prologue © Canal+

feature item © Canal+

epilogue © Canal+

Lobster Quadrille

by Richard Lucas
Designed by Patrick Downing
Directed by Kim Mills

Production Schedule

Episode 78

Running time

Expected: 51'25" excluding commercial breaks
Actual running time with bumpers: 51'44"

The bumpers between the acts are generally 10 seconds from fade in to the "End of Act" bumper to the end of audio before the commercial, a 10 second still without audio, then cut to the next act bumper. This would play with the theme for around 10 seconds. Accordingly, with the episodes being in 3 acts, the running time of the action is approximately a minute less than listed above, minus the opening and closing credits (normally 0'16", with a 2" fade, and anywhere from 0'41" to 1'20", hard cut or 1" fade or mix, respectively).

Transmission

Murders

Victim	Killer	Method
Williams	Quentin Slim	.38 revolver
Quentin Slim	Mrs Gale	unable to save from fire after knocking him out
click a name to see the face

Minutiæ

1. 0:18 - There are spots all over the telecine insert of the opening titles.
2. 1:06 - Who is this man? The fisherman appears to call Bush "Oscar". Later on (19:21), Katie refers to Bush as "Arnold Bush" and elsewhere he's referred to as "Max".
3. 1:30 - There's a water spot near top centre of the camera lens which reappears several times in the opening scene, and again at 14:59, 24:47, & 43:16.
4. 5:40-5:50 - A few small flickering black spots at top right and white spots in the centre.
5. 8:00 - A very poor bit of camerawork as we come up from underneath the glass chess set.
6. 9:37 - There's a dark spot in the top left corner of the screen, it becomes visible as the camera pans across as Mason crosses the set. It reappears at 22:37, 26:40, 29:45, 30:39, and 37:50.
7. 10:12-10:19 - The director cuts from a shot of Mason moving a chesspiece across two black squares of his chess set to an overhead shot of Captain Slim making a similar move on his checkerboard-tiled living room floor.
8. 11:28 - Bush keeps going in and out of focus in the MS two-up with Steed in the foreground.
9. 14:30 - A hair flicks against the bottom of the transfer plate and flaps wildly as a vertical streak until 15:05.
10. 16:20 & 37:10 - More white scratches on the tape.
11. 18:00 - Another smudge just above the centre of the screen. It reappaears at 24:36 when Steed answers the 'phone and at 30:00 in the close-up of Cathy at the chess board. Also at 32:07, 37:03. Maybe at 48:38 but the spot seems to be just BELOW dead centre.
12. 23:12 - Interference in the video signal as Bush enters the mortuary.
13. 24:01 - An odd zoom and refocus on the paper chessboard as the scene starts.
14. 24:10 & 31:50 - Does Steed live around Twickenham or Richmond? I've always assumed he lives in Westminster because of the 5 Westminster Mews address (and I'm sure Charles complains about him being late in "The Nustshell", but (24:10) Cathy suggests he take Katie for a walk on Richmond Hill and he later tells (31:50) Katie on a clear night he can see right across the river to the summit of Kew.
15. 25:37 - That's a very rubbery lobster that Bush cuts open.
16. 27:00 - There's a smudge at bottom centre that ruins the close-up of Katie.
17. 30:22 - When Mason kidnaps Cathy, Steed's bowler and burberry are on the hat stand, but when Steed returns later with Katie at the beginning of the next act (31:45), he's wearing the coat and she's wearing the hat. He deposits both bowler and burberry on it in the same places.
18. 32:22 - Another overhead shot by the director, this time of Katie lying on Steed's chesterfield.
19. 46:00 et passim. - The crates stacked in the hut are all marked J.W. Moore Ltd. Grimsby - in Lincolnshire and nowhere near the setting of the episode which is along the English Channel somewhere.
20. 49:25 - A very tongue in cheek reference to the impending production of "Goldfinger" in the closing scene, where Steed asks Cathy to investigate a problem in the Bahamas while she's "pussy footing" along the shores.
    When Cathy takes her leave, she tells Steed, "I'm not going to be pussy footing along those shores, I'm going to be lying on them!"
    Steed muses, "Not pussy footing? I must have been misinformed..."
    (For those who don't know, Honor Blackman had just decided to leave "The Avengers" and star as the leading lady in "Goldfinger" opposite Sean Connery, her character being Pussy Galore.)
21. 50:12 - After Cathy walks out on him, Steed rings someone else to get them to help with his next case. It's never revealed who it is - maybe it's Venus, maybe it's Mrs Peel?
    Here's what he says:
    

    Hello, my dear. John Steed. Eh? Well, I've been very busy you know. Hey, how are the little Salukis? Really? Vicious little beasts. Huh? It's, terrible weather for the time of year, isn't it? Very in-clement as my Auntie Tibby used to say. Bodes bad for the bulbs. Look, I think you should get a little sunshine, you know. Beautiful blue skies, sandy beaches. I've got a little job I want you to do for me.

    Well of course we'll discuss it as our leisure. What about tonight? Say eight o'clock? I know a little place down by the river ...

22. Set designer Patrick Downing admits to stealing the chessboard motif - in the morgue as well as the chess shop - from a Basil Rathbone Sherlock Holmes film.
23. This episode is credited as having been written by Richard Lucas, a pseudonym for Brian Clemens and Richard Bates.