DEFYING GRAVITY

Hustle - Series seven, Episode six. Mickey (Adrian Lester) and the gang must retrieve diamonds stolen by Cool Hand Cooper (Shaun Dooley) But these diamonds are buried beneath a busy police station and they belong to a humorless mafia boss who wants them back. Meanwhile, a woman named Susan (Hannah Gordon) is in London to bring Albert (Robert Vaughn) a shocking revelation.

Series seven of BBC One's con artist hit drama finished yesterday on a rather sour note, with an episode written by Hustle supremo Tony Jordan and directed by Colin Teague. Kudos to Twitterers who recognised Blue Streak (1999) as the basis of the intrigue, because your humble servant has been spared most of Martin Lawrence's filmography. But actually the heist was far from relevant and the twist, as usual, was beyond the notion of suspension of disbelief. The real deal was all about Albert Stroller in a personal situation unrelated to the main story.

Most of us believed Albert was victim of a con, tied (or not) to the diamond heist, but nothing like that. It was truly personal and lead to the dramatic open end brought by Sting's Shape of My Heart, one of those songs often heard in US shows - with Hallelujah or Somewhere over the Rainbow. All this gave the impression that we were prepared for the possible departure of Mr Robert Vaughn, should this screen legend decide to not return for another series.

And why there would not be another series? Without hype and with minimum promo, Hustle (like New Tricks) still manages to draw deservedly solid ratings and has a loyal following. Both which could be envied by some recent big budget flops.

THE OCEAN 14 AFFAIR

[12.03 - French Time] Borys Kit reports in his Heat Vision blog that Steven Soderbergh (Erin Brockovich, Ocean's Eleven) is in early talks to direct the long-in-development movie adaptation of the cult classic The Man From U.N.C.L.E. TV series.

The original Man from U.N.C.L.E. ran on NBC from 1964 to 1968 and was a product of the 60s James Bond craze. It followed the adventures of two spies, Napoleon Solo (Robert Vaughn) and Illya Kuriakin (David McCallum), working for U.N.C.L.E. (United Network Command for Law and Enforcement). They received their assignments from Alexander Waverly (Leo G. Carroll) and fought an evil organization named Thrush.

In the heyday of the show, co-producer MGM released theatrical movie compilations of episodes with extra footage and there was a spin-off series, The Girl from U.N.C.L.E. (1966-1967), with Stefanie Powers as April Dancer. Solo & Kuriakin and Dancer even appeared respectively in two episodes of a NBC/MGM sitcom called Please don't eat the Daisies (1965-1967).

Vaughn and McCallum returned as the U.N.C.L.E. agents in The Return of The Man from U.N.C.L.E. - The Fifteen Years Later Affair, a 1983 backdoor pilot for CBS, which unfortunately didn't pick up the series. Three years later they played "disguised" versions of their characters in an episode of The A-Team's fifth season - where Robert Vaughn was a regular.

With Steven Soderbergh helming the 2010 U.N.C.L.E. movie project for Warner Bros, does that mean we can expect George Clooney as Napoleon and Matt Damon as Illya? Clooney would not be a bad choice at all for the cool and suave Mr Solo, as long as Soderbergh's film doesn't recall the painful memory of the calamitous 2002 cinema adaptation of I Spy with Eddie Murphy.

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/blogs/heat-vision/steven-soderbergh-man-uncle-46007

See also:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iC88U1SyQQw