similar, and the tune also sounds very similar to the Goldfinger song.
I had to look up who sang the Goldfinger theme song. It was Shirley Bassey. Another singer, Kathy Kirby, sang the song for this movie.
Dame Shirl did NOTHING "softer".
I never realised how young Gerald Harper was in this......
Know of the series but can't recall it, looking forward to viewing it - has an Avengers vibe -thanks for posting.
I can imagine Pink Floyd sitting around watching this on the Telly.
Remember this the first time around
Adam Adamant Theme - sung by KATHY KIRBY
Never realised this was directed by Ridley Scott.
Wow i remember this and i was born in 1960😮
I was born in 1961 and only remember my parents talking about it, together with Maigret (Rupert Davies version).
I do remember Gerald Harper in Hadleigh (💕).
1962 , but I remember the opening credits showing him falling through a trap door , then being frozen in a block of ice. Perhaps this is a later series ? , or am I getting confused.
By the way , I remember the Yeti from Dr Who , when Hartnell's Doctor was stranded on the Moon , and the silver ball appearing from it's stomach.
I was ten when this was on the telly. It was pretty weird, this barking aristocratic crime fighter. The predecessor of "The Avengers".
What the hell! The womanoids are taking over the world from a former Gentleman's club in London, (swinging London back then), led by a man, who seems to be the butler. It's all crazy!
Miss Jones, the beautiful Juliet Harmer, five years earlier was my teacher at Hill House School in Knightsbridge.
Anybody out there remember her?
Nick Bell.
So a bit early for me but now I know where the pop star Adam Ant got his name.
It’s all very confusing.
Very entertaining!
All of those were reported to be lost. Taste of what was clearly a top notch drama for it time.
It was hokum, but enjoyable hokum when I was 12
I was only 9 when this was on television - I much preferred Thunderbirds at the time.
Thunderbirds was brilliant.
Begining could have been the Avengers. 😊
The theme sounds like Goldfinger. That’s a good thing.
Skipping through this I haven’t got the faintest idea what the bloody hell is going on!
It’s like a cross between some ancient Doctor Who episode and The Avengers but with a Bond theme song!
I have the DVD collection of all the existing episodes. It’s a shame that this series wasn’t brought back like some others (“Doctor Who” , for example) I really enjoy Kathy Kirby’s rendition of the theme song.
Do you also remember danger man the baron man in a suitcase
Danger Man was a guy called John Drake.....who one day woke up in a Village...be seeing you.
I believe only EP 2 and 13 exist from Season 2 due to the usual BBC wiping tape nonsense.
I havn't watched it yet but the reviews here are great reading already. I last saw aa 50 yrs ago in black + white, so this'll be a bit of time travel ha ha
Juliet Harmer was extremely attractive 😍
I had the sword stick as well.
Is this a TV series dave w. Wisconsin
Yes it is. I remember it from when I was a teenager. It had very a "swingin' sixties" feel.
@@jimmeltonbradley1497And the female lead Juliet Harmer was so cool I wanted to be her.
I always fancied Juliet Harmer.
I can see why! She's rather swoony!
Yeah I’d give her one.
I like TV series that have an interesting 'scenario' like this, but the problem i find is that the writers often don't think up suitable scenes and ideas to go with it; they can't comprehend what the character is and what they can do.( ie; The Champions, and super powers/ Randle and Hopkirk, one of them's dead/ The Proffessionals, unrestricted legal powers etc.) Many shows just seem to 're-use' story ideas that have been used previously.
Professionals 😮
@marchuws4993 There's a lot of proffs episodes which just seem to be 'dusted off' stories from the 1960's and don't really take in the 'remit' of what C.I.5 is about. ie; they can go outside of the law to get results.
Avengers used to recycle their own stories.
Clearly where Brett got his idea for Holmes 😂
Reminds of the Avengers ,which came on TV a few years before.
I wonder if Gerald Harper ever portrayed Sherlock Holmes? He certainly has an air of the Baker Street sleuth about him...
