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Landaus: 1977

Landaus: 1977

Successful any way you look at them

Unknown American newspaper, 1977.

Farrah Fawcett and Lee Majors, Allen Ludden and Betty White, maybe Valerie Harper and Dick Schaal? Which is your favourite TV couple?

One of the most successful husband and wife teams in show business is Barbara Bain and Martin Landau, although they are often left in the shadows of more spotlighted couples.

The Landaus' marriage is a success story in itself. They've been happily wed for 20 years and have two daughters, Susie, 16, and Julie, 10.

They've managed to remain side by side in their successful television careers that include co-starring in two series together.

They teamed in the well-known Mission: Impossible series in which Martin starred for five years and Barbara for six.

The Landaus are filming the second season of Space: 1999. Martin plays Cmdr. John Koenig of Moonbase Alpha, the space when a thermonuclear explosion tore the moon out of Earth's orbit.

Barbara, the winner of three Emmy awards for her Mission: Impossible role, plays Dr. Helena Russell, the cool and professional chief medical officer on the lunar station.

Until now, the writers have been more worried about realism than character development, but the Landaus said this year is different.

"There are lots of changes this year," Martin says, "and they're all for the better, I think. We (the crew) have more humanity, more humour. Last year we spent so much time under duress there was very little chance to develop human relationships."We still have crises, of course," says the 43-year-old actor. "It's still the same basic situation, but having been in space longer, we're more inclined to accept our plight," Martin assures.

One such character development is a budding romance between the commander (Martin) and the medical officer (Barbara). "Why not?" asks Barbara, who adds that after 20 happy years of marriage, "There must be something special about him."

The Landaus loved the idea of the series from the start. "It all started literally when three people came knocking on our door," Barbara says. "They were from ITC (International Television Corp.), and they came complete with scripts, story ideas and an outline of the show. The more we talked, the more exciting the show became.

"We were both concerned about the fact that science fiction is basically a literary form, and we were afraid we couldn't produce the necessary effects to win over sci-fi fans. Thank God for Sir Lew Grade (who originally put up $6.5 million for the show's production) and the creators of the show. They have made the show look like sci-fi. First-class sci-fi."

Space: 1999 is now seen in 101 countries and on 155 U.S. stations. It influenced Norman Lear to try syndication with Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, which also was turned down by the networks.

Landau wasn't upset by the differences of opinion with the networks because even Mission: Impossible had difficulty getting network time.

"It's easy to sell them on variety or Kojak or Baretta," Martin says, "but not something new."

The series has been phenomenally popular, and ironically Hollywood has suddenly taken a great interest in science fiction films- 16 are being made. "One of the reasons Barbara and I wanted to do this show is that we anticipated that this might happen," Martin says.

Martin took some acting assignments for a while that kept him travelling. But he didn't like it because, "I missed Barbara and the girls." Now the happy couple is back together both on the screen and off.

"There's no question about it, we are each other's best friend in the whole world," Barbara coos. "There's an awful lot of luck in the fact that both Martin and I know in some crazy deep way that we're the best for each other. We lucked out!"