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Spy
Catcher
BBC
1959 - 1961
A series of true stories of the search for spies in wartime based
on the experiences of Lieutenant-Colonel Oreste Pinto
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TX
: 3rd September 1959
Publicity : Robert Barr Introduces "Spycatcher"
- The series of adventure stories which begans at 8:45pm
tonight tells how Colonel Oreste Pinto and his team
of investigators sorted out, among the stream of war-time
refugees arriving in Britain, those who were genuine
and those who were spies:
During the war, when I was attached to General Eisenhower's
personal staff, I sometimes saw a Dutch Intelligence
officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Pinto, visit the camp to
make personal reports. General Eisenhower once referred
to him as "the greatest living expert in security".
Oreste Pinto, a lean, kindly Dutchman and an excellent
story-teller, began his Secret Service career with the
Deuxieme Bureau, the French equivalent of M.I.5, and
at the outbreak of war was engaged in counter-intelligence
work for Britain. With the German occupation of Europe
there began a steady flow, at times it was a flood,
of refugees into Britain. Most of them were determined
anti-NAZIs - young man from the disbanded armies, and
fishermen - welcome recruits for the newly-formed Free
Forces. But as this flow of refugees continued it became
clear to British counter-intelligence that since the
Germans could not stop the escapes, at least they could
use them to infiltrate spies into Britain.
So every refugee and escaper who arrived in Britain,
whether by cockleshell boat across the North Sea, or
by the long overland routes to Gibraltar and Lison,
was brought before Colonel Pinto's team of interrogators
for "screening". Here, in makeshift premises
in London, their stories were heard and their few possessions
were minutely examined. And it was here that the smallest
possessions - a forgotten bus ticket, the old-fashioned
watch, the pocket English dictionary, or the odd cigarettes
- were made to give up their secrets. The problems facing
the counter-intelligence team were infinite: the spies
had to be caught before they could engage in espionage;
only a tiny fraction of the escapers were potential
spies, and the others must not be made to feel that
that they had escaped from one Gestapo only to fall
into the hands of another; often the most patriotic
of the refugees vouched unwittingly for the spy who
had travelled with them.
The record of Colonel Pinto and his team in trapping
the spies who came to Britain is exceptional and is
fully described in Colonel Pinto's two excellent books
Spycatcher and Friend Or Foe? which tell in exciting
detail both the methods and intentions of the spies
and the patience and experience required to trap them.
Every efficient spy, says Colonel Pinto, would have
a plausible and well-supported story. Only the ability
of the interrogator to probe beneath the surface could
succeed in breaking the spy's story. Colonel Pinto lists
the following qualifications "for a successful
spycatcher": a phenomenal memory, patience and
regard for detail, a gift for languages, courage, a
detailed knowledge of the capitals and towns of the
world, a thorough knowledge of international law, a
gift for detection, and a long experience of the methods
and tricks of spies.
The six stories of the series have been chosen to show
these qualities in action. Most of the stories deal
with agents who came to Britain at great risk and determined
to spy - but not all of them! In choosing the stories
I have tried to put the viewer in the same quandary
as the spycatcher, for in at least two cases the suspect
was finally proved innocent, although in one case you
might not agree! (Radio Times, August 28, 1959 - Article
by Robert Barr).
Notes : Episodes were originally transmitted
8:45pm to 9:15pm on BBC 1.
TX
: 10th September 1959
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 17th September 1959
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 24th September 1959
TX
: 1st October 1959
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 8th October 1959
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 18th February 1960
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 25th February 1960
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 3rd March 1960
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 10th March 1960
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 17th March 1960
Notes
: This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 24th March 1960
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 31st March 1960
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 4th October 1960
TX
: 11th October 1960
Notes : This episode remains in the archives.
