1998's Saint and Charteris News

Please e-mail any current news and rumors about The Saint to:
           

December 15, 1998: Death of a Saint, part two

Lord Lew Grade, the founder of ATV, passed away this past weekend at age 91. See the story below, and check out the BBC's story for more details and a picture.

Entertainment Tycoon Lew Grade Dies

LONDON (AP) - Entertainment tycoon Lew Grade, who gave up an early dancing career and eventually founded Britain's first commercially funded television company, died Sunday. He was 91.

Grade, whose projects included the TV series ``The Saint,'' and the movie ``On Golden Pond,'' died of heart failure at the London Clinic two weeks after undergoing surgery, said his spokesman Dennis Michael.

The cigar-chomping Grade, a Jewish immigrant from Ukraine, started a small showbiz agency in 1934.

Twenty-one years later he founded Associated Television, the first commercially funded channel launched in Britain to compete with the British Broadcasting Corp.

Grade, who was knighted in 1963 and given a life peerage in 1976, worked for 70 years - with a string of TV hits, some movie flops, fantastic deal-making skills and memorable one-liners.

Of perhaps his most expensive box office flop - ``Raise the Titanic,'' which cost $30 million to make in 1980 - he quipped, ``It would have been cheaper to lower the Atlantic.''

Born Louis Winogradsky on Dec. 25, 1906, in Tokmak, Ukraine, he came to London with his parents at age 6. His family became a showbiz dynasty - one nephew heads Britain's Channel 4 and a brother ran a music and electronics business.

After school, as Louis Grad, he took up dancing, becoming the World Charleston Champion in 1926. In 1929 a French journalist misspelled his name - and Lew Grade stuck.

ATV dominated much of British popular television through the 50s, 60s and 70s.

He is survived by his wife, the former Kathleen Moody, his son, and two grandchildren. Funeral arrangements were not immediately announced.

December 1, 1998: The Saint on American TV

Encore's Mystery Channel begins airing The Saint TV series with Roger Moore today. The show will air from 4:30pm EST Monday through Thursday. The episodes will be shown in uncut digital quality and commercial free. The first episode will the "The Talented Husband", and it appears that Encore will be showing them in order after that.

Encore is available on some cable systems and on DirecTV at channel 234.

November 9, 1998: Death of a Saint

The actor who played The Saint in the 1966 film, "Le Saint Prend L'Affut (The Saint Lies in Wait)", passed away last week. See the story below, and check out Yahoo's AP feed for more details and a picture.

Veteran French actor Jean Marais dies at 84
11:23 a.m. Nov 09, 1998 Eastern

NICE, France, Nov 9 (Reuters) - Veteran French film and theatre actor Jean Marais has died, friends said on Monday. He was 84.

They said he died in hospital in the Riviera resort of Cannes early on Sunday.

Marais' best-known role was as the fierce-looking but kind-hearted beast in ``Beauty and the Beast,'' an internationally-acclaimed fantasy directed in 1946 by poet Jean Cocteau, his mentor and long-time companion.

His relationship with Cocteau was unknown to the public at large and Marais' spectacular good looks made him a heartthrob for French teenage girls in the early years of his long career.

His last film appearance was three years ago in Bernardo Bertolucci's ``Stolen Beauty.''

He appeared in dozens of classical plays, wrote several books and was also a talented sculptor.

Although he starred in films during the 1940-1944 German occupation of France, Marais joined General Philippe Leclerc's French Second Armoured Division after the liberation of Paris and participated in the Allied push into Germany as driver of lorries delivering petrol and ammunition to the front, often under fire.

