The precursors of “Mission: Impossible” chapter is only three pages long. It first describes the 1965 treatment titled “Briggs’ Squad: A Beginning” written by M:I creator Bruce Geller. Lt. Col. David (not Daniel) Briggs.
Wow, that title would've made it a lot harder to replace the lead actor...
Little Terry Targo, soft-spoken master at all forms if hand-to-hand combat and a hitman
That's amusing, since in the actual pilot episode, they toned Targo down to a safecracker. And his hands were crushed midway through, partly to complicate the plot, but probably due to network censorship standards requiring that he not be left free to continue his criminal career.
From the additional info you provided to me on Facebook, it sounds like Geller's original idea involved Briggs reuniting his old Special Forces squad to perform these missions -- which reminds me of
Nick Fury, Agent of SHIELD turning Sgt. Fury and his Howling Commandos from Marvel's WWII comics into superspies. And it sounds like they would've been a consistent team throughout, whereas in the early days of M:I, they tried to have a rotating team composition with different mixes of regulars and guest agents every week. Indeed, in the very early episodes, the guest agents tended to be the primary focus of the drama.
Then it describes two other Desilu pilots prior to this that bore similarities to the M:I format. The first being “Man With 1,000 Faces”/“The Man Nobody Knows”, a project intended for syndication. Created by Hendrik Vollaerts.
Better known to Trekkies as Rik Vollaerts, author of "For the World is Hollow...". He also wrote the Bookworm episodes of
Batman '66.
A “super-investigator” working out of Washington, D.C. Would have starred Steve Peck as the investigator, but Peck would have opened and closed each episode. Like Roland Hand, character would have donned make up at beginning of episode and taken it off again at the end, allowing other actors to play character in disguise for most of episode. Began development in 1957, pilot shot on 1959.
Sounds similar to DC's
Human Target, and the short-lived 1992 TV series based on it (the later Mark Valley series abandoned the disguise element). Except there, Christopher Chance disguised himself as people threatened with death in order to draw out their aspiring killers, while this sounds like it was more about infiltrating the bad guys.
Lastly, the chapter talks about “the real precursor of Mission: Impossible”, a short-lived series made by Filmways in the late 1950s titled “21 Beacon Street”. A team of operatives who devised elaborate schemes to catch criminals.
That does sound pretty similar, though I guess it was coincidental.
Disturbing story about Laurence Heath's background.
Thanks for tracking this down again!