Who does not remember Nick Slaughter and his detective adventures with his inseparable Sylvie in the middle of the heat of the Florida beaches? And who did not get goose bumps and feel a little closer to those incredible landscapes while singing that Anyway The Wind Blows with which the series started Tropical Heat?
It seemed that investigating and delving into the dangerous situations that surrounded the protagonists was something better when it was done in that place. The Mariah Cay they said it was … finish off a few bad guys to have a good cocktail later at Ian’s beach bar – named Tropical Heat, precisely – while we were getting information for a new case …
The setting of Tropical Heat it’s summer in itself, because the place invites you to do so. But for all the Spaniards who followed the series it was even more so, because it was a recurring broadcast of the summers of Antena 3, with the aggravation that they used to put nothing less than behind The Baywatch. Sea and sand overdose …
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Well, this series, starring Rob Stewart, Carolyn Dunn, Ian Tracey, John David Bland o Eugene Clark, among others, produced in Canada and set in the most famous peninsula of the USA -countries, by the way, where it was a success-, curiously, it was not shot in either of these two scenarios …
The beaches that we saw in this marvel of television from our early years changed location as the seasons passed – the three it had -. They started with the filming of the first season in Puerto Vallarta (Mexico), to go through Eilat (Israel) in the second and end with a third season divided between Pretoria, South Africa and Mauritius. A shoot that started just beginning the decade of the nineties of the last century and that we could enjoy between 1991 and 1993.
Do you remember the first chapter? We were hooked from minute one …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Twmbg1MCSUU
What happened to your cast?
The great protagonist Nick Slaughter, was played by Rob Stewart -not to be confused with Rod-. The Canadian actor started his career with 66 episodes of Tropical Heat, which launched him to fame in his country, after getting there a little rebound after making a living as guitarist and singer, although he already had a small acting debut in a remake of the series Alfred Hitchcock Presenta.
From there he continued in the audiovisual industry, in television movies, with more pain than glory participating in titles such as Nikita, Painkiller Jane, Defiance O Beauty and the Beast, but his great moment had it thanks to Tropical Heat and thanks to the character he played, who became a symbol of freedom in Serbia in the fight against the dictator Milosevic in the Yugoslav War under the motto ‘Nick Slaughter for president’.
Carolyn Dunn, also Canadian, also rose to fame in Tropical Heat What Sylvie Gerard, but little. The one who was Nick’s secretary and partner participated in one movie or another to end up returning to her city, Whitney Pier in Nova Scotia, where he runs a natural medicine store.
John David Bland, the handsome blond of Ian Stewart, owner of a Tropical Heat bar and a diving school, as well as informante de Nick Slaughter, continued working after the series in other productions, until in 1998 he passed away in Los Angeles…
Ian Tracey, Spider Garvin in the series, he has been perhaps the most prolific actor in the tropical heat factory … He has made 24 films –Timecop, Free Willy 3, Insomnia, Open Range, Elektra, Man of Steel– and as many series as Los 4400, Supernatural O File X, among other.
Eugene Clark it was the only thing in Florida that the series had. Los Angeles actor who dedicated himself to soccer in Canada, was Ollie Porter on Tropical Heat and he has been an actor in films for television and for the cinema; while we cannot forget either Pedro Armendáriz Jr. (Lieutenant Carrillo), Mexican actor who died of cancer in 1971 in New York after an acting career with some important Hollywood actors and as a voice actor in the North American factory.
Anyway The Wind Blows
Apart from long straight ponytail by Nick Slaughter, one of the hallmarks of the series is undoubtedly the hit of its opening: Anyway The Wind Blows. This two-minute song with a reggae touch and an unparalleled beachy and summery spirit was composed by Fred Mollin and played by him with his brother Larry. A great song performed by other artists such as the Jamaican Errol Blackwood…
In this case, do not confuse the mythical opening with songs by Frank Zappa o de JJ Cale with the same title, but they have nothing to do …
Isn’t the heat starting to get hot?
ANTONIO SÁNCHEZ
Photos: Gtres / Videos: YouTube
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