SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #4 (PRIZE)

Thunderball (1965) SPECTRE HQ. Production Designer/Ken Adam (Goldfinger, Dr. Strangelove), Art Director/Peter Murton (Goldfinger, Dr. Strangelove, The Ipcress File). Determined to expand on the traditional board room-style, Adam challenged himself to create the office lair of a calculating and deadly organization worthy of James Bond. Spoofed by Mike Meyers in Austin Powers, the room sports two rows of sleek chairs with microphone consoles and lamps. The "table" area resembles a fashion show runway, making the henchmen seem exposed and vulnerable. A large map covers the far wall. Overlooking the operation, and half-hidden by a frosted panel, sits Blofeld stroking his white cat. A few reports and unanswered questions later, the flick of a switch- and one fried baddie in a cloud of smoke and sizzle! And because evil geniuses tend to maintain decorum in social interactions, the chair quickly sinks into the floor to dispose of the untidy corpse. The meeting resumes. The vastness of the room echoes the far-reaching power of SPECTRE. They are ruthless, efficient, and faceless. We are in awe and know that Bond has his work cut out for him as Operation Thunderball commences. Baddie #2, Largo, enters the room through a sliding shelf and hidden metal door.

In celebration of the chain-of-doors concept, Spy Vibe will give away a Season One box set of GET SMART (1965)! Post a Thunderball or Get Smart memory in the comments section of the Spy Vibe blogsite under this posting, and a winner will be drawn at random on March 21, 2009. Don't need Get Smart? Post your memories anyway and let me know you're not in the drawing.

STAY TUNED FOR SET #3 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #5

The 10th Victim (1965). Production Designer/Piero Poletto (Eclipse, The Passenger), Set Decorator/Dario Micheli (The Last Emperor). Great care was taken to give The 10th Victim an ultra-futurist look. The main characters, victim and hunter in an institutionalized game of murder, have a stylized, fashion-world presence that reminds me of Besson's approach to The Fifth Element (1997). The style of the film owes much to Danish designer, Verner Panton, who introduced the world's first inflatable, transparent plastic furniture in 1960, and included Pop and Op-Art elements in his work.

A geometric, minimalist scheme defines most of the rooms in the film, often using an Op-Art-like contrast of black and white stripes or forms. Furniture that is not inflatable tends to be simple cubes- sometimes lit from within. The warmth and color present in many scenes are provided by Ursula Andress, who balances the high-graphic style of the architecture and of Mastroianni's monochromatic suits (more on the film's fashion in an upcoming article).





The 10th Victim also plays with Pop Art visuals. In Mastroianni's apartment, a gigantic eye in black glasses is framed on the wall. A display-style bookcase is filled with golden-age comic books. Cabinets in his country home, with walls of exposed concrete, sport high-fashion stills of underwear and models. The set also includes surreal elements with paper mache sculpture of figures (and creatures) inside and out, as well as a herd of sheep grazing in the yard! The visual world of The 10th Victim is very much a main character and highlight of watching the film. Its Spy Vibe aesthetic helps to establish and express the movie's themes of a high fashion, high-gloss society that views violence as entertainment (predating reality television by 30 years). Director Elio Petri managed to create both a satirical romp that captures a number of design and societal concepts that were colliding in 1965, and an ultra-cool action/adventure/comedy with unforgettable style. (Special thanks to Tony Sison at Design Within Reach)

*Years after I published this, I was able to contribute to the Blu-ray edition of The 10th Victim. See Amazon & Blue Underground for more details. More 10th Victim on Spy Vibe from the search window and Labels menu.

