The Avengers Declassified is delighted to present an exclusive interview with Jaz Wiseman, who has been spending the past few months producing special features for the first of forthcoming DVD sets of The Avengers to be released by Optimum. With the first release just a month away now, Jaz looks back on the project thus far and also looks to the future of the range.

First of all Jaz, you've worked on many well-received classic television DVD sets before, including numerous ITC adventure series for Umbrella/Madman in Australia, and have designed the popular Avengers calendars for more than ten years. Clearly, you have great affection for these series, so just how cool is it to be working on a new DVD release of The Avengers?

"It is very cool to working on these new DVDs. It's something I've been trying to do since the days when Contender announced they were going to release the series all those years ago. On that occasion, I missed out on working on them but by the time 2|entertain had acquired the rights, I had been working on DVDs for about six or seven years and they asked me to get involved. Again, it never quite worked out with 2|entertain but we'd gone down a route where they had asked me to start putting forward ideas for possible special features. I was delighted when Optimum called me having seen some of previous work and offered me the chance to work on The Avengers DVDs."

How have Optimum Releasing approached these releases knowing that many of their potential customers have a previous version of The Avengers on DVD on their shelves?

"Optimum and I sat down and discussed how best to release the series and from the word go they were very open to ideas and have pretty much gone with everything I've put forward. I'm really pleased that they agreed to start right back at the beginning with the surviving Ian Hendry episodes and the second series that starred Honor Blackman, Julie Stevens and Jon Rollason as Steed's new sidekicks.

Optimum understood that many fans of the series have bought the series on DVD before and imported overseas editions to get different extra bits, etc. The main positive they have with their release is the digitally restored episodes, which I have to say look gorgeous (I've seen examples from all the series) and especially give the filmed series a new lease of life."

What can Avengers fans expect from this new range of Avengers DVDs from Optimum and what do you believe will make them essential purchases?

"As I've just said, digitally restored episodes that really do look superb for starters. Added to this will be an interesting collection of special features that, I hope, will keep the majority of the fans happy. Obviously we have a budget for each set and I think it's important to get as many contributors as we can in terms of commentaries and interviews. Where possible, and budget allows, we'll try and get as much archive material as we can, but obviously there is a limit to what we can spend on each set. I think if you look at what we've put together for the first set, people will realise that we are trying to make this the best possible release of The Avengers."

The videotaped era of the series will be the first to be released. Did you think this was a straightforward way to go or is there an element of risk in not releasing the most well-known episodes first?

"I always wanted to start at the beginning and if you consider that the surviving Ian Hendry episodes and the second series have never had an official UK release on DVD, it seems obvious to begin there. I've often thought that releasing the film series first has been a bit of a mistake because it reinforces all the ideas that The Avengers is essentially a quirky series, featuring eccentric villains and is very much what the stereotypical American view of England is - beautiful villages in the countryside serving cream teas, etc. I know it kind of became like that, especially when it went into colour, but those first three series are very different, much grittier and I personally feel they've been overlooked since the days when Dave Rogers started writing books about The Avengers. That's not a criticism of Dave - far from it - but a lot of myths have gone into print and do the rounds on the internet and I felt that it was time that the other side of the story was told, particularly from Leonard White's point of view."

These releases will benefit from digitally restored prints for the first time on DVD. How much of a difference do you think this will make to the experience, particularly with the episodes that were made on videotape?

"The Honor Blackman episodes will never look as glorious as the black and white Diana Rigg series simply due to the fact that they were made on videotape and not 35mm film. Having seen all of the restored second series episodes, I can say that they are a vast improvement on what has been before and I've included some screen captures from A Chorus of Frogs as a comparison (see here). The new versions have been zoomed out, so there is more picture 'information' to start with and I've already spotted half a dozen boom mikes that were not visible before. The contrast is better, the image sharper and the soundtrack is cleaner– I suppose all that is going to be obvious, but it is worth mentioning."

You've now delivered the assets for the first set, comprising the complete Series Two and the surviving materials from the first. What did you hope to achieve when planning the extra features for this set, and how happy are you with the finished product?

"I'm generally very happy with what I've done with the first set. I'm particularly pleased to have given Leonard White a chance to talk about The Avengers in detail, as in the past he seems to have been avoided. It was great to hear so much from him and he is, without doubt, one of the best contributors I have worked with in ten years of producing DVDs.

What I really wanted to do was give the videotape era a chance to be reassessed, as I think they are often considered inferior to the filmed series. I also wanted to give the likes of Leonard White, Julie Stevens and others a chance to talk about their experiences and I'm pleased with what everyone has contributed. A very nice surprise was Leonard White producing his scrapbooks that contained telesnaps from some of the missing Ian Hendry episodes and I'm delighted that we've been allowed to reproduce some of these as part of the DVD set."

You've elected to include as an extra the sole surviving episode of Police Surgeon, the series that Ian Hendry and the production team were working on immediately prior to The Avengers. Why do you think it important to cover the part this short-lived series played in The Avengers story?

