Author of ‘The Eagle Has Landed’ planned best-seller

Press, 14 July 1982, Page 12

Author of ‘The Eagle Has Landed’ planned best-seller

The author. Jack Higgins, sat down to write "The Eagle Has Landed” in January. 1575. having decided he badly needed a big literary success. Two and a half months, and 170.000 words later. Higgins had completed his novel about a German attempt to kidnap Winston Churchill from British soil, during World War 11. How much of this astonishing story is fact and howmuch fiction 0 "Some things are true, others I made up based partly on facts.” said Higgins. whose real name is Harry Patterson. "In a sense the book has overtaken me. I'm at the stage where fact and fiction become blurred. "What set it off was a conversation I had with an English-speaking Russian officer, right after the war. when I was stationed in Berlin. We had a couple of drinks and were talking about various German intelligence activities around the world. The Russian commented that the Nazis had all sorts of wild schemes, many of which came to nothing. And then he said. 'Of course, they were more successful when they tried to capture Churchill in one of your coastal towns.’ “1 asked him for more details, but he wouldn’t say any more. He just smiled and said. ‘Remember what I told you.’ Higgins was impressed by all the facts that fell together to make the German kidnap attempt — in theory — possible. "Churchill did visit a re-

mote coastal area during the war and the local people knew about it.” he said. “The Germans did hatch those daring and audacious plans. They had a number of Allied planes at their disposal. so they could have fooled British coastal defences into believing that an Allied exercise was taking place. And when I visited the Norfolk coast. I was told that, at a given place, there was a wide radar gap. So all the physical possibilities existed." The movie based on the best-selling book stars Michael Caine, in a drastic

departure from the usual, as Colonel Kurt Steiner of the famed German paratroops corps - a tough resourceful man chosen to repeat with Churchill what the Germans had accomplished when they lifted Mussolini from his fortress prison in Italy and brought him to Hitler’s headquarters in Germany. In a contrasting role. Donald Sutherland plays Liam Devlin, a softly-spoken Irishman in the service of German counter-intelligence, while Robert Duvall is cast as Max Radi. Colonel of Mountain Troops and chief of Abwehr Section 3. who insti-

gates the raid. The supporting cast includes Jenny Agutter. Donald Pleasence. Anthony Quayle. Jean Marsh. Sven Bertil Taube. John-Standing. Judy Geeson. Treat Williams and Larry (J. R.) Hagman. The picture was filmed in Finland and England, using such locations as London, the Norfolk and Cornish coasts and a little Berkshire village. © "The Eagle Has Landed." produced by Jack Wiener and David Niven, junior, and directed by John Sturges for Associated General Films, will be screened on One on Saturday at 8.30 p.m.