The Persuaders!
| Fandom | |
|---|---|
| Name: | The Persuaders! |
| Abbreviation(s): | |
| Creator: | Robert S. Baker |
| Date(s): | 1971 |
| Medium: | Television series |
| Country of Origin: | UK, USA |
| External Links: | wikipedia |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
The Persuaders! was an international action-adventure series produced for ABC (in America) and ITV (in the UK). It starred Tony Curtis as a Bronx street kid who made it big, and Roger Moore as an English earl. The two jet-setting playboys have an adorable buddy cop meet-cute and as a result, are reluctantly drawn into a life of danger and adventure due to the machinations of a mysterious retired judge.
Unsuccessful in the US, it was cancelled after one season consisting of 24 episodes, freeing up Roger Moore to play James Bond.
International success
Despite its failure to make an impact in America, the show was extremely popular (in dubbed format) in many other countries, especially Germany and France. The German version was almost a different show, due to the translation of Rainer Brandt who was also the voice actor for Tony Curtis. He used a mixture of street slang and ironic tongue-in-cheek remarks, something that became known as "Schnodderdeutsch", to create something that could be described as a constructed reality based on sound. The translation was meant to be funny and fit the source material--with no obligation to stay true to the original--and as a result it was often quite different, longer (people turning their back to the camera suddenly had a lot to say!), with much more witty and often sexually explicit banter. The French version was in fact a translation of the German version instead of the English original, which may explain why it was so popular in France too.
Fandom
Considering how ridiculously slashy some of the episodes are, The Persuaders! has a tiny English-language fandom. As of September 2010, there were 14 Persuaders! stories on the Archive of Our Own. Most of the online fanfiction has been produced in recent years for Yuletide.
Screencaps, icons and other fanworks can be found at the Persuaders! Livejournal community, persuaders71, moderated by Keiko Kirin.
There are a few vids available.
- Help Yourself, by LenokGo (viewable on youtube)
- I Only Want To Be With You, by Keiko Kirin (as Kay of JKL)
- Should I Stay Or Should I Go, by joandarck
There is also a fantastic crack_van overview by joandarck, here.
| Examples Wanted: Editors are encouraged to add more examples or a wider variety of examples. |
Fanzines
- The Man from UNCLE zine Worlds Enough 2 contained one story that was a crossover with The Persuaders!.