TX
: 18th October 1960
TX
: 25th October 1960
TX
: 1st November 1960
TX
: 8th November 1960
TX
: 2nd May 1961
TX
: 9th May 1961
TX
: 16th May 1961
Publicity : Bernard Archard - The Man Who Plays
Pinto: In tonight's Spycatcher episode you will again
see a man who has come to Britain from wartime Occupied
Europe being interrogated over an official desk. The
verbal duel could mean life or death. The man who asks
the questions combines the sympathy and dignity of a
friendly headmaster with the calculated charm and evasiveness
of a bank manager secretly appraising an applicant for
an overdraft. Such as Lieutenant-Colonel Oreste Pinto,
of the Allied Counter-Intelligence Service, as we meet
him in the person of thirty-nine-year-old actor Bernard
Archard. Tonight's story is the third in the final series
of Spycatcher, based on the Colonel's wartime memoirs,
and it marks a further march in the astonishing career
of Bernard Archard himself. Two years ago the actor
who confessed to me that he has now given up swimming
because autograph hunters spot him even in bathing trunks,
was an "unknown". Not even a RADA scholarship
and years in the hard school of "Rep" had
won him as much as a competence. "When the chance
of Spycatcher came along," said Bernard, "I
was within ten years of emigrating to Canada".
Said Robert Barr, scriptwriter of the series: "Producer
Terence Cook and I knew that Colonel Pinto - aged about
forty - was a star part, but we wanted an `unknown'
to play it. Agents laughed. No one of star value, they
said, could possibly have reached that age without being
a star". Luckily for Bernard Archard, someone in
the BBC had spotted him back in 1958 as a minor Coal
Board official in a television commentary on open-cast
mining. He was sent for. "We liked him," said
Robert Carr, "because for one thing, he could sit
still. Spycatcher is a continious trial scene - always
a winner in television - boiled down to essentials.
Pinto is judge, jury, and prosecuting counsel all in
one. But he gets no help from the old stage tricks.
There's no wig to fiddle with, no pacing around, no
striking of attitudes. He simply sits. A forbidding
role? "You'd think so," said Bernard, with
the self-deprecatory smile that is part of his charm.
"Yet I've had two direct offers of marriage and
about a dozen oblique ones. Goodness knows why!".
(Radio Times, May 11, 1961 - Article by Ernest Thomson).
TX
: 23rd May 1961
TX
: 30th May 1961
TX
: 6th June 1961
TX
: 13th June 1961
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Characters
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Portrayed
By
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Lieutenant-Colonel
Oreste Pinto
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Bernard
Archard
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The
series was created and written by Robert Barr. The
series was produced and directed by Terence Cook.
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Bernard
Archard as Oreste Pinto.
RADA-trained
actor Bernard Archard, having exhausted every possible avenue in
the pursuit of regular employment in the United Kingdom, had booked
a seat on the next flight to Canada when he was contacted by producer
Terence Cook and asked to audition for a proposed new series based
on the wartime memoirs of Allied counter-espionage Lieutenant-Colonel
Oreste Pinto.
The
real Oreste Pinto.
Robert Barr, already having carved out a niche for himself with
Associated Rediffusion's Secret Mission (a similarly-theme series
examining the stories of women serving during the war), would be responsible
for the scripts of the series, which would prove to be a radical departure
from the mode of story-telling previously offered by the BBC.
Archard successfully auditioned for the role - at thirty-nine, it
was virtually his first major role on British television and a
last-gasp attempt to secure employment in England - and worked
closely with Cook and Barr to flesh out the character of
Pinto for television audiences. The premise of the series would
be stemming the flow of refugees into Britain from German-occupied
Europe during the Second World War. Pinto would be
responsible for screening and interrogating refugees to metre out potential
spies determined to infiltrate the British establishment under
this guise.
A
scene from the episode Friend or Foe.
Archard provided a commanding performance as Pinto, a man
who engaged in verbal fencing with his "opponents" in a subtle
endeavour to catch out potential spies when their guard was down. The
episodes were, for the most part, confined to one set, with Pinto
sitting at a desk opposite "refugees" whom he suspected of ulterior
motives.
The verbal interplay between two characters in such a claustrophobic environment
proved potently compelling, and the audience appreciation figures ensured
the programme survived to span four series and twenty-five episodes. Such
was the popularity of the series that it topped the list of the five most-watched
programmes throughout 1960.
One of the most memorable scenes involved Pinto eliciting a confession
from a spy after attaching a photograph of Adolf Hitler to a dartboard
and using it as target practice, yet he was not always successful in capturing
spies: on two separate occasions he interrogated to the brink of exhaustion
two innocent refugees, and was forced to let them go.
The programme would succeed in making Archard an instantly-recognisable
household name. He would go on to appear in a wide variety of roles for
BBC Television and ITV, some of which would take advantage
of his capacity of speak fluent German. The series was never commercially
released and only 12 episodes remain intact. These are listed in the episode
guide below.
Text © Matthew Lee, 2004.
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