• title card: white all caps text reading ‘TROJAN HORSE’ superimposed on a blackboard showing starting prices for seven horse races
  • Ann and Lynton read the newspaper headline while Steed looks on, rubbing his chin
  • Steed shares a joke with the tote girl
  • Johnson instructs the stablehands in the use of poisons
  • Heuston sits back after his meal, partly distorted by a brandy balloon in the foreground
  • Cathy and Steed smile as they pat the horse in the stable door

Series 3 — Episode 20
Trojan Horse

by Malcolm Hulke
Designed by Richard Harrison
Directed by Laurence Bourne

Production No 3621, VTR/ABC/3352
Production completed: January 30 1964. First transmission: February 8 1964.

Production Schedule

Episode 74
Production Number : 3621
VTR/ABC/3352 + Insert
Teddington Studio 1

Wednesday, 29th January, 1964

Camera rehearsal 10.00–12.30
Lunch break 12.30–13.30
Camera rehearsal 13.30–18.00
Supper break 18.00–19.00
Rehearse 19.00–20.00
Line-Up 20.00–20.30
VTR Insert 20.30–21.00

Thursday, 30th January, 1964

Camera rehearsal 10.00–13.00
Lunch break 13.00–14.00
Camera rehearsal 14.00–15.30
Tea break, line up,
normal scan & make-up
15.30–16.15
Dress rehearsal 16.15–17.30
Notes 17.30–18.00
Line-up 18.00–18.30
VTR 18.30–19.30

Running time

Expected: 51′25″ excluding commercial breaks
Actual running time with bumpers: 51′46″

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 credits (normally 0′16″ with a 2″ fade) and closing credits (anywhere from 0′41″ to 1′20″, hard cut or 1″ fade or mix).

Equipment

Cameras: 6 Pedestals. Fork Lift Truck
Sound: Three Booms. Grams, FX. Practioal FX Speakers. PA System.
Telecine: ABC Synbol/ Avengers Opening. 35m.m. Mute.
VTR Insert: VTR/ABC/3352A
  • 14:28–19:50 — Scenes 57–77 — there’s a telecine insert played onto the monitors, showing horse racing (actually, steeplechasing) at racetrack and in Heuston’s office.
  • 48:00–49:02 — VTR insert 3352A — between scenes 205 & 206 — interior harness room — Johnson orders ffordsham to kill Steed but when Kirby enters Steed gains the upper hand and apprehends the villains. Pantling leads Cathy in and is revealed to be the ringleader and duly arrested.

Transmission

BroadcasterDateTime
ATV London8/02/196410.05pm
ABC Midlands8/02/19649.10pm
ABC North8/02/19649.10pm
Anglia Television8/02/19649.10pm
Border Television8/02/19649.10pm
Channel Television8/02/19649.10pm
Grampian Television8/02/19649.10pm
Southern Television8/02/196410.05pm
Scottish Television8/02/19649.10pm
Tyne Tees Television8/02/19649.10pm
Ulster Television8/02/19649.10pm
Westward Television8/02/19649.10pm
Television Wales & West8/02/19649.10pm
Teledu Cymru (WWN)8/02/19649.10pm
ABN2 Sydney16/02/19658.00pm
ABV2 Melbourne--

This episode was already scheduled to be broadcast, a week later, while it was being produced.

This episode was not shown in Melbourne as, finding themselves a year behind Sydney, they dropped a lot of episodes to catch up to series 4.

TV Times listing

TV Times listing for February 8 1964, 10.05pm (London edition)
Sydney Morning Herald listing for February 16 1965, 8pm

10.5 The Avengers
starring
Patrick Macnee
Honor Blackman

in

Trojan Horse
By Malcolm Hulke

Cast

Johnson Derek Newark
Rt. Hom. Lucien
Ffordsham
Geoffrey Whitehead
Kirby James Donnelly
George
Meadows
Arthur Pentelow
Major
Ronald Pantling
Basil Dignam
John Steed Patrick Macnee
Ann Meadows Lucinda Curtis
Tony Heuston T. P. McKenna
Lynton Smith John Lowe
Cathy Gale Honor Blackman
Tote girl Marjorie Keys

Story Editor Richard Bates
Producer John Bryce
Directed by
Laurence Bourne

In which Steed goes horse-racing and Cathy becomes the favourite for murder

ABC Television Network Production

Murders

Victim Killer Method
Kirby Johnson Brass knuckles (faked)
Patrice Dubois Kirby ? (not shown)
Lynton Smith Kirby lethal injection
Click a name to see the face

Continuity and trivia

  1. 2:25 — Trying to name the new filly — Tax Collector out of Silver Virgin — Major Pantling suggests ‘Silver Boy’, then ‘Shining Money’, Meadows suggests ‘Revenue Girl’ (sadly already used); Steed later suggests ‘Impossible’ (although the script originally had Steed suggest the name ‘Pay As You Learn’).
  2. 6:52 — Anne asks, “Do you know anything about horses, Mr. Steed?” and he replies, “Yes, I know which end is which”.
  3. 15:00 — Steed backs Transfer Supervisor which is left at the post, while Cathy back Scavenger which finishes second to Hold The Line, Steed derides her for watching the television in the bar instead of going out to the track, and jokingly eggs the horse on whenever she does.
  4. 15:45–19:05 — Steed, Cathy and the tote girl all mention “Shop Window”, as does the announcer at the track, but the race caller on the television in Heuston’s office (19:14 onwards) calls the horse “Shop Steward”.
  5. 18:30 — Steed says there are twelve unsolved murders of rich men and Cathy mentions Luther Streussel, the German banker.
  6. 20:04 — two of the bookie assistants, Peter Thompson and Bob Raymond, are in the crowd at the track as Smith is carried through on the stretcher.
  7. 23:48 — steed opens his thermos in the stables and pulls out a Veuve Clicquot piccolo, which he enjoys with “Alpi” caviar and “Forte” crackers.
  8. 24:09 — Kirby’s Parisian target, banker Patrice Dubois (major shareholder in the House de Suchet), must be rich — living at 17 avenue de la Grande Armée and working at 29 boulevarde Saint Michel. His car has the registration number 8293 MY 75; it’s too hard to definitely confirm the marque and model but it looks like a Peugeot 403.
  9. 31:50 — An “Alice in Wonderland” air, with Cathy and Houston perched on a huge armchair-like sofa, gives way to a parody of Peter Hammond’s directing when Laurence Bourne shoots the actors through their brandy balloons.
  10. The poisons covered in the talk are arsenic, sulphuric acid, cyanide, and strychnine.
  11. 38:49 — it’s a bit indistinct, but it looks like the photo of Steed’s car is the same one they used for Dubois around 24:15.
  12. 50:04 — the stablehands in the background appear to be one of the originals, Brian MacNeil (based on his jumper), plus Peter Thompson and possibly Michael Harrison.

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