The Best Laid Schemes
CAST:
Sylvia Syms - Arlene
Paul Daneman - Dr. Ormsby
Gabrielle Drake - Diana
Norman Bird - Insp. Mitchell
Fulton Mackay - John Everett
John Tate - Skinner
Godfrey Quigley - Ballard
Francis de Wolff - Capt. Flemming
Olive Milbourne - Mrs. Haggerty
Jonathan Elsom - Andrew
Fredric Abbott - Joe Carney
Geoffrey Lumsden - Coroner
John Ringham - Dr. Russell
Joanne Dainton - Nurse
Erik Mason - Sailor
Directed by John Llewelyn Moxey; Screenplay by Joseph Morhaim & A. Sandford Wolf
STORY:
Old captain Flemming is found dead by his niece at the beach - drowned. Simon witnesses this and offers his help.
Templar delves into a story of deceit
around the captain's fishing company.
What more - the dead captain seems
suddenly not so dead anymore!
OPINION: When first seen this episode is really creepy! Turn down the lights!
NOTES:
* Sylvia Syms also appears in Episodes
#29 "The Noble Sportsman", #42 "Jeaninne" and #109/110 "The Fiction Makers"
* Gabrielle Drake was later a regular of the series "UFO"
* Norman Bird also appears in Episodes #24 "The Well Meaning Mayor", #59 "The Frightened Inn-Keeper" and #103 "The Organization Man"
* Fulton Mackay also appears in Episodes
#77 "The Convenient Monster" and #113/114 "Vendetta
for the Saint"
* John Tate also appears in Episodes
#46 "The Loving Brothers" and #65 "The Crooked Ring"
* Godfrey Quigley also appears in
Episodes #25 "The Sporting Chance", #57 "The Sign of the Claw" and #74 "The Russian Prisoner"
* Fredric Abbott also appears in Episodes
#22 "The Rough Diamonds" (uncredited) and #78 "The Angel's Eye" (credited as Frederick Abbott)
* Geoffrey Lumsden also appears in Episode #116 "The Man Who Gambled with Life"
* Eric Mason also appears in Episode
#85 "Escape Route"
* Note the stand-in on the beach and Roger Moore in front of the blue screen. (0:01)
* Seems like almost the whole funeral
was filmed in the studio. (0:05)
* The double doors were frequently used as a set item in the colour episodes. In this episode a version without gold inlays was used.
* If we already know the solution of the story - why does the captain's wife react like she does in the nightly
"appearance"? Nobody's watching her!? (0:19)
* Niece Diana arrives much too fast
after the scream in the nightly "appearance" of the captain. Seems like
she waited at the top of the stair.
* Look closely at the scene with the knife thrown at the Saint: You'll notice the string and also that it was
filmed backwards. (0:29)
Leslie Charteris, 11th March 1967: <<I have to note that this is yet another script in which the Saint gets involved by sheer wild coincidence, just happening to be on the spot when a body is washed up. The Saint in the stories is always looking for trouble. Are all your writers incapable of devising a plot in which the Saint is intrigued by something he hears, or reads about in the paper, and deliberately sets out to investigate?>> (Barer, p.147)
AIRDATE:
UK: 29th September 1968
GERMAN TITLE:
S.T. und der tote Kapitän
AVAILABLE ON:
* DVD (NTSC): AAE-70465 (2002)
THE SAINT
www.simontemplar.de
Last Updated: 03/23/2018