October 7, 1998: Order The Saint Today

You can now order the following Saintly music CD's and movies from Amazon.com:

Videos:

• The Saint (Val Kilmer), DVD Region 1
• The Saint (Val Kilmer), Laserdisc Widescreen
• The Saint (Val Kilmer), VHS Letterbox Widescreen
• The Saint (Val Kilmer), VHS NTSC format
• The Saint (Val Kilmer), VHS NTSC with Spanish Subtitles
• The Saint (Roger Moore) Volume 1, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint (Roger Moore) Volume 2, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint (Roger Moore) Volume 3, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint (Roger Moore) Volume 4, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint And The Fiction Makers (Roger Moore), VHS NTSC format
• The Saint in New York/The Saint Strikes Back, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint in London/The Saint's Double Trouble, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint Takes Over/The Saint's Vacation, VHS NTSC format
• The Saint in Palm Springs/The Saint Meets The Tiger, VHS NTSC format

Music:

• Music from the TV Series 'The Saint'
• 'The Saint' Movie Soundtrack
• Orbital's CD-Single of 'The Saint'
• The Original Classical Score to 'The Saint' movie

Most of the music pages have sound excerpts on them; you will need RealAudio Player to hear them.

October 6, 1998: The Saint DVD Release

On October 6th Paramount released the DVD of The Saint, starring Val Kilmer for $29.99. The video has a running time of 118 minutes and is Closed Captioned.

The DVD also features:

• Widescreen 2.35:1 aspect ratio, enhanced for 16x9 TVs
• Languages: English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, English Dolby Surround, French Dolby Surround
• Spanish subtitles
• Theatrical trailer

September 25, 1998: Capture the Saint Going Fast

"Capture The Saint" is only available through a limited edition from The Saint Club. Order "Capture The Saint" today! All proceeds go to charity.

We are down to the last batch-o-books at this bargain price -- people should order NOW while they can!

August 25, 1998: Saint Auction on eBay

I am testing the eBay auction house waters by listing a couple of Saintly items. Check them out, and don't forget to put in your highest bid!

• Four unopened packs of The Saint gum cards
• Roger Moore display for The Saint gum cards

August 14, 1998: Paramount Sets Launch Of DVD Movies

HOLLYWOOD, Calif. (Reuters) - Paramount Pictures' home video division said it will premiere a new line of movies on digital videodisc (DVD) this October, with 10 hits led by a "Star Trek" movie and recent action hit "Face/Off."

Paramount, the film studio arm of Viacom has been slow to adopt DVD as it has waited for copyright issues to be resolved, so its entry into the marketplace is a strong endorsement for the emerging medium.

DVD is targeted to viewers who want to upgrade home movie watching with the crisper sound and clearer picture that the digital format provides.

Paramount's titles will sell for the suggested retail price of $29.99 in the United States and C$39.99 in Canada.

On October 6, Paramount will release "Star Trek: First Contact," "Face/Off," "The Saint," "Kiss the Girls" and "Twilight." Following the initial group, on October 20, it will release "Top Gun," "Clear and Present Danger," "Primal Fear," "In & Out" and "Neil Simon's The Odd Couple II." Fifteen more titles will be released in November and December.

August 10, 1998: Search Amazon.com Today!

Search: Books Popular Music Classical Music Video	Enter keywords...

July 31, 1998: Barer on True Crime

Saintly author Burl Barer will appear on the special TRUE CRIME panel this year at the World Mystery Convention, Oct 1-4th, in Philadelphia, PA, USA. He will also be signing THE SAINT and Capture the Saint for the several thousands mystery fans who attend this annual event.

July 17, 1998: RKO Saint

RKO, still holding remake rights to all their original Saint and Falcon movies, recently turned to acclaimed television producer Norman Stevens for help developing these properties. Stevens, in turn, consulted with the hit TV writing team of Lee Goldberg and William Rabkin (Diagnosis Murder).

According to inside sources, Goldberg and Rabkin passed on The Saint because Simon Templar's adventures for RKO could only be movies for TV or theater, and not a TV series of hour long weekly shows. They have, however, reportedly accepted the challenge of developing THE FALCON as a proposed series.

It should be noted that Lee Goldberg is the nephew of Saintly author Burl Barer (THE SAINT: A COMPLETE HISTORY, CAPTURE THE SAINT, and THE SAINT-- movie tie-in novel).

July 15, 1998: The Saint on Radio

The Saint returns to American radio in July and August.

Syndicated old-time radio show WHEN RADIO WAS is running "Fishes Gotta Eat", an episode starring Vincent Price as the Saint that was first broadcast on April 29th 1951, on July 16th.

