The Incredible World of Spy-Fi: Wild and Crazy Spy Gadgets, Props, and Artifacts from TV and the Movies

Even people who aren't big spy movie fans know that James Bond gets to play with some great gadgets. The same goes for the casts of Mission: Impossible, The Man from U.N.C.L.E. and I Spy. Biederman has been immersed in the spy world, at least as Hollywood depicts it, from the time of his youth in the 1960s, when he was introduced to a world of ""spies, gadgets, adventure, and beautiful women--everything that a ten-year-old boy could possibly want."" Since then he has collected over 4,000 props from various sets, amassing such an impressive trove that in 2000 the CIA asked him to exhibit it at its headquarters. This book tells the story of each TV series and movie through Biederman's props, which range from the coat hook used in U.N.C.L.E. to open a secret passageway, to the gold sofa that adorned James West's private railroad car in The Wild Wild West. Biederman, a screenwriter who works as an expert consultant to spy film producers, obviously knows the episodes of each series inside out, and his love for the genre is evident in his exuberant anecdotes (his search for his ""holy grail,"" the cigarette-pack transmitter from U.N.C.L.E., is particularly dramatic). Fortunately, he isn't so obsessed that he can't take a joke about his passion: he also enjoys, and has memorabilia from, spy spoofs like Get Smart and Austin Powers. Few readers are likely to be as enamored of the Hollywood spy world as the author, but those who have some interest in it will enjoy perusing this celebration of all things espionage. 200 color images.