The Invisible Man (1958 TV series)

The Invisible Man (later known as H.G. Wells' Invisible Man) is a British black-and-white science fiction television series that aired on ITV. It aired from September 1958 to July 1959, on CBS in the USA, two seasons. Of which these shows amounted to twenty-six one-half-hour episodes. This series was loosely inspired by the 1897 novel which was authored by the famous H. G. Wells. This television program was one of at least four 'Invisible Men' television series. This interation deviates from the novel making the character's name Dr. Peter Brady. The character remains sane, opposed to a lunatic as in the book or the 1933 film adaptation. No characters from the novel appear in the series.

The series also changed plot items from episode to episode. In earlier episodes, Dr. Brady's clothing becomes invisible if it is of natural fiber and natural material, but synthetic or artificial clothes stay visible. Later episodes assert that only Dr. Brady's original lab clothing is permanently invisible. Also later episodes minimize Dr. Brady's status as a scientist, and refer to him as either Mr. Brady, or just 'Brady' and as 'The Invisible Man'.

Plot
The series follows the adventures of the fictional Dr. Peter Brady. He is a scientist. Dr. Brady experiments with light, and refraction. He attempts to achieve invisibility. He puts a guinea pig into an ionization chamber. The animal begins to fade from sight, Dr. Brady calls his assistant. The experiment goes wrong. There is a bang. Dr. Brady is permanently invisible. Dr. Brady doesn't understand exactly how the process occurs and is unable to duplicate it. The lab decides to lock him in. Invisible, he easily escapes making his way to his sister's house. With his sister, he returns to the laboratory. He is initially declared a state secret. He negotiates his freedom. He negotiates with the lab and the UK government, represented by Sir Charles Anderson, to allow him to return to his laboratory.

Dr. Brady's sister and young niece are main characters in the series. One or both feature in a good number of the Doctor's adventures. His experiments focus on his return to visibility ("Secret Experiment"). British Intelligence recruits him for an top-secret Middle East assignment ("Crisis in the Desert") to rescue an undercover operative. After security is breached in ("Behind the Mask"), his identity is exposed. Soon he becomes a celebrity ("Picnic with Death"). Invisibility now is an avenue by which to help people who are besot with troubled predicaments, solve crimes and defeat enemy spies.

Cast

 * The Invisible Man — Himself* (series voice: Tim Turner, uncredited; unaired pilot episode voice: Robert Beatty, uncredited)
 * Lisa Daniely as Jane Brady Wilson (unaired pilot episode) / Diane Brady Wilson (series) (Brady's widowed sister)**
 * Deborah Watling as Sally Wilson (Diane's daughter)
 * Ernest Clark as Sir Charles Anderson (series 1 only) / Colonel Ward (series 2 only)

* This is how the character is credited on the rear sleeve of the Network DVD release. Billed in on-screen closing credits as simply The Invisible Man, with no actor's name listed. Michael Goodliffe, who plays the criminal scientist Crompton in the first story, is credited in the original release promotional documentation.

** In the unaired pilot episode The Invisible Man, the character's first name was Jane, but this was changed to Diane — or "Dee", as Brady himself usually refers to her — for the series.

Production
The pilot, which bears the on-screen episode title "The Invisible Man" (but is often wrongly referred to as "Secret Experiment"), was never aired. Canadian actor Robert Beatty provided the voice of Dr. Peter Brady. After Ralph Smart, the creator, saw the pilot, he realised that he could not use it. The bandaged hero could be seen bumping into doors and scenery, the strings which animated moving objects could be seen in a number of scenes. Despite that this Invisible Man was never transmitted, plot elements and footage from it were reused in the episodes "Secret Experiment", "Picnic with Death" and "Bank Raid". The Invisible Man pilot is included in its entirety on the Network DVD release of the series. Note: Series originally started filming in 1957.

A second pilot episode titled "Secret Experiment" was made, and was used as the opening installment of the series. This featured Dr. Peter Brady (who is only ever seen obliquely), who is unwittingly subjected to radiation and turns invisible. While Brady searches for a cure to restore himself to normal, he also acts as an agent for the British Intelligence services. The original ITC press book states that "Secret Experiment", the second episode "The Locked Room", the fourth episode "Crisis in the Desert" and the fifth episode "Picnic with Death" should be shown first by any TV company; however, this directive was ignored by UK and US broadcasters leading to episodes in which Brady's invisibility is known about by the public, such as "Behind the Mask", being screened before its reveal in the episode "Picnic with Death". In these earlier episodes, the public does not know that Brady is invisible, and he wears bandages and sunglasses (as well as gloves) when he appears in public, but the episode "Behind the Mask" has a foreign industrialist with influence who tricks Brady into making him invisible too in an attempt to assassinate his country's new ruler. Subsequently, in "Picnic with Death", a motoring accident fully exposes Brady's invisibility, to the point that he is besieged by the Press. The same bandages Brady uses when out in public help fugitive convict Joe Green (played by Dermot Walsh) in the episode "Jailbreak" to escape the police when they thought he was Brady.