And the August 29th weekend edition of the show features another exciting epsiode of... The Saint.

Check out www.radiospirits.com for more information

July 1, 1998: The French Saint

Belgian publisher Claude Lefrancq are taking a break from reprinting the adventures of the Saint in an individual pocket book format and have just published their first Saintly omnibus.

"Le Saint 1" features "Le Saint a New York", "L'heroique aventure", "Les anges des tenebres" and "La justice du Saint" all under one cover. The book also features an introduction by Francis Valery and in the centre pages, color reproductions of some of the early Fayard covers.

Further volumes are planned.

June 11, 1998: Satellite Saint

The Satellite Times has reported that "The Saint"'s U.S. Pay-Television rights have been purchased by Encore Media Group. EMG operates the Encore Muliplex channels, a premium package of themed networks. One of them is the Mystery Channel, which "The Saint" would most likely be on. Other programs that have been shown on the Mystery Channel are, "The Avengers," "The Alfred Hitchcock Hour" and "Danger Man/Secret Agent."

June 4, 1998: Return of the Saint on Granada Plus

Granada Plus is now showing 'Return of The Saint' with Ian Oglivy, and you can also send 'Return of The Saint' postcards to your friends and family from their website... Check out http://www.gsb.co.uk/plus/action/returnsaint/setframe-home.html for complete details!

May 26, 1998: Buy a Volvo C70 Today!

Volvo has launched a special C70 sitelet to promote their Saintly new sports coupe. The C70, as seen in The Saint movie, is now fairly well available from many Volvo dealers. It will move in ways Volvo never has.

For more pictures, and a detailed review of the C70, read Chief Inspector Teal's report on an incident he had with Simon Templar and his new Volvo C70 turbo coupe.

Also be sure to read about Volvo's convertibles throughtout the years. Some of them are extremely worthy of The Saint's attention!

Click here for the Volvo C70

May 22, 1998: Award the Saint

Capture the Saint, the new Saint novel by Edgar Award winning author Burl Barer, is currently under consideration for the prestigious Spotted Owl Award (no joke!). The Spotted Owl is presented yearly for the best mystery novel by a Northwest author (Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and British Columbia). The winner is selected by a special committee of Friends of Mystery.

May 21, 1998: Cars of the Stars

One of the actual Volvo P1800s used in The Saint television show is housed at the Cars of the Stars museum in England. The Saints Volvo (NUV) has been out and about recently. It has just come back from Belgium and was in Sweden before that. Number plate 77 GYL is currently planned for one of the Chitty Chitty Bang Bangs to make it road legal. It should go back on the original car (which has been registered 132 NOU for over 20 years) but it means doing some repairs to the clutch and gearbox to get it through an MOT. It doesn't seem worth it as NUV is the show car and 77 is the museum car (it hasn't been on the road for at least 5 years).

May 20, 1998: Painting Search

Roger Moore was given a painting of himself in a white Volvo by the well-known motoring artist, Michael Turner, in the 1960's. David Cleary is a client and friend on Michael and he has been trying to locate the picture to take some colour shots of it (he only has B&Ws). David has asked a Roger Moore fan (Mike Jones in the UK) to try and find out from Roger, but can anybody else help? A picture of Micheal, Roger, the picture, Jim Clark, and Graham Hill can be seen in the book "The Motorsport Art of Michael Turner".

May 4, 1998: Updated Statistics for www.saint.org

The Saint's web site at http://www.saint.org/ has been up and running for over 900 days, and the log file contains over 3.3 million entries! Using Analog 2.11 for Macintosh, I have compiled and posted a complete statistical usage report for www.saint.org through April 30th, 1998. I have also compiled the statistics for 1997, as well as the past month, seperately for even more detail.

May 2, 1998: The Saint's Volvo Convertible

We all know about The Saint's long history with Volvo. Roger Moore drove a white P1800, and Val Kilmer speeds around in a red C70 coupe. But what if The Saint wanted to drive a convertible? The words Volvo and convertible don't exactly roll off the tongue. Well, be sure to read about Volvo's convertibles throughtout the years. Some of them are extremely worthy of The Saint's attention!