Adamant, not to be confused with the TV cartoon made the same year, Atom Ant.
So this was a tv show? Looks like it was filmed on 16mm.
Interesting you should mention 16mm ! I think this size was quite adequate to be viewed on British television sets right up to 2000 ! I don't know the reason why many other programmes are on 35mm or high definition video tape.( surely they weren't thinking of future re-runs when people had better telly's ? Or did they imagine them being shown at the cinema ?)
16mm copy of a series originally videotaped? That`s how a lot of old TV of that era still survives.
@@AbelMcTalisker Yes, that's right. On UK tv a few years ago it showed how they did this ( there was a 'booth' with a 'high definition tv screen in it with a 16mm camera pointing at it. This was in a program about colouring in an episode of Dad's Army, that had been recorded onto 'hi-def' colour video tape, where only a 16mm Black and white copy remained. ) There were TV series that were filmed on 16mm though; i read that 'The Protectors' was the last series on UK tv to do this.
Apparently this was the inspiration for for name of the name of 👩🏻🎤a pop group called Adam Ant , of the seventies
I thought the origin of that was the '60's cartoon series 'Atom Ant'.
Eighties.
So that's where the band got its name
Stand and Deliver!
There was also a cartoon in 1965 called Atom Ant
Enjoyable, aside from the fact that everyone is shouting all the way through.
Gerald Harper sounds like Hans Conried.
Almost.
Cool Limey series… reminds me of The Avengers 😅
😊. 🎉.
Harper's acting was so awful my mum used to call him Cedric Sediment.
I never saw this series because my mother detested Gerald Harper. The other kids talked about it at school and sang the song, so I had to pretend I had seen it too. “No hiding place” was another series, with Raymond Francis who my mother didn’t like.
Yes he was always over the top in every thing he appeared in
Hmm reminds me of an 80s band, now what was their name...............
Kings of the Wild Frontier!!
Incidentally, Stuart Goddard got his name derivation from elsewhere than this.
Duran Duran
Was Ridley Scott responsible for the several characters smiling into the camera, up close, and the blurry 'movement' scenes of 'Swinging London'? And he's a genius, right? That was much less than genius, even for then.
I THOUGHT THIS WAS REALLY WIERD AND CREEPY AS A KID
I wonder if Ridley is a freemason.
How did Ridley Scott ever work again after this dross
Easy, by never mentioning that he ever directed episodic television. In most of his interviews I've come across, Scott only mentions getting his start doing commercials.
Ridley Scott was talentless even back then
Usely talent disappears with age but Old Ridley has never had very much to begin with ....
To think Scott went from this rubbish to Alien 😂
Such a James Bond rip off... bet that's Sherly Bassey singing too!
Sad attempt at emulating 'The Avengers'.
Gerald Harper is like nails down a chalk board.
Unwatchable then, and similarly pointless now.
Try reading about the series’ production!
The irony being, that all the actors were in the Avengers, some of them more than once.
Avengers was moving 🎯, pretty much every season different, cast, filming, studio, location, production values. Took Laugh-In to bring 'em down. This resembles Mrs. Gale era, which didn't even get global distribution.
@@ShotDrawnCut I've only just started watching these and was wondering if he tackles more 'real' crime and criminals of the 1966 ? The type of 'wrong doing' here is of the 'fantasy' sort as seen in The Avengers.
@@unowen-nh9ov True, though its success was bound to create imitation. I understand they still do re-runs of The Avengers on American cable, which just goes to prove the quality and immortality of the story lines and character construction.
dreadful camera direction
The TV cameras back then were clunky old things and difficult to work smoothly. Also, clearly Ridley Scott was still learning his craft.
Come on it's 1960s
@@scottmasson3336 In 70‘s tv camera was still too heavy to carry more than an hour.
@@tonkatsu007 I've noticed that some British TV start using video cameras for outdoor filming from 1970 ? ( On The Buses, but i don't know exactly what the camera was like.)