Series 4 — Episode 4
Death at Bargain Prices
by Brian Clemens
Directed by Charles Crichton
Production No E.64.10.5
Production completed: February 17 1965. First transmission: October 19 1965.
Production
Production dates: 25/01/1965 - 17/02/1965
Except for a few external establishing shots which may have come from stock libraries, this episode was shot on a large studio set designed by Harry Pottle, with all the departments of the store ranged out across it, as seen in some publicity photographs. Careful camera angles maintain the illusion of a large store across six floors although there are the occasional glimpses of other departments. Pottle also designed the standing set of Emma's flat, first used in the production of this episode although it ended up debuting in The Cybernauts.
Filming started near the end of January and concluded on February 17, 1965.
Regional broadcasts
| Broadcaster | Date | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Rediffusion London | 21/10/1965 | 8:00pm |
| ABC Midlands | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| ABC North | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| Anglia Television | 21/10/1965 | 8:00pm |
| Border Television | 24/10/1965 | 9:35pm |
| Channel Television | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| Grampian Television | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| Southern Television | 21/10/1965 | 8:00pm |
| Scottish Television | 19/10/1965 | 8:00pm |
| Tyne Tees Television | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| Ulster Television | 22/10/1965 | 8:00pm |
| Westward Television | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
| Television Wales & West | 23/10/1965 | 8:25pm |
TV Times listing
8.25 The Avengers
starring
Patrick Macnee as John Steed
and
Diana Rigg as Emma Peel
Death At Bargain Prices
By Brian Clemens
In which Steed fights in ‘ladies’ underwear’ — and Emma tries ‘feinting’ …
Cast also includes
| Horatio Kane | Andre Morell |
| Wentworth | T. P. McKenna |
| Farthingale | Allan Cuthbertson |
| Massey | George Selway |
| Marco | Harvey Ashby |
| Jarvis | John Cater |
| Professor Popple | Peter Howell |
| Glynn | Ronnie Stevens |
| Julie | Diane Clare |
Music by Laurie Johnson
Directed by
Charles Crichton
Produced by Julian Wintle
ABC Weekend Network Production
International broadcasts
| Broadcaster | Date | Time |
|---|---|---|
| ABN2 Sydney, Australia | 26/04/1966 | 8:00pm |
| ABV2 Melbourne, Australia | 19/04/1966 | 7:30pm |
| ABC New York, USA | 11/04/1966 | 10:00pm |
| ORTF2 France | 13/06/1967 | 8:00pm |
| Suisse Romande, Switzerland | 28/01/1967 | 9:20pm |
| French title | Mort en magasin | |
| ZDF Germany | 21/03/1967 | 9:15pm |
| German title | Auzverkauf des Todes | |
| KRO Netherlands (N2) | 2/11/1968 | 9:00pm |
| Dutch title | Moord tegen opruimingsprijzen | |
| Italy | 17/10/1969 | 10:00pm |
| Italian title | Corsa contro il tempo | |
| Spain | 28/02/1967 | 10:15pm |
| Spanish title | Muerte a plazos módicos | |
Episode Rating
| Subject | 0–5 |
|---|---|
| Direction | 3½ stars |
| Music | 3 stars |
| Humour | 3 stars |
| Intros/tags | 3½ stars |
| Villains | 4 stars |
| Plot | 3½ stars |
| Emma | 4 stars |
| Sets/Props | 3 stars |
| Overall (0–10) |
7 stars |
Second week in a row we have a villain in a wheelchair, and this one pales in comparison. Excellent set-up but not the best execution.
The Fashions
| Emma’s Fashions | Steed’s Fashions |
|---|---|
|
|
The Cars
| Marque/Model/Type | Number Plate |
|---|---|
| Penny Farthing bicycle | - |
| Oldsmobile curved-dash | AR 244 |
| wheelchair | - |
| bicycles | - |
Who’s Killing Whom?
| Victim | Killer | Method |
|---|---|---|
| Moran | Wentworth V* | shot |
| Jarvis | Wentworth? V* | sickle in back |
| Wentworth? V* | Mrs. Peel | shot |
| Kane? V* | Wentworth V* | pushed down stairs |
Click a name to see the face
Continuity and trivia
- 3:43 — Wentworth uses a revolver with a silencer, but silencers don’t work on most revolvers due to the gap between the barrel and the cylinder.. He kills Moran by firing all six bullets (which Emma later states to have been ostentatious).
- 5:53 — the receipt is dated 7th February 1965; Pinter’s Stores was at 114 New Oxford St London W1
- 5:53 & 6:11 — Steed remarks, “It may help us find out what Moran was buying”, but the receipt clearly states “One Pram, Hood, & Canopy - £12/5/0”.
- 6:55 — “That’s funny, this isn’t Old Bates at all; it’s Royal Crichton”. Mrs. Peel remarks that the dresser for the china department can’t distinguish between two fictitious brands - a reference to either John Bates (Diana Rigg’s costumier) or Richard Bates (the former story editor for The Avengers), and Charles Crichton, who directed this episode.
- 8:28 — Steed sidles up to Emma and purrs, “I asked the chief predator where to find you and he said, ‘Our Mrs. Peel is in ladies underwear’. I rattled up the stairs three at a time”. “Merry quips department on the fifth floor, sir”, Emma replies.
