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Geregistreerd op: 23-12-2004
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A crack, not to say crackpot, unit of misfits - a former Vietnam combat squad on the run after being falsely accused of a crime - have become soldiers of fortune.
The A-Team, on ITV this week, see themselves as heroes for hire; a sort of TV version of The Dirty Dozen and The Wild Bunch meet Robin Hood and his Merry Men. They take on any mission if the cause, and the price, is right.
On American television, the series is the only runaway hit out of 45 new shows this year. The A-Team - courageous, cunning and devil-may-care - crash and connive their way through danger with sexy grins, half-chewed cigars, casually-tossed hand-grenades and enough dynamite to keep a Hollywood props factory in business for years.
George Peppard, star of the long-running Banacek series, is the jaunty, smooth-talking Colonel John 'Hannibal' Smith. This is a role Peppard can play off the top of his silver-grey head - a macho man with sex appeal, despite a middle-aged spread.
The other characters are a motley collection of roustabout rebels with a cause. There's BA (Bad Attitude) Baracus, played by Mr T, best known for his role as Clubber Lang, challenger of the Italian Stallion in the film Rocky III. He was once the bodyguard of various celebrities, including boxers Muhammad Ali and Leon Spinks, singer Michael Jackson and actor LeVar Burton.
Baracus is a former staff sergeant brought up in Chicago's black ghetto. He is a mechanical genius and weapons expert who can take an old jalopy and an outboard motor and, in 24 hours, create something that could win the Monte Carlo Grand Prix.
He has a limited vocabulary, unlimited strength, and fears nothing except aeroplanes - they terrify him.
Dirk Benedict, star of the TV series Battlestar Galactica, is a chip off the Peppard block. In The A-Team he plays a skirt-chasing, fun-loving, fast-talker who can tackle anything from a beautiful woman to a Lear jet. He is the smoothy con-man Templeton (Face Man) Peck - he specialises in disguises - and shares Hannibal's passion for cigars, wisecracks and women.
President of the NBC TV Entertainment Division, Brandon Tartikoff, says: 'We are not looking for Emmy nominations but to get viewers' blood pumping. In that respect, The A-Team has exceeded my expectations.'
The show certainly has lots of shooting, wrecking, punching and blasting. Tartikoff adds: 'These are crazy times. The A-Team are underdogs, outcasts of society at a time when there are a lot of depressed people - the unemployed and those who are experiencing a poor quality of life. The show is for them. It's escapist -fun to watch.'
Executive producer Stephen Cannell, who also created The Rockford Files and Baretta, says: 'The show isn't working just because we are flipping jeeps over. People are getting a kick out of the characters, who have specific attributes that make them funny.'
One unusual character is (Howling Mad) Murdock, played by Dwight Schultz. He portrays a shell-shocked former pilot who can fly anything now that he's escaped from his bed in a mental hospital. Schultz is an experienced Broadway actor with an impressive number of straight acting roles.
Melinda Culea is Amy Amanda Allen (dubbed Triple A by her team mates), a beautiful young reporter who meets the dashing A-Team and hires them to rescue a fellow reporter held captive in Mexico. Smitten by them all, she becomes a team member and finds herself addicted to life on the run.
Introductions over, now just sit back and enjoy the action. |
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