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #6

The Prisoner (1967-1968). Art Director/Jack Shampan (Modesty Blaise, The Ladykillers), Set Dresser and future Art Director Ken Bridgeman (Billy Liar, Straw Dogs), Set Dresser/John Lageu (Captain Scarlet, Thunderbirds). You know you have slipped into the quasi-Sci-Fi world of The Prisoner when Patrick McGoohan first walks inside from the resort town into the ominous, eerie lair of Number Two. This Ken Adam-worthy room sports a central globe chair in black surrounded by an assortment of sleek furniture that rises electronically from the floor. A massive screen lights the room with fluctuating patterns and sounds (like a giant lava lamp), and doubles as a Big Brother eye into secret files and into citizen's private lives. Brushed metal doors seal the room. The music cues help to define the chilling tone when McGoohan’s Number Six first enters this chamber in the episode, The Arrival, and remains one of the most unforgettable moments in Spy Vibe culture. Number Two's famous chair is based on the Ball Chair (see below), designed in 1963 by Finnish furniture designer Eero Aarnio and seen as a height of industrial design at the time.

The Control center in The Prisoner is another iconic set, sporting a giant screen, large electronic probes that look like eyeballs, and a rotating seesaw where observers peer into view screens that resemble mounted machine guns. From this room, the jailers of the Village keep a close watch on their citizens, and when needed, subdue or kill them with a large, floating white ball called Rover. These imaginative sets establish a Kafkaesque, 1984-like environment for the modern (and Mod) age.

STAY TUNED FOR SET #5 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #7

The Avengers (1962-1969). "The House That Jack Built" (1966). Art Director/Harry Pottle (You Only Live Twice, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang). It was a time for fashion and design when Mod and Futurism met the Edwardian. The sets in The Avengers echoed these trends and added to the British charm of the show. The designers often used very little to imply the interior sets, creating a space between a foreground object and a simple set in the background. The Pop Art canvases and cartoony objet d’art that are sold now illustrate the enduring influence of The Avengers and of that period. Memorable highlights were the central hooded stove and seating area in Mrs. Peel's apartment and the view-glass in her door, which was visible as a giant eye-lashed eyeball.


In the episode, The House That Jack Built, the sets played a major role in the plot; A maniacal scientist out for revenge lures Mrs. Peel to an automated house with revolving rooms and corridors- a mixture of computer banks, Mod and Expressionist patterns, and playing card imagery- all designed to drive her insane and into a suicide cabinet. Even on the small budget, the production team constructed fantastic spaces that moved and created the illusion of an architectural labyrinth of doom. The walls could be lit differently from either side to create a variety of effects. The evil mastermind in the story has long-since died. His body is preserved within a glass case, leaving the house to run like a computerized Venus Flytrap. Art Director, Harry Pottle, left The Avengers to join Eon Productions (and Ken Adam) to work on the Bond film, You Only Live Twice.

STAY TUNED FOR SET #6 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #8

Dr. No (1962) Antechamber. Production Design by Ken Adam. Adam established the larger-than-life scale of the 007 adventures in his first Bond film. Like McGoohan’s "Prisoner" discovering that he has gone through the looking glass when he first meets Number Two, Professor Dent travels to a remote complex to confer with his master, Dr. No. The predictable world of blue sky and ocean is left behind for the irrational and ominous atmosphere of cinema's debut Bond villain. The antechamber, like Adam’s other designs, has an "ahead-of-contemporary" look, with a hint of The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari in the spider web shadows cast by the domed, slanted skylight. It's an unforgettable scene; Dent walks in, dwarfed by the space- empty but for a tiny chair. Dr. No’s chilling command breaks the silence, “Sit down.” Movie-goers, like Dent, knew immediately that Bond was a new brand of larger-than-life adventure.

STAY TUNED FOR SET #7 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #9

Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons (1967-1968). Art Director/Bob Bell (Thunderbirds, UFO), Production Designer/Keith Wilson (Joe 90, UFO). Though not strictly a "spy" program, Captain Scarlet made use of fantastic Sci-Spy aesthetics and technology. Woven into the story was a double agent, Captian Black, who (like Scarlet in the first episode) is a double agent working against the Earthlings. As with most of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson’s productions, Captain Scarlet just pops off the screen with Spy Vibe colors and gadgetry. Dealing with puppets and futuristic themes, the team invented fantastic technology to move our heroes around by all manner of secret shoots, conveyor belts, trap doors, and elevators- conventions that will be familiar to fans of the Wallace and Gromit films. Spectrum HQ is a floating sky-base with vast windows, pop art colors, computer and microphone consoles, and a hip lounge where the super model jet pilots hang out! They always seem to be browsing through interesting magazines and chilling to the catchy organ music of Barry Gray. But when the alarm sounds, these groovy agents rise up through the ceiling into their planes for immediate take-off.