May 1, 1998: Saint Books for Sale

For those of you interested in buying some Saint books, I still have some lots available on my sales shelves. Otherwise, search Amazon.com for books that you would like to buy.

April 16, 1998: A Review of CAPTURE THE SAINT by Harriet Klausner

CAPTURE THE SAINT
Burl Barer
The Saint Club, 240 pp.

Simon Templar is visiting Seattle to watch the filming of his book, The Pirate. Better known as the Saint, Simon soon finds himself the recipient of three job offers. Viola Berkman, who The Saint rescued when she was a child, pleads with her hero to help bring down and end a child-porno/prostitute ring involving a bad cop named Talon. Salvadore Alisdare has given Simon a ten thousand dollar check to obtain his services in finding the lost Costello Treasure. Police detective Dexter Talon wants Simon to eliminate a blackmailer named Salvadore. Then there is the local fan club in the persons of Ian and Dan.

The suave, sophisticated, but most deadly Simon accepts all three cases and the fan adulation, but on his terms. Simon soon weaves the cases together because, in his brilliant mind, justice must be served above all else.

This reviewer remembers Roger Moore (pre-Bond days) as Templar and the Charteris novels and after last year's disappointing film, expected very little from this novel. However, instead, Burl Barer captures the essence of the original Saint in all his witty fascination. The story line is extremely humorous and fast-paced, and the three sub-plots brilliantly tie together into a cohesive, wonderful tale. The support cast adds much flavor as both the criminals and the good guys push the story forward. Mr. Barer has brilliantly written a rendition of Simon Templar that feels as if Mr. Charteris simply updated his character for the nineties while keeping the essence of his star intact. The lead protagonist alone makes this novel a must read for fans of the "Brightest Buccaneer". Throw in a well-written and jocular story line on top of that and you have a novel that is must reading for all mystery lovers.

"Capture The Saint" is only available through a limited edition from The Saint Club. Order "Capture The Saint" today! All proceeds go to charity.

April 11, 1998: Sotheby's Saint Auction Report

Thought you might like to know that the original Saint doodles from Paul Simper's Saint book have just been autioned off at Sotheby's for charity. The doodles netted £550 for UNICEF, which was substantially more than Ian the Cynic thought they would bring.

April 4, 1998: The Saint Club Goes Down Under

The Saint Club, that august institution with branches in England and America, has gone down under and opened it's first Australian branch, OzSaint, run by two longtime Saint fans. Please visit OzSaint's web site at http://users.hunterlink.net.au/~lmcvd/saint/saint.htm to see what The Saint looks like upside-down.

For more information about OzSaint please contact:

Ian Golledge
Honorary Secretary, OzSaint
2/9 Bedser Street
MACGREGOR QLD 4109
Australia

E-mail: i.golledge@qut.edu.au

March 30, 1998: Saint Simon's Dangerous Beauty

Simon Dutton's (star of the six made-for-TV Saint movies in the 1980's) latest movie was released last month in the United States.

Dangerous Beauty is set in the 16th century and was filmed on location in Rome and Venice. It stars Rufus Sewell and Jacqueline Bisset and is directed by Marshall Herskovitz (Thirtysomething) and is based on the book The Honest Courtesan by Margaret Rosenthal.

The film's web site is at http://www.newregency.com/dangerous/

March 25, 1998: HBO Saint

THE SAINT, starring Val Kilmer and Elisabeth Shue will premiere on Home Box Office (HBO) next Saturday, April 4th. A complete schedule of airings lists all the times that you can catch the Saint!

The Kilmer flick also premieres in Europe on Sky Box Office 4 (one of Sky's pay-per-view movie channels) at 20:00 (with repeats at 22:00 and 04:00) on Wednesday April 22nd.

March 24, 1998: The Return of the Saint

The Saint's web site is proud to announce the addition of a few web pages dedicated to the Saint himself, Ian Ogilvy. Ogilvy, a Vice-President of the Saint Club and star of Return of the Saint, has given his kind permission and helped supply materials for the page. It will carry all the latest news on his acting and writing careers as well as features on his past work, such as Menace Unseen. Check out Ian's page at http://www.saint.org/ogilvy.htm today!

