Landau was offered the part of Spock, but turned it down because he said playing an emotionless character would have driven him crazy! Ironically, it was Leonard Nimoy who took the role of Spock (and went on to great fame with it), because he was the one who later replaced Landau on MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE...
No the true irony is that Nimoy left MI after one season because he considered his Paris character completely flat, with no development and no background. ST TOS extras interview with Leonard Nimoy. So both played roles the other found maddening to play for a long time.
No the true irony is that Nimoy left MI after one season because he considered his Paris character completely flat, with no development and no background. ST TOS extras interview with Leonard Nimoy. So both played roles the other found maddening to play for a long time.
D.S.
It was two seasons , and while Nimoy is on record saying he enjoyed his first year on M:I, by the second he was given a lot less to do as far as having challenging characterizations.
Plus he got sick of working on the Desilu/Paramount lot and having two bosses named Jim (Kirk and Phelps).
Martin Landau had his first lead role in the 1963 British war drama DECISION AT MIDNIGHT. The film did not play in the U.S. Lewis Allen (SUDDENLY!) directed the film, which had a unreleased score by Paul Dunlap.
Landau's next appearance on American movie screens was in the George Stevens biblical epic THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD. Landau played Caiaphas, the Jewish high priest who organizes the plot to kill Jesus (Max von Sydow). Landau later said in interviews that half of his role was deleted in the editing stage. Alfred Newman's score was released on a United Artists LP, and was most recently released in an expanded format by Varese Sarabande in 2004.
In the John Sturges Cinerama comedy western THE HALLELUJAH TRAIL, Landau played a Sioux Indian, "Chief Walks-Stooped-Over," who attempts to intercept a wagon-train-load of whiskey headed for Denver. Elmer Bernstein's score was released on a United Artists LP and was re-issued on CD by Varese Sarabande in 2005.
In the 1966 western NEVADA SMITH, Landau co-starred as "Jesse Coe," one of the murderers of "Max Sand's" (Steve McQueen's) parents. The film was a reunion of sorts for the two actors. Of the 2,000 performers that auditioned for Lee Strasberg's exclusive theater school in 1955, Steve McQueen and Martin Landau were the only ones who were accepted. Alfred Newman's score was released on a Dot LP, but has never had a legitimate CD re-issue.
In the fall of 1966, Martin Landau began appearing in the television series "Mission: Impossible". He played an agent of the Impossible Missions Force named "Rollin Hand," who was a noted actor, makeup artist, escape artist, magician and "man of a million faces." Landau had been cast as a guest star for the pilot show with the understanding that he would be one of four or five rotating guest star agents. His contract gave the producers an option to have him "render services for (three or four) additional episodes." During the first season, Martin Landau's face was not shown during the main title sequence. In fact, during that season he was credited as making a "special appearance." It wasn't until season two that he was acknowledged as being a full cast member. This was because Landau, who at the time had a thriving motion picture career, didn't want to commit himself to the standard five-year contract that studios typically required of actors in a television series. Series Producer Bruce Geller wanted Landau badly enough, however, that he agreed to use him on a "guest star" basis during the first season.
To fill the void left by star Steven Hill's Sabbath absences (Hill was an Orthodox Jew), producers wound up using Landau for more episodes than anticipated. He eventually struck a deal to appear in all the first season's remaining episodes, but always billed as a "guest star" so that he could have the option to give notice to work on a feature film. Landau signed one-year contracts at the beginning of the second (1967-68) and third (1968-69) seasons. He did not have any feature film appearances while he was on the show.
Landau's then wife, Barbara Bain was also a regular on the series, playing "Cinnamon Carter," a top fashion model and actress. Both Landau and Bain jointly left the show after the third season due to a contract dispute after their demands for a salary raise weren't met.
During his three years on "Mission: Impossible," Martin Landau was nominated every year for an Emmy Award as Outstanding Actor in a Leading Role in a Dramatic Series. He lost in 1967 and 1968 to Bill Cosby for "I Spy," and in 1969 to Carl Betz for "Judd for the Defense."
The main cast of "Mission: Impossible" (1966-67) - Steven Hill, Barbara Bain, Martin Landau, and Greg Morris
For his nuanced and incredibly heartfelt performance in 1988's TUCKER: A MAN AND HIS DREAM, he certainly deserved the Oscar over the anybody-can-chew-the-scenery performance of Kevin Kline in A FISH CALLED WANDA.
I am so glad Landau was recognized with an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for ED WOOD a few years later, but I still feel his work in TUCKER is a much better epitaph.
Landau's first feature film after leaving "Mission: Impossible" was an Italian war comedy called ROSOLINO PATERNO, SOLDATO (Rosolino Paternò, Soldier). Nino Manfredi starred as "Rosolino Paterno," and Landau played "Joe Mellone." The film was about a commando group (Jason Robards, Peter Falk, and Landau) that was sent on a secret mission in Sicily. They had a reluctant Italian prisoner of war (Manfredi) to help them. Nanni Loy directed the film, which was not released in the U.S. Carlo Rustichelli's score was released by Cinevox in 1991.
As a kid, Commander Koenig was my hero, and I never missed an episode of Space: 1999. Years later, his work would again enthrall me in Woody Allen's Crimes and Misdemeanors.
, and while Nimoy is on record saying he enjoyed his first year on M:I, by the second he was given a lot less to do as far as having challenging characterizations.