All of Gerry Anderson’s shows share this great sense of inventiveness, adventure, and style, and the numerous exterior and interior sets for Scarlet were a highlight of Anderson's career. With the exception of UFO and Space 1999, he mostly produced shows with miniatures and puppets, so extra points go to the teams of artists that put so much attention to every detail on screen to make the stories come alive. Captain Scarlet saw the introduction of a more high-tech puppet style with more proportionate designs compared to earlier shows like Thunderbirds. Here are some interiors. Our agent at Design Within Reach has identified the chair design as (most likely) based on Danish designers Preben and Jorgen Kastholm & Fabricius.

STAY TUNED FOR SET #8 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

SPY VIBE SET COUNTDOWN #10

The Silencers (1966) bachelor pad. Art Director/Joseph Wright (Guys and Dolls), Set Decorator/George Nelson (Godfather Part 2). In the first Matt Helm film, Dean Martin is introduced on a large revolving bed, which rolls him out of the room… and then tips him into a massive bubble bath (complete with awaiting companion)! Helm yawns and stretches his way through this luxurious experience. This is just a normal morning for him. Although many of the interiors lack such memorable elements, this initial use of gadgetry for relaxation (and womanizing) is an interesting way to establish his character as a cocktail-loving Photographer/Spy, and echoes the man-of-leisure culture promoted by Playboy. It’s humorous today to think that a romantic tryst could be ignited by the sheer grooviness of one’s apartment, but that’s an essential element to this genre of fantasy adventure- and part of the fun! Revolving beds show up again and again in films such as Casino Royale, Danger Diabolik, A Flea in Her Ear, and spoofed in Austin Powers. Like waterbeds in the 70s-80s, revolving beds stayed frozen in time as a major symbol of the 1960’s bachelor pad- until now! The Lazy Susan bed has become a new trend among min-century modern enthusiasts. A number of Italian designers are selling well in Los Angeles. Read the LA Times article here. Helm's car is a mini-version of his apartment, sans bath, but complete with hide-a-way bed and gadget-like cocktail bar. As Bond would say, "for our man to stop for a quick one en route."

STAY TUNED FOR SET #9 -AND- THE TOP 5 SETS FROM SPY AND MOVIE WRITERS AROUND THE GLOBE!

Check out Spy Vibe's production set series, an event that gathered together many writers to celebrate the best spy sets from cold war-era film & TV. Guest Set Lists: Lee Pfeiffer, Jeremy Duns, Armstrong Sabian, Steve Bissette, Roger Langley, Matthew Bradford, Wesley Britton, David Foster, Matt Kindt. Spy Vibe's Set For Adventure here, Set Countdown #10, #9, #8 ,#7, #6, #5, #4, #3, #2, #1.

Spy Vibe 101: Set For Adventure

Set For Adventure is one of Spy Vibe's most popular posts of all time! Find related books, DVDs, and music in the Spy Vibe Amazon Store.


PADS AND LAIRS
Creating your Secret Agent Pad or Evil Lair? Need a cavernous room with that ultra-modern Spy Vibe? Chances are that your wish-list has sprung from the mind of influential designer, Ken Adam (Dr. No, Goldfinger, Dr. Strangelove). Adam was left to design the first Bond sets for Dr. No (1962) while the crew was in Jamaica filming on location. Blending the expressionist aesthetic of his Berlin childhood, the modernism of his architectural studies, and Cold War technology, Adam created indelible sets worthy of the Space Age and launched the 007 image into public imagination. His rooms were vast and dynamic, with tilted, triangular ceilings and circular skylights. The synthesis of his cultural pallet, Dr. Caligari, Post-War lifestyle trends, paperback thrillers, and mid-century modern would inspire a look- a Spy Vibe style of architecture and design.