March 18, 1998: The Saint on British Television

Granada Plus, a cable and satellite channel in the UK, will be showing the Roger Moore Saint series three times a day starting on the 1st of April, 1998. Granada Plus' web site will be featuring The Saint soon, so check it out for more information.

March 16, 1998: The Saint on Video

THE SAINT, starring Val Kilmer and Elisabeth Shue was officially released to stores Tuesday, March 10, 1998. This is an affordable video, aimed at the consumer market. Reports have come in that Walmart, for one, had it on the shelves on Monday. Prices generally range from $9.95 to $14.95, but CostCo has it for $8.89!

March 11, 1998: Latest Saint FAQ

The latest version of The Saint FAQ is now available. I have updated it to note that Paramount's studio store still has a small Saint pin for sale, but the price has gone up to $9.00 plus $2.00 for shipping and handling.

March 4, 1998: Gentleman Thief Reading Material

If you like Leslie Charteris' Saint series, check out our list of suggested books for those of you who like the Gentleman Thief genre of writing.

I would also like to mention that the book "To Catch a Thief" by David Dodge is quite good, but it is currently out of print. The last publishing that I've heard about is a British "Mastercrime" series pressing in 1988.

Also of note, a reader wrote in to tell of the recent glut of "cat burglar" scripts in Hollywood. Our mysterious friend is a sometimes screenwriter, and by having his ear close to the ground, he has uncovered a script based on the old "It Takes a Thief" TV show. He also informs us of another "burglarly film" already in production with Sean Connery, directed by Antoine Fuqua (of "The Replacement Killers" fame). Please don't talk to me about "Lassiter"... or even "Burglar" for that matter... "Hudson Hawk"?

February 23, 1998: Discover Roger Moore

Roger Moore will be narrating the Discovery Channel's 3-hour special on the deadly secret world of spies tonight at 8:00pm Pacific (9:00pm Eastern). Entitled, "Spy Tek", the show will dig into the high technology devices that every super spy must wear to be dressed to kill. Gadgets will include poison pill glasses, the infamous tie camera, pen transmitters, a wristwatch microphone, and the ever-popular concealed push dagger in the shoe.

The special will air again on Sunday, March 1, at 4:00pm.

February 20, 1998: French Rental

LE SAINT will be available for video rental, in France, next month.

February 11, 1998: More Rave Reviews for Capture the Saint

Here are just a couple of the most recent reviews for the new Saint novel, "Capture the Saint", by Burl Barer.

"The real Saint is back! It's great to find our devil-may-care buccaneer back in action and his exploits described in the Chronicler's patented wry and witty style. A splendid job!"
-- Tom Millstead, Chicago

"If Charteris read this book, he'd probably think he wrote it himself! I loved it!"
-- Delmo Walters, Jr., New York

"Capture The Saint" is only available through a limited edition from The Saint Club. Order "Capture The Saint" today! All proceeds go to charity.

January 28, 1998: Ian Ogilvy on Diagnosis Murder

Ian Ogilvy is guest-starring in a February sweeps (one of the three key ratings periods on American TV) episode of Diagnosis Murder entitled TALKED TO DEATH. He plays a talkshow host in the Jerry Springer-mold. In the episode, famed American talkshow hosts Regis Philbin and Kathy Lee Gifford portray thinly-veiled versions of themselves... and Regis guns down Kathy lee (fullfilling the dreams of millions of Americans). Ian is suspected of putting real bullets in Regis' prop gun. Ian previously guest-starred in an episode of Diagnosis Murder that spoofed the TV series ER.

January 27, 1998: Alan Arnold

Longtime members of the Saint Club may remember the name of Alan Arnold, who passed away recently. Alan was the Honorary Secretary of the Saint Club for most of the 1980s, having picked up the job when longstanding secretary Norman Turner died. Apart from taking care of the Saint Club for many years Alan and his wife Pat were kept busy running the Hailebury Youth Centre in Stepney. A Saint fan since childhood Alan boasted an impressive collection of first editions, and a hagiographic knowledge of the life and times of the Arbour Youth Centre.

