2-14. Nice People Die at Home.

The Marshalls (Angela Morant, Harry Towb) are
genuinely nice people.  And also Soviet spies.

Air Date: Apr. 9, 1969. Written by: Robert Banks Stewart. Directed by: Peter Duguid. Produced by: Terence Feely, Lloyd Shirley.


THE PLOT:

Eric Marshall (Harry Towb) and his daughter Nadia (Angela Morant) are a friendly pair, all smiles and pleasantries as they run their small London pet shop and plan for an upcoming trip abroad. They are utterly ordinary, absolutely wholesome, and pose no threat to anyone.

Except that the Marshalls are actually Soviet spies. Low-level ones: They describe themselves as "clerks," and even Hunter doesn't deem their activities particularly harmful. But they are part of a ring connected to Belukov (Frederick Jaeger), a KGB assassin-turned-bureaucrat who is now attached to the Soviet Embassy in London. Hunter wants Belukov - and since the Russian once murdered a woman close to Callan while trying to kill him, Callan wants him to.

And the nice, pleasant, otherwise irrelevant Marshalls offer the perfect opportunity to get to him...

Hunter has a job Callan doesn't even want to refuse...

CHARACTERS:

Callan: The episode is a reminder of how very different Callan's relationship was with Col. Hunter. He admits that he's found his work much more bearable since John Ramsay became Hunter. With John, he may grumble about his assignments, but he feels reasonably secure that he won't be betrayed or forced to cross certain lines (at least, not without good reason). With the colonel, he has to plan for contingencies... which he does, to pretty good effect, in the episode's final Act.

Col. Hunter: Ronald Radd's coldly pragmatic Hunter is back in the big chair for this one episode, (most of) which was originally shot for Series One. He remains a nasty delight, though I do think the newly-shot scenes overplay him a bit, such as when he directly threatens Callan to try to force him to do his bidding. He still gets some choice moments, from bullying Soviet spy Rocovitch, aka "Ross"(Roger Bizley) to divulge a code name that Callan needs for his plan to work, to arranging for the same man's escape in order to increase pressure on Callan to finish the job.

Meres: "Your man takes an unhealthy pleasure in his work." Ross becomes the latest victim of Meres' enthusiastic interrogation tactics, as Meres practices marksmanship by aiming to just miss Ross's head. The agent holds out long enough for Meres to compliment him on his nerve - and then up the ante by practicing his golf swing at him. Once Ross realizes that he's dealing with a sociopath, he gives up enough information to end the interrogation, which allows Callan to succeed in his impersonation of him.

Lonely: This episode features the series' only interaction between Lonely and Col. Hunter, in a brief but thoroughly entertaining exchange. When Lonely finds Hunter and Meres in Callan's hotel room, he alternates between fear and indignation. He largely stands his ground against Hunter, insisting that he works only for Callan and not for them. When he leaves to inform Callan of their presence, Radd's nonverbal reaction - both to Lonely's manner and his smell - is highly amusing.

Callan tries to protect Nadia and
her father even while deceiving them.

AN EPISODE IN A NEW CONTEXT:

Nice People Die at Home was originally shot for Series One, but it was held over for Series Two. The significant format changes for the second season - Callan officially working for The Section, the temporary status of Col. Hunter's return - meant that several scenes had to be rewritten and reshot.

The Callan: This Man Alone set includes the Series One rehearsal script in its .pdf archive, along with scripts for the replacement scenes. The replacements play like what they are: bits written in a hurry to convey the same information, but that lack the sharpness of the original interactions. Take the scene in which Hunter gives Callan the assignment. In the aired episode, since Callan is part of The Section, Hunter makes clear he has no option to refuse - making his going on to dangle the personal stakes of Belukov jarring because he has no real need to do so. The original version is better: Callan (who does not work for The Section in this draft) makes clear how eagerly he's looking forward to turning the job down, only for Hunter to use Belukov to reel him in.  It plays more smoothly, there's more cleverness to the dialogue, and there are more layers to the Hunter/Callan interaction. 

Still, while I suspect the episode was slightly stronger in its original form, I also suspect that it only survived because of the delay in broadcasting it. A few scenes being replaced with blander clones is a small price to pay for it remaining in the archives.

Meres mixes business with pleasure...

THOUGHTS:

The last-aired (though not last-written) of Robert Banks Stewart's three Callan episodes. I was generally unimpressed with Stewart's missing episode scripts... though depending on guest performances and directing choices, I would give Goodbye, Nobby Clarke even odds of being a decent episode (I would not extend the same courtesy to You're Under Starter's Orders).

"Decent" is the descriptor that comes to mind for Nice People Die at Home. It's an entertaining enough piece. Harry Towb and Angela Morant are likable as the father/daughter pair of low-level spies; the episode got me invested enough in their welfare to hook me even through its slower bits. I particularly enjoyed the opening scenes, establishing their 1950s sitcom-level wholesomeness before revealing them as spies - a revelation that never undermines how thoroughly nice they are.

The plot is extremely pedestrian, however, and the stakes feel low. We understand why Callan wants to kill Belukov, but there's very little indication of why Hunter is sufficiently bothered to put him a red file. The Belukov we meet is a man whose truly dangerous days are in the past. He's stuck in an Embassy desk job that he hates, and spends most of his time drinking or playing squash. He's roused from his torpor by personal animosity toward Callan... but that animosity rings almost as false as Callan's reluctance to follow through with his mission at the end.

I still enjoyed watching this episode. It's never less than engaging, and there are a handful of terrific moments. Even so, I can't help but find this to be a step below most of the surrounding installments.


Overall Rating: 6/10.

Previous Episode: The Worst Soldier I Ever Saw
Next Episode: Death of a Hunter



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