In Memoriam -- Peter Graves

[vanillafluffy]

Peter Graves
1926 -- 2010
RIP
***




The death of Peter Graves makes me sad. I have vast quantities of childhood nostalgia for him from Mission: Impossible*. For years, my Saturday evenings were religiously spent parked in front of the TV at 9PM, quivering with excitement as the dynamic Lalo Schifrin theme signaled the beginning of a new mission. Yet despite his memorable performance as the clever spymaster Jim Phelps, Peter Graves's talent was enough that he wasn't pidgeon-holed as ONLY Jim Phelps. He had a well-rounded career before M:I, such as Robert Mitchum's cellmate in Night of the Hunter and westerns like Fury---which was before my time, but as a horse-crazy kid, I would've been all over that, too. After the IMF had carried out its final mission, he continued to develop with work as a narrator-host and a comedian. A few years ago, he showed up on House MD as a philandering husband in search of Viagra! Clearly, he had a sense of humor and didn't take himself too seriously.

Good night, Mr. Phelps....

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* The original series. The 80s remake was tolerable, but the films were rubbish, IMO. Okay as action movies, IF you like Tom Cruise, but not a patch on the version I grew up with.
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Comments

[vanillafluffy.livejournal.com]

One of the digital cable channels shows the original series intermittantly, so I had a chance to remember why I loved it so much. Of course, now I recognize how VERY "shot on the backlot" it was, reuse of sets, etc. Plus, the "high-tech" of 1960-something is amusingly retro. But yes, such wonderful chemistry! (I saw at least one ep where that happened...one of which involved a corpse, and I wished in vain for "He's dead, Jim."...but smirked anyway.)