Remington Steele
It was the show that made Pierce Brosnan a viable contender for James Bond – it’s also the show that stopped Pierce Brosnan from playing Bond back in the late 80s. Running from 1982-1987, Remington Steele combined confident tricksters, crime solving, comedy, and a post-Backlash feminism to create a show that, while not exactly the last word in television quality, was great fun in its own right.
Brosnan played the charming (and otherwise nameless) con-man who becomes the great detective Remington Steele, a creation of actual detective Laura Holt (Stephanie Zimbalist), who learned that people don’t want a female solving crimes. In exchange for generally keeping him out of the grips of the police, Steele poses as the titular detective to clients, allowing Laura to get on with her work. The conflict – and long-developing romance – between the pair might have grown strained after five seasons of crime-solving shenanigans, but like its sister show Moonlighting, it managed to keep things fresh for most of its reign.
NBC actually announced a reboot of the series – as a half hour comedy featuring the daughter of Remington and Laura – back in 2013, but we have not heard much more about it since.
Why reboot Remington Steele? There are plenty of people who still remember the show, but it’s also the sort of concept that can be developed and expanded. The 80s were a great time for these kinds of detective shows, with none-too-serious crimes and cookie-cutter villains, but this one has the added element of your leading man not being quite trustworthy. With the rise of feminist heroes like Agent Carter, it would be nice to update Laura Holt and her masculine partner to the new millennium.
