THE ADVENTURER

Gene Bradley is an agent with British Intelligence.

I am guessing on the nationality. No agency name, that I know of, is mentioned in the televised adventures of this roving operative but he definitely worked for one as shown by the often uptight, always put-upon Mr. Parminter who directed his missions and had to deal with the stress of dealing with an unorthodox and highly independent agent. But Parminter is British and Bradley is American so it is uncertain as for which country the work is being done.

To the outside world, though, Bradley is a beloved, admired, and well known movie star who uses this obviously quite overt occupation as a cover to hide his covert activities. If one is a world-famous sophisticated jet-setter, it would not be at all surprising to see him pop up anywhere for any reason. Be it a press tour, scouting for new locations, visiting far away love interests, or just traveling on a whim, Bradley's screen persona would afford him the bizarre anonymity of fame.

When we meet him, he has obviously been an agent for some time for his relationship with his "boss" has already been firmly established. The Bradley that we get to know is still in relatively good shape but he is no spring chicken being in his likely late 40's. He is still ruggedly handsome and can still mix it up with the bad guys and charm the fairer sex. One has to wonder how long of a soak in a hot tub he might need after either.

A couple of interesting facts on Bradley very much worth noting. The first is that he is a multi-millionaire and is successful in the business world as well as in front of the camera (merchandising, perhaps?). The other is that he is a pilot and is rated for small planes and helicopters which comes in handy more than once.

The types of missions we will watch and read about his activities vary from investigating murders to smuggling vital secrets and artifacts. Invariably, it seems, there will be a lovely woman involved. Sometimes that lady is the gorgeous and highly skilled Diane Marsh who gets involved in many of his assignments and who shows she can hold her own quite nicely.

I only saw one or two of the actual episodes and that was many years ago so my memory is suspect. What I remember flies in conflict with a couple of articles I found on this series, including one by the terrific spy-television historian Wesley Britton (and I would trust him quicker than I would trust myself). Mr. Britton says that the character Gene Bradley "pretended to be an international film star" in order to carry out his missions. My memory says otherwise and the opening credits for the program shows him at the end of shooting a scene and everyone there obviously knows him and likes him, including the assistant he so patronisingly pats on the head as he leaves the set. [I am trying to get the chance to watch a couple more but am too cheap much for them.]

The stories were fairly standard fare and would have been better served with a younger man playing the agent. Gene Barry, whom I adored in Bat Masterson and Burke's Law and The Name of the Game, was a tad too old to play the character. His suave and smooth demeanor was perfect, of course, but the fight scenes were less than believable. I would have been happier with Stuart Damon (of The Champions fame) who was in the first couple of episodes of the series before being ousted, but then Damon did not have the name recognition in the States that Barry had.

But the show did have Catherine Schell in about half of the episodes so they are worth watching.