- 39:52 — the regular iron spiral staircase returns, they have to run down it three times.
- 40:30 etc. — with the low-angle shots while Kane is menacing Steed and Mrs. Peel, you can see the gaps in the ceiling for the lighting gantries.
- 45:03 — Steed reuses his steel-topped bowler.
- It looks like Tony Allen standing in for George Selway and Bill Westley Jr for Diana Rigg in one dramatic tumble. Joe Cornelius and Ray Austin were also on set, as seen in publicity photographs, with Ray choreographing Diana Rigg’s dance-inspired fight with Massey, and Joe instructing Diana on martial arts.
- 46:15 — the old soldier Wentworth proves to be a coward and turns tail and runs after being hit in the shoulder.
- This and the previous episode sit strangely together, as they both have a wheelchair-bound diabolical masterminds, although their motives are diagonally opposed.
- The lift in the Elstree studio only went down one level, so when they filmed the shots from inside the lift, they had to stop over and over again to redress the shop set to look like a different department, much like the tunnels in The Town of No Return.
- There is a lot of product placement throughout the episode, with Brades Skelton garden tools, Wilkinson & Sword garden tools, Slazenger cricket bats, Summit Mark-I Ball Guns and Summit Shooting Gallery toy guns all prominently displayed.
- Running time 51′38″
A note on the timecodes
Where I have listed two sets of timecodes, the first is from the 2009–11 Optimum Releasing/Studio Canal DVD sets, any other timecodes are from the A&E and Contender DVD sets from a decade beforehand.
The new releases have been remastered and their frame rate has been changed, resulting in a shorter running time. However, the picture quality has increased markedly. I assume this is because they used a simple 2:2 pulldown (24 @ 25) when converting from the original film masters (film runs at 24 frames per second, while PAL runs at 25fps, the new DVDs are in PAL format).
This pulldown was also the cause of audio errors on many episodes, especially for Series 5, as the audio sped up to match the new rate (4% faster), rather than being properly pitch-shifted. Checking the dialogue sheets, which list the feet and frames of the reels, it looks like the speed change is around 5.04%, so there may be some cuts as well - probably from around the commercial breaks and ends of reels, as they amount to about 25 seconds. All my assumptions are based on the episodes having been filmed on standard 35mm film, which has 16 frames per foot and runs at 24 frames per second, so a minute of footage uses 90 feet of film (1,440 frames).
These audio errors have been corrected in the currently available DVDs, but the 2:2 pulldown remains. There is also the addition of a Studio Canal lead-in, converted to black and white to match the episode for Series Four, but colour for Series Five, adding an extra 18 or 19 seconds to the runnning time and making it harder to match timecodes with previous releases. It’s annoying that it has been slapped on every single episode, Series 1–3 didn’t suffer this indignity.
The previous Contender and A&E DVD releases didn’t seem to suffer from these problems, so I assume they either used soft telecine and preserved the original 24fps rate of the film (my preferred option in DVDs) or they used 24 @ 25 pulldown (2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:3 Euro pull-down).
Thankfully, the new blu ray releases for series 4–6 appear to use native 24fps with soft telecine so the running times and pitch all seem to be correct again along with a much grreatly improved picture quality, most notably in the Tara King episodes which are finally back to their original glory.
Where I have listed two sets of timecodes, the first is from the 2009–11 Optimum Releasing/Studio Canal DVD sets, any other timecodes are from the A&E and Contender DVD sets from a decade beforehand.
The new releases have been remastered and their frame rate has been changed, resulting in a shorter running time. However, the picture quality has increased markedly. I assume this is because they used a simple 2:2 pulldown (24 @ 25) when converting from the original film masters (film runs at 24 frames per second, while PAL runs at 25fps, the new DVDs are in PAL format).
This pulldown was also the cause of audio errors on many episodes, especially for Series 5, as the audio sped up to match the new rate (4% faster), rather than being properly pitch-shifted. Checking the dialogue sheets, which list the feet and frames of the reels, it looks like the speed change is around 5.04%, so there may be some cuts as well - probably from around the commercial breaks and ends of reels, as they amount to about 25 seconds. All my assumptions are based on the episodes having been filmed on standard 35mm film, which has 16 frames per foot and runs at 24 frames per second, so a minute of footage uses 90 feet of film (1,440 frames).
These audio errors have been corrected in the currently available DVDs, but the 2:2 pulldown remains. There is also the addition of a Studio Canal lead-in, converted to black and white to match the episode for Series Four, but colour for Series Five, adding an extra 18 or 19 seconds to the runnning time and making it harder to match timecodes with previous releases. It’s annoying that it has been slapped on every single episode, Series 1–3 didn’t suffer this indignity.
The previous Contender and A&E DVD releases didn’t seem to suffer from these problems, so I assume they either used soft telecine and preserved the original 24fps rate of the film (my preferred option in DVDs) or they used 24 @ 25 pulldown (2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:2:3 Euro pull-down).
Thankfully, the new blu ray releases for series 4–6 appear to use native 24fps with soft telecine so the running times and pitch all seem to be correct again along with a much grreatly improved picture quality, most notably in the Tara King episodes which are finally back to their original glory.