TV FLASHBACK : MISSION IMPOSSIBLE ... NICOLE .. 1969

                                                                                                                                                                       
Paramount Television
Presents
A Desilu Production

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE .....

" NICOLE"
Starring
PETER GRAVES as Jim Phelps

MARTIN LANDAU as Rollin Hand
BARBARA BAIN as Cinnamon Carter
GREG MORRIS as Barney Collier
PETER LUPUS as Willy Armitage
   Guest starring....
JOAN COLLINS  as Nicole Vedette
LOGAN RAMSEY as Anton Valdas
ANN SHOEMAKER as Madame Prokov
DAL JENKINS as Razoff
JAMES NC CALLION as Sparrow

The mission is to get hold of a master list of all of the Allied agents who have defected...one man has the list, Anton Valdas, the enemy's highest ranking intelligence minister. The contact for Jim and Rollin's is Nicole Vedette, who happens to be Valda's secretary. Nicole is working as a double agent and Jim becomes attracted to her, but can they both survive the mission to forge a new romance? On a Mission Impossible, there is danger around every corner and only the strong will survive!

"Mission Impossible" first aired on CBS television on September 1966 and is now among the few truly cult classic series. Created by Bruce Gellar, it began life in script form as "Briggs Squad" and was inspired by the 1964 movie "Topkapi"...The script was given to Desilu Productions, where Desi and Lucy sat up all night going through scripts for the coming season and they liked the idea of the show, which was now retitled "Mission Impossible".. Lucy commented .."while she liked the script..she did not quite understand it!".. Joan appeared in the third season, which by then had become a hit and very popular with viewers.. By this time the show had also become very expensive, for it's time to produce and almost always went over it's $185,000 an episode budget..Star Barbara Bain won her third Emmy award for her role as Cinnamon Carter, but by the end of the season, both she and husband Martin Landau had decided to leave the series..
In this episode, Joan's character Nicole Vedette is shot in the climax, Star Peter Graves recalled..
" Marty (Landau), had caught up with us and she dies in my arms. I figured it was about time to shed a tear or two! So I am trying to squeeze out a trear and I look up at Marty and there are tears streaming down his face! I said to him...'What are you doing..Crying in my goddam scene!'
Landau explains.....
" Well! I was moved! Tears were just flowing- But I don't think I was on camera!"
After eight seasons and as rating had fallen, the team completed their final mission in February of 1973.. although the series was revived with Peter Graves in the 80's and of course the blockbuster movies with Tom Cruise.. But they are not a patch on the style and quality casting of the original "Missions"......