ON HALO-ED GROUND! "THE SAINT" MAKES A COMEBACK?

Roger Moore as THE SAINT. Image: ITC/ITV

With a long running and iconic fictional history that matches, and even surpasses, that of his rival, James Bond, the immortal figure of the occasionally anti-establishment, anti-hero Simon Templar, created by Leslie Charteris-otherwise known as THE SAINT- continues to endure as one of the literary worlds most popular heroes of adventure and detective fiction. Like Bond, of whom the role has many recognisably similar characteristics, he's also been portrayed on the radio, film and TV screen by a number of different actors, all of whom have brought their own unique and enjoyable characteristics and identities to the part, from Horror genre supremo Vincent Price, who brought Templar's life on the edge flourishes to vocal reality in the late forties and early fifties on American NBC radio, to the more exciting and memorable visual form, with distinguished English actor George Saunders as the dry, laconic version of the 1950's movies series, not so much a stiff upper lip but more of a drink before crime fighting raison d'etre, followed by Hugh Sinclair, and then onto television, where the character would enjoy the peak of its success, with the ITC black and white, then colour, series of the mid to late sixties, featuring the lead actor whom many still regard as the seminal and iconic portrayal yet of the character-and the man who instantly made it his own without ever having really needed to try very hard (and I mean that as a compliment)-Roger Moore, who seemed tailor made for the role with his handsome looks, mean right fist that sent many a baddie (or stuntman) into the middle of next Thursday, a nice way with the ladies and possessing world travelling enthusiasm heightened with a realist attitude to life. Following on from the huge success of Moore in the role was never going to be easy, but keeper of THE SAINT's TV rights, Robert S. Baker, was determined to get a new series off the ground as the swinging sixties made way to the flair-swishing seventies, the result being the not unsuccessful RETURN OF THE SAINT, again from ITC studios, with the similar looking to Roger Moore actor Ian Ogilvy keeping the crime fighting tradition going for the short lived but bigger budgeted series, which, unlike the Moore episode/novel adaptations, actually did have glossy location filming abroad that wasn't confined to the dreary ELSTREE Studios backlot! Into the late eighties, and in line with darker and more complex times, actor Christopher Neame, a man who could have played the character himself back in the day, captured the series TV rights (with Baker returning as a consultant) and brought suave British actor Simon Dutton into the exclusive SAINT actors club with his portrayal that was almost a kind of precursor to the kind of James Bond interpretation given by Pierce Brosnan, though without the injection of much needed humour. Sadly, the Dutton adventures, a multi-country produced miasma of a series, has now faded into TV history and was sadly not to succeed as the next popular and evolutionary success for the character that audiences had hoped for, and ended up being pretty unremarkable, leaded with some poor scripts and the seemingly harder edged looking lead actor himself not having enough time to develop into the role. It seemed as if the famous adventurer had hung up his halo once and for all...

THE SAINT (Roger Moore) colour titles:YouTube - ‪The Saint - Title Sequence‬‏
THE RETURN OF THE SAINT (Ian Ogilvy) titles:YouTube - ‪Return of the Saint opening‬‏
THE SAINT (Simon Dutton) titles: YouTube - ‪THE SAINT (1989) THIS IS LONDON WEEKEND TELEVISION‬‏
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Yet, as we all know, from the equally diverse histories of other populist heroes like Bond and the evergreen Time Lord, DOCTOR WHO, you can't put a good character down, and news has circulated recently that, despite a prior unsuccessful attempt to get a revival off the ground in 2007/8, popular British star James Purefoy, a fine actor with diverse film and TV credits including SHARPE, SHERLOCK HOLMES, ROME, and the recent INJUSTICE mini-series thriller for ITV, as well as being used to action/adventure with his lead role in SOLOMON KANE, fighting zombies in RESIDENT EVIL and soon appearing in the big budget sci-fi actioner scheduled for next year: JOHN CARTER, is apparently to take up the hallowed role-and a good choice he is, too!- for a new series attempt of re-imagined stories that will hopefully be a success and re-launch the character, and his halo'ed overhead symbol, to much deserved heights of popularity once again. However, whether the same opening storyline from 2008 will be made, involving Templar- a member of a secret and eons old organisation called The Knights of the Templar- going up against a ruthless child slaver businessman, is currently unknown...

The original teaser poster for the so far unmade THE SAINT 2008 TV project to have starred James Purefoy.

Ultimately, we must remember that no matter what the new series, if it does get off the ground, ends up being like, it surely can't be any worse than that dreadful abortion of a SAINT movie from the mid-nineties starring Val Kilmer- an unmitigated disaster that should never have been realised! Nothing can surely ever top that for sheer awfulness!

The complete series of Roger Moore's THE SAINT, and Ian Ogilvy's RETURN OF THE SAINT are available on DVD. Simon Dutton's series is available on DVD only via Australian stockists.