1930s-1940s HEROES
The idea of Pads and Secret Lairs really took flight with serialized adventures of the 1930s and 1940s. One of the most popular genres was the Mystery Detective story- sensational yarns about wealthy sleuths who battled incognito from Inner Sanctums against the fiendish plots of an array of masked villains with ever-colorful names. The largely male audience reveled in the exotic locations, and kids were hooked by the cliffhanger death traps that escalated with each chapter. Writers cooked up fantastic spaces with fun elements like trap doors, secret chambers, escape hatches, and deadly gadgets. Adventure was to be found everywhere, from Tarzan’s jungle to Flash Gordon’s rocket ship, from Zorro’s night raids to the world of wartime spies and saboteurs. The Spy Vibe films of the 1960s drew on this colorful tradition, which set the stories apart from other crime/detective movies.

1950s: POST-WAR LIFESTYLES
Cliffhanger Serials faded by the mid-1950s with the advent of television. Crime and horror comics soared briefly until censorship emasculated the industry with the creation of the Comics Code Authority in 1954. Fans with a taste for edgier entertainment could find excitement among men’s adventure magazines, paperback thrillers, and private eye heroes. It was in this cultural context that a forty-six year old journalist finally sat down to write the “spy story to end all spy stories.” Some say he wrote to stave off the anxiety of marriage. Three years later, American Popular Library released his first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, in paperback in the United States in 1955. Anthony Boucher of The New York Times dismissed it as "pretty much to the private-eye school" of fiction. Despite this review, the novel would eventually launch a film franchise that would prove to be a beacon of hope for guys living in the claustrophobia of 1950s suburbanization who chafed for a more masculine ideal, and who craved a freedom of lifestyle.
One particular boy who grew up in this climate dreamed of becoming a cartoonist, but found that his greater talents lay in his ability to envision a personal view and approach to living that, as it turned out, many men could relate to. That cartoonist was Hugh Hefner and his Playboy Magazine became a major influence in the 1950s and 1960s on men to entertain a way of life based on pleasure, curiosity, and a male aesthetic. Features about architecture and interior design gained popularity quickly. The articles sported illustrations of ideal homes and modern pads that electrified the imaginations of men weary of caving to the nine-to-five paradigm of the grey flannel suit-set.

History professor Elizabeth Fraterrigo has written a study of the magazine’s influence: “In the 1950s and 1960s, Playboy promoted a decidedly masculine vision for the realms of home, work, and leisure in its textual and literal construction of their spatial corollaries- the bachelor pad, the white-collar office, and the realm of urban nightlife- which served as counterpoints to the cultural emphasis on the suburban-situated nuclear-family home. Through its magazine, television programs, and key-clubs, Playboy identified spaces where men could craft and nurture a masculine identity based on style, leisure, and consumption” (Elizabeth Fraterrigo/UNLV).

I imagine that the designers themselves had the simple, sweeping curves of the mid-century modern aesthetic in mind when they drafted their work during that period. But I agree with Fraterrigo that those archetypical bachelor pads with Hi-Fi Jazz, Scandinavian style, and cocktail lounges were, well… for bachelors. Or at the very least, for sophisticated young couples who embodied the urban, perhaps swinging, lifestyle. By nature, the ultra-cool interiors symbolized freedom and individuality over the suburban family B.B.Q ideal that was prevalent in mainstream culture. A reaction was the lounge culture of kitschy LA ranch houses, Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, and at a higher level, the era of Alexander Calder and Eero Saarinen. Production Designers keen to establish characters who embodied this individuality found inspiration among this wider, artistic world. Mid-century modern flagstone mixed with plastics, inflatable furniture, neo-classical antiques, and with the ever-advancing technology. Ken Adam’s film designs, which he called “slightly tongue-in-cheek, slightly ahead of contemporary,” became as culturally influential as Saarinen’s TWA terminal (1961).

