THE PROFESSIONALS
BOOK
Das Buch zur Serie Die Profis sollte am 1. Mai 2006 erscheinen. Leider mußte der Termin aus organisatorischen Gründen verschoben werden. Mittlerweile ist es erhältlich, und vorbestellte Exemplare wurden bereits am Freitag, dem 28. Juli ausgeliefert.
Regrettably, publication of the Professionals book had to be postponed. (Nothing to do with me really!)
It is available now but as this continues to be a non-commercial site I refer you to the publisher's page:
http://www.schwarzkopf-schwarzkopf.de/film/1/dassachbuch/dieprofis.html
For those who are into this kind of thing, here is a brief history of the book cover.
These two were designed by the lovely Christina Padberg in July 2004. Needless to say they are still my favourites. These are just b/w scans; the logos appeared in colour originally.
This one was briefly mooted by the publisher at the end of 2005. It was rejected for obvious reasons (see how many you can spot!).
This is the preliminary version which made it into the publisher's Spring catalogue.
Final colour version slightly modified by the publisher and agreed upon briefly before printing in Mid-July.
An outline of the contents follows.
Opening the book with a concise history of LWT I move on to explain the "rogue cops" phenomenon of the 1970s, beginning with Dirty Harry and French Connection and relevant American TV shows. This leads into a detailed backgound chapter on British TV cops from Z Cars via The Sweeney to more recent programmes such as Cracker. I then deal with Brian Clemens' previous TV work, the setting up of Mark 1 productions and creating the series format and principal characters. Having covered casting problems and final decisions I move over to biographies of the three leads. A detailed look at the season one/Sidney Hayers era follows; then an equally detailed look at the first Menmuir/O'Hara season, explaining the changes established by the new team and describing all sorts of personnel decisions. An overview of the remaining three seasons is next before I explain how and why the series came to an end and why there were repeat issues due to Martin Shaw's veto.
Chapter three explains camera, editing and narration techniques used in The Professionals as an action series. Chapter four focuses on the content and offers a historical background intro (real-life spies, social unrest, faltering economy etc.) before dealing with the presentation of police work, foreign nationals, women, terrorism and violence in the series.
The following chapters are about censorship (deleted scenes, "creative" dubbing) in Germany and audience reactions/critical reception both in the UK and in Germany respectively. A brief "flashback" essay is next which sums up the previous chapters and poses the question, "Can we love The Professionals without feeling guilty?" The answer, of course, is 'yes' ...
I then discuss all 57 episodes on at least three pages (Operation Susie and No Stone get six, for different reasons: with respect to the first censorship is quite an issue, regarding the second I explain why it is extremely well executed). In addition to a detailed synopsis (which is supposed to give the reader an idea about logic, structure and quality of the story) I include a section about changes applied to the German version and a discussion of what the episode achieves and how it works. Occasionally the latter sections include comments by actors, writers and crew members. For example, Roger Tucker offers an extensive view on Mixed Doubles, we hear about Peter J. Hammond's Heroes experience and share Michael Latimers memories of working on Killer With a Long Arm.
Complete cast and crew lists (including some uncredited parts) follow.
After that the Who Dares Wins movie gets a similar treatment, including a detailed comment from the film's producer, Euan Lloyd.
Chapter 9 picks up the threads from chapter two and starts with background information on The New Professionals: series set-up, casting decisions, topical "new millennium" stories. Although this obviously means walking on thin ice, an attempt is made to compare the "old" and the new series. A final statement from David Wickes rounds off this introduction.
After that all 13 episodes get the synopses and analyses treatment described above (minus a censorship section as there was virtually none).
An extensive "Who's Who" appendix lists filmographies of the leads, of prominent guest artists from Steve Alder to David Yip (screenshots from the series are inserted here to facilitate identification), of writers and selected crew members from Dennis Abey to Christopher Wicking (images are included depending on availability).
The book is illustrated with b/w photos throughout, several hundreds in total, and includes a 16-page colour section with stills, publicity shots and behind-the-scenes-photos from various season 1, 2 and 3 episodes, courtesy of Rex Features Limited.
ERRATA:
Buchrückentext: Nach "gut" fehlt ein Komma, bei "Hunderte" wäre Großschreibung erforderlich.
Innere Umschlagseite (hinten): "Noir-Reader" wird nicht mitkursiviert.
Seite 113: Cowley trinkt Whisky, nicht Bourbon.
Seite 331: Das Bild ist von 2004.
Seite 358: Bildunterschrift fehlt.
Seite 437: In Martin Shaws Filmographie fehlt The Mating Machine.
Seite 539: Es fehlt (ganz oben links) der Eintrag HILL STREET BLUES - Polizeirevier Hill Street.
Seite 540: Daves neue bzw. aktuelle Webadresse ist: http://www.mark-1.co.uk
Seite 541: Der Rex-Fotocredit muß lauten: Farbteil 1-11, 12 (unten), 13-16
This is an unofficial and non-commercial website. The rights to The Professionals are held by Mark 1 Productions (Brian Clemens & Laurie Johnson). The sole purpose of this page is to promote the abovementioned series - no copyright infringement is intended. However, should the copyright holders be unhappy with my use of screenshots the material in question will be removed immediately.
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