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The New York Times recently called the cerebral spy drama The Sandbaggers
(ITV, 1978-1980) "the best spy series in television history". It was created by
former naval intelligence officer Ian Mackintosh and depicted the decidedly
unglamorous activities of a small SIS (aka MI6) unit, nicknamed 'Sandbaggers',
which undertakes shady overseas operations. Director of Operations is Neil
Burnside, a hard-bitten, astonishingly cynical ex-Sandbagger who lives only for
his work, played with just the right combination of paranoid ruthlessness and
neurotic deviousness by Roy Marsden. It is to Marsden's credit that Burnside
remains sympathetic even when forced to make appalling decisions, as in the
breathtakingly cruel finale to 'Special Relationship' (tx. 30/10/1978), when he
has one of his own operatives (and his own lover) assassinated by the CIA.
Exploring the internecine and Machiavellian machinations of British and
American intelligence, the highlights of most episodes are Burnside's spiky
exchanges with Whitehall Minister (and ex-father-in-law) Sir Geoffrey Wellingham
(Alan MacNaughton) and encounters with CIA contact Jeff Ross (Bob Sherman),
either during park strolls or meals at McDonald's (still a novelty in late 1970s
Britain). Ross was one of Burnside's few friends, but this is extinguished after
the CIA tries to trick British Intelligence in 'All in a Good Cause' (tx.
9/6/1980). Burnside's attempts at a love life always end badly, and his only
steadfast friend remains Willie Caine (Ray Lonnen), his longest serving
Sandbagger.
Usually trying to outwit Peele (Jerome Willis), his often foolish direct
superior, Burnside initially finds an ally in Sir James Greenley (Richard
Vernon), head of SIS, but he dies at the end of the second series, replaced by
the openly hostile John Tower Gibbs (Dennis Burgess).
Sandbaggers was mostly shot in the studio, with Leeds standing in for Eastern
Europe and overseas filming limited to Malta, the location for the
heart-wrenching 'To Hell with Justice' (tx. 20/6/1980), in which one of the
series regulars is exposed as a KGB mole.
The series' trademark complex plotting, vivid characterisation, terse
dialogue and dark wit are largely absent from the three third series episodes
which others wrote after Mackintosh's mysterious disappearance in June 1979.
Significantly they do not feature Wellingham and use the kind of standard spy
plots (an agent fakes his own death, British intelligence plants a mole in
Russia) which Mackintosh eschewed. Consequently, the series ended on an
unplanned cliffhanger, with Burnside defeated by Peele and Caine seriously,
perhaps fatally, wounded.
Sergio Angelini
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1. Caine's offer (3:12)
