A TANGLED WEBB OF RELATEEVEETY

'GET SMART'

"HUBERT'S LAST SYMPHONY"

'NAKED CITY'

"STRIKE A STATUE"

During the 1960s, there was a no-nonsense police lieutenant working in Washington D.C. who was so straight-edged you could slice a tomato along his jawline.  He seemed to be the type who was uncorruptible and with a very limited sense of humor.

We don't know his name, but I believe that - even if his family name had been changed upon entry into "Telemerica" at Ellis Island - he could trace his ancestry back to Eastern Europe.  And there he was related to a dictator who had begun his political life with promise as a reformist rebel, but had become a cruel despot insane with paranoia.  

We don't know this dictator by name either, nor do we know the name of the Eastern European country he controlled.  We never even saw him, but at least we know what he looked like, thanks to early work by sculptor Kermit Garrison on a statue which the dictator had commissioned of himself.

The gentleman on the top is the police lieutenant from the Nation's Capital.  Beneath him is the statue of the dictator.....

 

I think the case could be made that both men are related.  It wouldn't matter how many generations you had to go back in order to find a common ancestor, because telegenetics are just that strong in the TV Universe.  The Detective and the Dictator might as well have been Identical Cousins.  As to whether they talked alike and walked alike, I'm not going to lose my mind over them being two of a kind.

If I wrote actual fan fiction, I might consider a story based on this, in which the Detective's resemblance to the Dictator comes to the attention of the Impossible Mission Force or those men from U.N.C.L.E. and he is recruited to impersonate the ruler until he is discredited in front of the whole world and makes it impossible for him to return home.  (Probably by losing the support of his personal militia.)

If there's anybody out there who wants to run with that idea, have at it.

Since we don't know much else about the Detective and the Dictator, I have no trouble suggesting a further theory of relateeveety, to that of a Korean War vet known only by his Secret Squadron code name of "Captain Midnight".  All three men were similar in appearance and for alls I know, they all shared the same surname.  (Such a power, to create my own characters for Toobworld!  Since it would have to be something of Eastern European, I'm tempted to borrow such a name from some other TV source.  Szyznyk, for example.....)

I always toyed with the idea that Captain Midnight and that Police Department detective might be related, since Richard Webb played both roles.  But I only noticed the similarity in the statue's features recently with a late-night repeat of that 'Naked City' episode.

Let me know what you think.

BCnU!