07/18/2003 | KAKTUZZ

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http://www.cia.gov/spy fi/item01.html

U.N.C.L.E. Cigarette Case Communicator (1964)
“The Man From U.N.C.L.E.”
MGM
NBC-TV, 1964-65

“Open Channel D … Overseas Relay.”

An ordinary-looking cigarette case. Flip open the lid and you see the top of an ordinary pack of cigarettes. Slide out the pack and discover that it is actually a cleverly disguised radio transmitter.

This was the imaginative gadget used by U.N.C.L.E. agents Napoleon Solo and Illya Kuryakin for all of their international communications during the show’s first (and part of its second) year on television. Originally, when the agents requested “Channel D” over this transmitter, their call went directly to an attractive woman who answered all Channel “D” calls at U.N.C.L.E. headquarters in New York City. During the show’s second season, the gadget was replaced by a different style of Cigarette Case Communicator, which in turn was replaced by the Pen Communicator.

This original version was so popular that it was manufactured as a children’s toy and even satirized in Mad magazine.

A one-of-a-kind piece, according to “U.N.C.L.E.”’s executive producer, the 1964 prop was thought not to have survived. After a decades-long search, Danny Biederman discovered it at the eleventh hour—in a heap of junk that was destined for the garbage bin. Recognizing a half-inch corner peering out from the bottom of the heap, Biederman plucked it out of the pile, rescuing an important piece of television history from certain oblivion.

Copyright 2000 SpyFiArchives and Danny Biederman.