ABOVE AVERAGE
Remington Steele shared many similarities with another lighthearted procedural called Moonlighting, which also featured two detectives that spent a lot of time bickering even though they really were in love. No wonder – the creator of Moonlighting cut his teeth writing episodes of Remington Steele. My favorite remains the Pierce Brosnan starrer. After all, Steele and I are avid cineastes.
In need of a male alias
The show’s primary focus was on a young woman called Laura Holt (Stephanie Zimbalist), a bright and enthusiastic private eye who quickly learned that this was a man’s world. Few clients were willing to hire her. So she invented a male alias and named him Remington Steele, which was a hit… but Laura soon realized that she actually needed someone to pose as Mr. Steele. That’s when He walked into her life, a mysterious stranger (Pierce Brosnan) with a British accent and no name. He was willing to become Remington Steele and the clients trusted him. A perfect understanding were it not for Steele’s bumbling incompetence; he was an adventurer, but had very little experience when it came to solving crimes. That took logical thinking and an ability to understand clues, which was not his strength.
He got better at it over the years though and his passion for classic Hollywood movies constantly gave him ideas how to solve crimes. Laura reluctantly began to accept him as an equal partner, but there were constant fights. Not just over cases, but personal matters as well. Laura thought she was above falling in love with such a shallow, womanizing and shady character, but she was also a romantic and couldn’t resist the charms of her handsome, fictional employer.
A lot of comic potential
In the first season, James Read and Janet DeMay played Laura’s partner and secretary, but they were soon replaced with Doris Roberts as Mildred, the new secretary, who didn’t know that her boss was just a figurehead. There was a lot of comic potential in the fact that Mildred idolized Steele and completely ignored Laura. This infuriated Laura because she was the one who had taught Steele everything he knew and he was enjoying this whole charade a little too much. Romance and fun – but there was also tension, because there would always be days when Steele’s illustrious past caught up with him in some way. Roberts was terrific and really complemented the Zimbalist-Brosnan duo. The couple reportedly fought behind the scenes, but the show never suffered; they’re really good together and the romance was reasonably engaging.
When I first saw this show as a teenager, I fell in love with spunky Laura and wanted to be like Steele; the show was a fitting training exercise for Brosnan on his way to becoming James Bond.
The murder mysteries were amusing, relying heavily on the playful performances of its cast and a healthy dose of humor.
Remington Steele never really challenged its format, but the writing was not bad at all. The murder mysteries were amusing, relying heavily on the playful performances of its cast and a healthy dose of humor. It was just a lot of fun, even the final few episodes that were shot in 1987 and reunited a cast that was contractually obligated to make an appearance but pretty much hated doing it. I believe Remington Steele had more to offer, even when it was canceled.
Remington Steele 1982-1987:U.S. 94 episodes. Color. Created by Michael Gleason, Robert Butler. Theme: Henry Mancini. Cast: Stephanie Zimbalist (Laura Holt), Pierce Brosnan (Remington Steele), Doris Roberts (Mildred Krebs, 83-87), James Read (82-83), Janet DeMay (82-83), Jack Scalia (87).
Last word: “When we went in and pitched the concept to NBC, they gave us the go-ahead. But they also said that sometimes they greenlight a great pilot but then don’t get a great series out of it. So they said, ‘Give us Episode 6 first so we can see what we have here.’ And after they picked it up, they said it would be wonderful to then see how Laura and Remington met. So ‘License to Steele’ was the first to air [October 1, 1982], but ‘Tempered Steele’ [October 8, 1982], which was slightly rewritten, was actually our pilot episode.” (Gleason, Sound + Vision)
