Wilde Alliance (TV Series) A Question of Research (1978) User Reviews

A GOOD FIRST EPISODE

[duncanbrown-76733 · 8/10 · 7 November 2021]

What I like about this episode is the Wilde's find themselves in the first of many catch 22 situations.

The laugh of it all, is Rupert is doing research for his latest novel, but unknown to him and his wife Amy, it leads them into a Hitchcock type situation.

What I like about this episode is everybody is spying on everyone. The result is that they all misunderstand each other. This episode has got a phoney telephone engineer, a beautiful female spy posing as a au pair, senior RAF officers, a spy chief, a suspected white-slaver, an irate literary agent and a pickpocket.

Both the two stars of this television show, Julia Foster and John Stride are a class act, and it is a good on screen partnership, which is similar to the Charles Bronson and Lee Remick partnership from the film Telefon which had just come out in cinemas at the same time.

The guest stars Judy Buxton, Jerome Willis and Donald Burton give fine performances in this episode.

I would describe this story as bittersweet.

Britain's answer to 'The Thin Man'

[ShadeGrenade · 9/10 · 15 January 2012]

Yorkshire Television's 'Wilde Alliance' was an attempt to do a updated British version of 'The Thin Man' comedy thrillers of the '30's, which starred Dick Powell and Myrna Loy as crime-busting husband-and-wife duo 'Nick' and 'Nora Charles' ( not forgetting their cute dog Asta ). No dogs, cute or otherwise, featured in the Ian Mackintosh-created show. It starred John Stride ( best known to viewers at that time as 'David Main' in the popular legal drama 'The Main Chance' ) as bestselling mystery author 'Rupert Wilde', with Julia Foster ( whose film credits include 'Alfie' and 'Half A Sixpence' ) as his delightful spouse 'Amy', neither of whom seem able to avoid getting mixed up with real-life crime.

'A Question Of Research' begins with Wilde lurking suspiciously near an Air Force base. A fake telephone engineer ( Robert Blythe ) bugs his desk, and a dubious au pair called 'Camilla' ( the buxom Judy Buxton ) steals a synopsis from Wilde's desk. His latest thriller plot is an exact copy of a top secret project currently under way at the very Air Force base Wilde was seen snooping around. The question is - is it a pure coincidence or has there been a major security leak?

Stride and Foster made a good team in the same vein as Patrick Macnee and Diana Rigg, and the scripts crackled like brand new five pound notes. Speaking of 'The Avengers', who should turn out to be living upstairs to the Wilde's but the mysterious 'Bailey' ( Patrick Newell, a.k.a. 'Mother' in the Linda Thorson shows ). He is fond of taking sexy girls into his room, and for a time the Wildes suspect him of being a white slaver. He is not, of course, only making blue movies on the q.t. John Lee played Rupert's nervous literary agent 'Christopher Bridgewater'.

Watching this again recently, I was reminded not only of the U.S. series 'Hart To Hart' ( the title sequences of both are very remarkably similar ) but also Alan Plater's 'The Beiderbecke Trilogy'. It was Mackintosh's first show for Y.T.V. after moving over from the B.B.C. where he'd created the hit naval drama 'Warship' for Bryan Marshall. Later he established the spy series 'The Sandbaggers' ( starring Roy Marsden ) and even had a go at a sitcom - 'Thundercloud'. His formats might not have been original, but they were solid - and they worked. He died in strange circumstances in 1979 when his plane went missing over the Pacific Ocean near Alaska. His passing was a great loss to British television.

On the night this episode first aired ( 17th January 1978 ), Dave Allen presented another of his documentaries in which he went searching for eccentrics in America, 'Rigsby' ( Leonard Rossiter ) bought a new car in the 'Clunk Click' episode of 'Rising Damp', and in you lived in the Anglia region, you could see Claude Akins take to the road in the U.S. import 'Moving On', and watch a late-night repeat of the 'Once Upon A Time' episode of 'The Prisoner' in which Patrick McGoohan and Leo McKern screamed nursery rhyme quotes at each other endlessly. The evening before, I.T.V. had premiered 'Hazell' - starring Nicholas Ball as Cockney private eye 'James Hazell'. The contrast between it and 'Wilde Alliance' - city violence versus country mystery - could not have been greater. 'The T.V. Times' did features on both shows, but chose to put 'Wilde Alliance' on the front cover. In those days, the magazine promoted new shows with short pieces of fiction, hence 'Wilde Alliance' was introduced to prospective viewers by means of an Ian Mackintosh-penned tale.

Nice to see the show out on D.V.D. after all this time. My only real grumble is the Anthony Issac theme, which sounds like a remix of Tony Hatch's 'Emmerdale' signature tune.

An easy going, fluffy start.

[Sleepin_Dragon · 6/10 · 27 June 2018]

I had never heard of Wilde Alliance until an advert popped up suggesting it, as a lover of mysteries and seventies series I expect to love it.

This first episode was a bit of an oddity, it sets the tone I guess, introducing the characters, what they do, their relationships etc. The plot on this opener is paper thin in truth, it doesn't even verge on any sort of crime, it's a whimsical, fluffy drama, albeit enjoyable and amusing.

I'd say the acting was acceptable, nobody in particular shines, and it's not exactly wooden, but I'm sure tomorrow I'd have forgotten almost everything....apart from the Triumph TR7, which looks fabulous.

Watchable start.