As a publicity gimmick, the actor playing the Invisible Man himself was never credited, either on-screen or in TVTimes, but Johnny Scripps played Brady without the bandages, i.e. apparently headless but otherwise dressed. Being a little person, he was able to see through the buttonholes in Brady's coat. Tim Turner provided Brady's voice, also without on-screen credit, using a transatlantic accent in order to help ITC sell the series to the United States.

The various 'actors' playing Brady's body remain unknown to this day, apart from Tim Turner whose identity was revealed in 1965 (the series was still being repeated regularly up until 1966). In later episodes, Tim Turner both played and voiced Brady — as press cast list handouts from 1959 clearly show. A number of different 'actors' portrayed Brady throughout the earlier episodes, particularly noticeable in the episode "Play to Kill" where a slim Brady is seen in studio scenes but changes into a stocky version on location. Although according to Lisa Daniely: "I can't remember his name, and he wasn't really a very good actor. And they used somebody else's voice; that was the final insult — poor man. He was quite a nice looking bloke, but not a very dynamic personality."

Tim Turner himself appeared visibly in the "Man in Disguise" episode, though on this occasion he played Nick, a foreign-accented villain who impersonates Brady. Among the writers recruited for the show were Ian Stuart Black, Michael Pertwee and Brian Clemens under the pseudonym Tony O'Grady. Puppeteer Jack Whitehead, who had earlier worked on Muffin the Mule, was called in to provide the brilliant special effects of the show – such as cigarettes smoking while hanging in the air and wine being drunk by an invisible drinker (The pilot episode credits "Trick Photography" by Victor Margutti).

Stuntmen risked their lives hiding in the bottom of cars, driving the vehicle while looking from a slightly open door, or in the steering of a motorbike from a sidecar, which caused members of the public to try and stop what they thought was a runaway vehicle; they didn't realise there was actually a stuntman concealed in the sidecar, steering the motorbike with duplicate controls.

On another occasion, a motorist was surprised to see a car without a driver pull up at traffic lights alongside him. A man then rushed across to the apparently empty car, pulled open the door, and then recoiled from an invisible blow. The motorist didn't know that there was a film unit present, and the man thrown back from the driverless car was actually an actor. Fortunately, the motorist was felt not to have spoilt the take, but rather had helped it — his look of astonishment at what he had witnessed was so well displayed that he was kept in the finished scene.

In the second series, the camera often took on Brady's point of view, i.e. showing whoever and/or whatever the character himself was seeing at the time, which meant that the need for special effects could be cut down.

It has since come to light that two other actors played the voice of Peter Brady after Robert Beatty and before Tim Turner. Because Beatty's Canadian accent in The Invisible Man pilot was considered too harsh, "Secret Experiment" featured the softer accent of fellow Canadian actor Lee Patterson. Unfortunately, when the series was commissioned and went into production, Patterson was found to be committed workwise and so his place was taken by another Canadian actor, Paul Carpenter, a former band singer and B-feature leading man.

The first series was script edited by Victor Wolfson, for the second series Ian Stuart Black took over, having written scripts for the first series. The music for the pilot was composed by Sydney John Kay, and he is credited as the musical director for series one. Assistant directors on series one were Jack Drury (2 episodes), Peter Crowhurst (2 episodes) and David Tomblin, who also worked on all series two episodes and the pilot. Casting director Harry Fine and sound supervisor Fred Turtle also worked on both series

Guest stars included Peter Sallis, Leslie Phillips, Irene Handl, Honor Blackman, Patrick Troughton, Dennis Price, Dermot Walsh, Willoughby Goddard and Ian Hendry.

Episode list
Airdates given here are for ATV London. Other ITV regions varied airdates and transmission order.

Note: The actors who provided the Voice of Peter Brady are listed only once until they change.

Series Two
First series episodes are copyright Incorporated Television Programme Co. Ltd, second series episodes are copyright Official Films Inc.

Apart from ATV London, other UK Networks – such as ABC Weekend Television – screened the series as one 26-episode run between 13 June 1959 and 19 December 1959, Tyne-Tees Television screened the series from its opening night on 15 January 1959.

Home media
MPI Home Video has released the entire series on DVD in North America. The discs are in NTSC format and carry no region encoding. They are available in two double-disc sets, or as a complete, four-disc set.

Network released the entire series in the UK as a four-disc DVD set using new prints made from the original negatives. The discs are in PAL format and are encoded for Region 2.


 * Label: Network
 * Release Date: 2008
 * Catalogue N°: 7952963
 * Availability: Out now

Special Features

 * Brand new commentaries available on Secret Experiment, Picnic With Death featuring Lisa Daniely, Deborah Watling, and Shadow Bomb featuring Brian Clemens and Ray Austin
 * The unscreened and abandoned pilot version
 * Mute Italian Opening/closing titles
 * Image Gallery
 * ATV Star Book PDFs (DVD-Rom only. PC/Mac)

Other media

 * In Alan Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier, Peter Brady was one of the members of the failed 1950s League in the fictional The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen universe. Brady recreated Hawley Griffin's original notebooks and successfully achieved invisibility, but was not very impressive as a spy due to smoking-related coughing fits, which revealed his invisible presence.