TV and Movies

[Oznell]

2:00 a.m. Eastern Thursday morning MeTV.

"Mannix"--   Mike Connors, Joe Campanella, Gail Fisher, Ward Wood

Mannix purists who want to start at the very beginning, and work their way through the 8 year series, are in luck!  "My Name is Mannix" kicks off the first season of what is arguably one of the best-- and certainly best-loved-- of the classic TV detective series.

Season One finds independent Joe Mannix in the uneasy employ of "Intertec",  a vast, computerized, and depersonalized private investigation conglomerate, led by equally hard headed Joseph Campanella.  This format never quite worked for easy going but iconoclastic Mannix.  This, in spite of the fact that veteran character actor Joe Campanella and Mike Connors developed a nice "friendly-antagonistic" working relationship over the season.

In Season Two though, you'll see the show really grow into its own. Mannix has left the agency and is on his own, with offices and upstairs apartment in a Spanish plaza-type development, and his own hyper-efficient secretary, police widow "Peggy Fair" (Gail Fisher).  

Liberating Mannix and teaming him with the smoky Bacall-voiced Gail Fisher was the exact right direction.

As actors, both Mike Connors and Gail Fisher had such audience appeal, and both radiated an interestingly similar kind of warmth and "realness",  amid some pretty fanciful plots, that you can't help but be drawn in.  Gail Fisher was so outstanding she snagged two Golden Globes and an Emmy in the series;  she was the first African American woman to win either award.

The solid production values, jazzy Lalo Schifrin score, lush late Sixties/Seventies' L.A. ambiance, the unending roster of lustrous guest stars, the cars, the clothes-- it's eye candy with a twist of danger thrown in.  Mostly, there's the likeability of Mike Connors, easy to spend a mystery-solving hour with.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuldM3o47Tg

[Group 5 minus 1]

We own all of the episodes. Really enjoy the show.

[Sooner]

Thanks!!!!!  So little worth watching now!  We're back in tennis season again, which is good for us!  We like watching that. 

[godi]

@Oznell  Thank you so much for the info. I love this show. So exciting. ✌️❤️

[vsm]

@Oznell   What a perfect write-up, oznell -- and you're so right:  it's Joe's and Peggy's "realness" that draws you in. Never any Hollywood fuss 'n folly about Mike Connors.  He always struck me as a gentleman and "a man's man" -- so appealing.  (He died at 91 in 2017, still married to his wife of 68 years.) 

[Oznell]

It is exciting!  As only we Mannix lovers can appreciate!

Even though we have the series on DVD,  I still record the MeTV shows as they come on!  So I'll be watching it from the beginning again too, starting Thursday.

Agreed totally, @vsm--  Mike Connors had that sort of "everyman" decency that just stands out, especially in tinseltown.  I enjoyed that he brought his love of his Armenian background into the stories of "Mannix",  occasionally speaking Armenian and having a whole back story of his Dad being a stubborn grape grower in a California valley...

One of the reasons the show was so good, according to those who were there, is that Connors brought these aspects of himself.  He also kept a light, congenial atmosphere, but he knew everything that went on, and it shows in the high quality of the series, year in and year out, I think.