Alan turned over the Saint Club to the current Honorary Secretary, Ian Dickerson, in 1988.

January 24, 1998: The Saint Writes On

Ian Ogilvy, the star of The Return of The Saint, continues to carve out a career for himself as a writer. His first novel, "Loose Chippings," a satire about what happens to a small village in the Cotswolds when an American evangelist moves in, was well received. The follow-up, "The Polkerton Giant" was published in October and tells the tale of an enormous chalk drawing on the hillside that may have the gift of fertility.

"The Polkerton Giant" is now available in hardback from all good booksellers (price £17.99). It's due in paperback this April (price £5.99). Ian's books are available from the Internet Bookshop.

The Polkerton Giant - a vast, Paleolithic chalk outline on the side of an obscure hill in the West of England - becomes (after millenia of indifference by the locals) the sudden focal point of their interest. One group wants it obliterated, on the grounds that the frank depiction of its aroused genitals is causing the moral decline of Somerset youth; another is passionate to preserve it on historical grounds; a third group, militantly feminist, would like to alter its sex - with the help of shovels and some white paint - in their favor. Of course, it all ends in tears...

January 23, 1998: The Saint on Video

The latest information that we have is a Tuesday, March 10, 1998 release date for the The Saint to be available to purchase on video.

January 22, 1998: The Saint on French TV

French channel M6 is currently showing the Roger Moore series of The Saint every weekday at 11am. The schedule can be found at http://www.m6.fr/siteV2/noshock/bientot/prog/programme.htm

January 21, 1998: Roger Moore and the Spice Girls

The Electronic Telegraph has an interesting article about Roger Moore and his connection to the new Spice Girls movie. The article also features a nice collection of links for Roger Moore fans.

January 15, 1998: Burl's Books In Print

"The Saint--A Complete History in Print, Radio, Film and Television" by Burl Barer has just had another print run, so it is available again. Order yours today!

For those of you on more restrictive budgets, "Capture The Saint" is still available directly from The Saint Club for only $15.00. And for those of you who haven't read Burl Barer's novelization of the Saint movie, you can order "The Saint" from Amazon.com for only $4.79.

January 14, 1998: Blockbuster Saint Glass

Blockbuster Video has an offer for a Saint glass. You must rent a couple of movies, and buy a couple of sodas, and you can get a free commemorative glass from a number of different movies. One of the choices is The Saint. The glass has the Blockbuster logo on one side and a logo for The Saint on the other, along with the words "now on video".

January 14, 1998: Bravo Stops The Saint

On a sad note for our Canadian fans, Bravo TV stopped airing "The Saint" episodes last week. It has been replaced with "Fame", at least for the next week anyways. If anyone knows of US or Canadian airings of the Roger Moore series, please write to me with any details available.

January 12, 1998: Simper's Sotheby's Auction

The auction of the Saintly illustrations from Paul Simper's book, The Saint: From Big Screen to Small Screen and Back Again, (with all proceeds going to UNICEF) is scheduled for March 18th, 1998.

For those of you interested in the 15 doodles, including ones by Roger Moore and Lord Grade, the auction will be held by Sotheby's. Their catalogues, probably priced at around £15, are available from any branch of Sotheby's or by calling their catalogue subscription department (in London) on 0171 293 6441. Catalogues should be available in late February. Phone bids will be accepted.

January 10, 1998: Updated Statistics for www.saint.org

The Saint's web site at http://www.saint.org/ has been up and running for over 800 days, and the log file contains over 2.7 million entries! Using Analog 2.11 for Macintosh, I have compiled and posted a complete statistical usage report for www.saint.org through December 31st, 1997. I have also compiled the statistics for 1997, as well as the past month, seperately for even more detail.

News and Rumors Archives

If you want more Saint news, there was lots of news in 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005, 2004, 2003, 2002, 2001, 2000, 1999, 1998, late 1997, early 1997, 1996, and 1995. As always, be sure to check The Saint's News and Rumors Blog on a regular basis.