1960s: YOUTH CULTURE FOR THE SPACE AGE
The fantastical movie sets of the 1960s were also a sign of an emerging youth culture- playful, lusty, rebellious, modern, and pushing a breakdown between consumer design and Fine Art. This generation found its leader in John F. Kennedy, who launched us into the Space Age in May 1961. Three months earlier, JFK helped to build the popularity of James Bond by adding Ian Fleming's From Russia With Love to his top-ten list of books for Life magazine. Producers were already working to bring Bond to the big screen, and Ken Adam was busy creating the sets that would establish Bond's character in the larger-than-life world of rockets and of evil villains worthy of Kennedy's era. The British public was introduced to Adam's visual style for 007 in an October 1962 premiere, followed by a US premiere in May 1963. It was the launch of a new look and feel for entertainment that embodied the times as much as Hefner's Playboy and the arrival of The Beatles (UK/Jan 1963, US/Feb 1964).
Ken Adam went on to design many Bond films and now-famous sets, including one of the ultimate pads- Goldfinger’s transforming rumpus room. Other notable sets include Spectre HQ (Thunderball), the War Room (Dr. Strangelove), Blofeld’s volcano missile base (You Only Live Twice), and his Oscar-nominated Atlantis (The Spy Who Loved Me). Adam was also the visionary behind many iconic spy props, including the Aston Martin DB5 (Goldfinger) with its lethal accessories.

Repeated and parodied for forty years, Ken Adam's mixture of expressionism, modern-minimal and high-tech gadgetry remains an irresistible cocktail and defines Spy Vibe design. With the growing baby-boomer generation buying movie tickets, designers that followed Adam added extra doses of grooviness, producing memorable sets for films like Danger Diabolik, Our Man Flint, and Barbarella. The sets elicit visions of Cold War culture- Playboy, the sexual revolution, the Space Race, and the merging of Fine Art and consumer culture. Where the bachelor pads of the Doris Day/Rock Hudson movies of the 1950s were left behind for marriage and domesticity at the end of the films, the Pads and Lairs of the 1960s spies endured as focus on the individual became more accepted. The hero of the 1960s could not be so easily tamed. Dr. No was killed, but another baddie would always emerge from under a new rock. "The End, but James Bond Will Return." Spy Vibe will continue this discussion with a look at the most memorable sets and design trends of the 1960s.
STAY TUNED FOR SPY VIBE'S TOP-TEN SET COUNTDOWNSet Countdown #1 here. Search "set countdown" in search window for more pages.
Sketches Copyright by Ken Adam (Ken Adam Designs the Movies)
SPY VIBE ESSENTIALSKen Adam Designs the Movies by Ken Adam
Ken Adam: Art of Production Design by Ken Adam
Pad by Matt Maranian
Pad Parties by Matt Maranian
Our Man Flint/In Like Flint soundtrack by Jerry Goldsmith
Mondo Exotica by Francesco Adinolfi
Bachelor Style by Sally Griffiths
Tiki Modern by Sven Kirsten
Mid-Century Modern by Cara Greenberg
Shag: The Art of Josh Angle by Colin Berry

Happy Valentines Day!

Happy Valentines Day from Spy Vibe!

U.N.C.L.E. SCHOOL pt 2

Despite the tongue-in-cheek vibe of the television series, the end pages from the Man From U.N.C.L.E. comics by Gold Key capture some of the edgier tones of the Cold War and of spy history in general. Focusing on the techniques of espionage and on major operations from WWII, U.N.C.L.E. fans got an extra dose of thrills and adventure to stimulate their imaginations and fantasy play. My friends and I would often spend evenings running around the neighborhood thwarting enemy spies with blackened tubes of paper taped to our cap pistols so that they resembled silencers, and passing invisible ink messages. Here are the end page features from issues 2, 4, 5, and 6. Click images for larger view. Visit SpyVibe.com for more info, videos, and 1960s Spy Style Satisfaction.

Man From U.N.C.L.E. #6

Man From U.N.C.L.E. #5

Man From U.N.C.L.E. #4

Man From U.N.C.L.E. #2