Question: In My Bodyguard, who played the lunch money-stealing “Melvin Moody”?

Last Question: What television detective had several fake passports in the names of characters played by Humphrey Bogart?

Answer: Remington Steele

Remington Steele starred Stephanie Zimbalist and launched the career of Pierce Brosnan. Zimbalist played Laura Holt, a private detective who opened her own agency. But she could not get any clients because nobody wanted to hire a woman as a private detective. So she renamed her agency from “Laura Holt Investigations” to “Remington Steele Investigations” and told everyone that she works for a mythical “Mr. Steele”. Although her business picks up dramatically, all of her clients eventually want to meet her employer (who doesn’t exist). As the pressure is building beyond her ability to deal with it, she meets a handsome man with just the right amount of class to play the part of Remington Steele. He convinces her to make him her partner and the story begins.

The series ran from 1982 to 1987, and was groundbreaking. At a time when hour-long series were serious and half-hour series were humorous, Steele incorporated multiple styles of comedy into the standard detective format. It was also one of the first shows to have the “will they or won’t they” series arc, which is now common in both dramas and comedies.

NBC canceled the TV show on May 15, 1986 at the end of the 4th season. That very same day, the New York Post reported that Pierce Brosnan had signed to be the new James Bond on May 14, 1986. Unfortunately, NBC still had a 60 day option to renew the show with Brosnan still under contract. The news of his selection as “Bond” caused much interest in the summer reruns of Remington Steele and the network decided to produce a few more episodes causing Brosnan to lose the role in License To Kill to Timothy Dalton. Stephanie Zimbalist also lost the role of Anne Lewis in the movie Robocop to Nancy Allen for the same reason.