"Police Surgeon is important because of all the links, including actors Ian Hendry and Ingrid Hafner, plus Leonard White (producer), Don Leaver (director) and Alpho O'Reilly (designer). It also gives us another insight into Hendry as an actor in the early years of Independent television. Leonard White emphasises that The Avengers came out of Police Surgeon suddenly being 'stopped' and that he and Sydney Newman knew it was important to get another series for Hendry immediately.

I had also managed to track down the show's creator, Julian Bond, who amazingly lives only four miles up the road from me, so it seemed too good an opportunity to miss. The surviving episode, Easy Money, was very easy to clear because it's an ABC production like The Avengers. However, it was less straightforward to get hold of a broadcast standard print of the episode and rather than leave the episode off the set, we have sourced the best quality copy available to us. It's not up to the standard of the restored Avengers episodes, but at least it's there for all to see now."

I'm sure that everyone reading this interview has a hundred ideas for DVD extras for The Avengers. How easy has it been to narrow your own ideas and those of others to what is practical and affordable, and has anything turned up and opened unexpected avenues?

"There is a lot of material out there doing the rounds that fans are aware of that I'd like to include, but as with all DVDs, there are rights to negotiate and budgetary constraints. What I usually do is sit down and write a plan that means working out how many DVDs are going to be in the set, how the episodes are spread across the discs and make a list of potential special features. From this, I usually call the commentary/interview people first and get these all set up so I can tick off them off the list. I'll then contact any archives that might have film footage to see if we can license it and sort out any clearances. By that point, I'll know what we can and can't clear and/or afford and will know pretty much what exactly is going on the set.

I have located some interesting film material that I hope to clear for future sets that has never been released before on DVD, but obviously at this stage I can't go into more detail."

You've gathered an impressive selection of commentators for the commentaries and interviews. How did you go about finding people who have, for the most part, been retired for a good number of years?

"A lot of them I already knew and had worked with before, such as Julie Stevens, Roger Marshall, Brian Clemens, Roy Ward Baker, etc, so it was simply a case of calling them and asking them if they were interested. Once they all knew that this was an official release, they were all very happy to contribute and via Roger Marshall and Leonard White I've got hold of another half dozen or so people who worked on the series for the future sets. I have to say that they've all been excellent to work with and contributed a great deal to making these sets something special.

Honor Blackman was approached via her agent and I have introduced Optimum to Patrick Macnee's son Rupert who looks after his father's business affairs. I can't really say any more than that at the moment but I'm hoping that all the leading ladies will contribute to these sets in some shape or form."

How have the recording sessions gone?

"They've all gone really well – the Martin Woodhouse one was 'interesting' as I had to do this remotely and due to exterior location this has some added ambience! Even though all the commentaries on Set 1 are solo efforts, it's been nice to reunite people who've not seen each other for a number of years as they were all in the studio on the same day. I've also decided to take a back step as moderator on some of these commentaries and have handed over this role to Henry Holland, my long time production assistant, while I concentrate on producing them."

What has been the highlight of working of this first DVD set?

"Without doubt meeting and working with Leonard White, who at ninety-two still has a wonderful sense of humour and superb recall for events that took place getting on for fifty years ago.

Leonard has been incredibly supportive and by generously allowing us to reproduce some of his Series One scrapbook, he has given us a hugely valuable insight into the Ian Hendry series. The telesnaps are very revealing and I was quite surprised to see how much location footage was used back then. It's obviously not the same amount as seen in the filmed series, but still most episodes seem to have one or two scenes where they went on location."

The question that will be on the lips of every British Avengers fan is "will we finally be getting a complete release of all surviving episodes in this country?" – so… will this be happening?

"100% YES! Optimum have scheduled all 5 sets (from Ian Hendry through to Linda Thorson) and I'm already well into the work for Set 2 and have already recorded commentaries for Sets 3, 4 and 5. It would unprofessional of me to talk about release schedules, but rest assured the fans will get all the series of The Avengers on DVD."

What are your hopes and plans for the later volumes in The Avengers range? How do you plan to keep the special features fresh from set to set?

"As the range progresses, I hope to be able to include as much archive film material as possible, to have a minimum of four commentaries per set, to have as many scripts as possible as PDFs, ensure that the stills galleries are extensive and to generally make sure the discs are presented in a manner that suits the style of the series. There's a lot that's already been sorted for the future sets, but I'm sure you'll appreciate I can't divulge any of this at present. I'm hoping that I can keep The Avengers Declassified up to speed and give you a few exclusives for each release."

Thanks Jaz, for taking the time to keep readers of The Avengers Declassified informed with the latest  news about the Optimum DVDs - we all have an exciting time ahead!

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© Jaz Wiseman and Alan Hayes, September 2009
Images © Optimum Releasing / StudioCanal / Leonard White

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