Barbara Bain and Peter Graves in Mission: Impossible

Barbara Bain enjoyed playing many
roles in Mission: Impossible

come in and then he had various struggles
with the Powers That Be because I was an
unknown actress. They were looking for
a particular think: in television in those
days there were very few roles for women.
Women either said, 'Yes dear, no dear'
and stirred a pot, or they were the dance
hall hostess or the helpless female in
Western. Not very challenging. Bruce
wrote a woman who was intelligent and
up there playing with the big boys. It was
an interesting moment in Hollywood."
��One aspect of the character that attracted
Barbara was the number of different dis-
guises she would assume. "It grew into a
really exciting role because the writers
started writing parts within the part for
me. That became a romance between
producers, writers and actress as they
would always think of something new to
try, and I was ecstatic. It was great fun,
and an oppurtunity to have a wide range
of things to play. I had the best of all
worlds; I was playing a sophisticated at-
tractive part and within that I'd be some
Russian or a German or whatever."

In Good Hands

��Barbara has only praise for the produc-
tion team, whose professionalism and
dedication made the series such a joy to
work on. "There was a feeling from the ac-
tors that we were in good hands because
they cared about every detail; when a
script came down it was polished and
ready to go. Very seldom were we unclear
about anything, and that means a lot when
you're working around the clock, finish-
ing one episode and then starting another.
��"Only once during the first season --
and it never happened again -- a script
came down which we were starting the
next and there was a discrepancy in
one of the characters that I was playing as
Cinnamon. I went upstairs to their offices
 and asked about it, and they were just then
amending it.
��"Bruce was a very demanding producer,
and insisted on taking the time he felt was
necessary; he was clear on what he wanted
and wouldn't settle for less. When we
came to film the pilot, he was insistent that
he wanted John Halton, who was one of
the most revered men in camerawork, to
work on it. John had retired to Italy to
paint, and Bruce asked him to come out of
retirement to do the show, and he did. John
Halton set the style, and it was followed.
It was rare to have a man like that involved
in a television pilot. The lighting on me
that John had set was particularly gor-
geous. If we were in tunnels, the poor guys
would have shadows on them but I always
had perfect light wherever I was. Bruce
made that decision even though there
wouldn't have actually been a light source
in reality. He just wanted me to look good.
If he took licence in any way, there was
reason for it."

On Location

��Although the stories in Mission: Im-
possible were set across the globe, the
production crew never strayed far for
location filming. "We filmed here in
Southern California, with one day out on
location each show. All those exotic
Eastern European or South American
locations were various buildings here in
Pasadena and so on, redressed by the set
guys. There's plenty of suitable architec-
ture here."
��Barbara's fondness for the series is quite
evident. That being the case, why did she
leave after series three? "That's a long
murky stort that's only been told once. It
was a complex misunderstanding mainly
on the part of Paramount Studios in rela-
tion to contracts. A lot of things that were
said aren't true: it wasn't a money issue.
It was something to do with an approach

 that was made concerning Martin's con-
tract--it had nothing to do with mine--
and I got caught in the cross-fire. We went
through some very unpleasant litigation
on both parts, which kept me from work-
ing for a year and kept me in lawyers of-
fices.
��"At the same time Bruce was asked to
leave, and he had created it. It was a sad
ending to a really glorious time."

The Next Generation

��When Mission: Impossible was resur-
rected for a new generation, had any
desire been expressed to bring back Cin-
namon? "I was approached. I don't want
to smash anybody's efforts, but we did
Mission: Impossible and we did it well
when we did it. I didn't seen any reason to
do it again, less well. The remake was
born out of a really negative situation, as
it came out of the writers' strike. What
they did was start by taking old scripts and
re-shooting them, then when the strike
was over they started to write new ones.
That wasn't the best way to begin a
project."

Planning 1999

��In the early 1970s, Gerry and Sylvia
Anderson were commissioned by Lew
Grade to create a successor to UFO.
Space: 1999 was to be made in England
but tailored for the American market, and
so needed the attraction of two American
performers in the lead roles of John
Koenig and Helena Russell. The Ander-
sons flew out to Los Angeles to meet Mar-
tin Landau and Barbara Bain. "They came
to visit us with this quite extraordinary
idea," Barbara recalls. "It seemed a very
interesting project, and their past creden-
tials were very good. We talked and talked
about it, and came to terms and it looked
very promising. Many other projects had
Protective partners in the less enjoyable second Space: 1999 season
Helena, John, Maya, Tony and Alan
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