Television writer Henry Sharp dies at 106
The Spy Command
By Bill Koenig
January 15, 2019
Television writer Henry Sharp, whose credits included The Wild Wild West, Mission: Impossible and The Man From U.N.C.L.E., died Jan. 9 at 106, according to a Twitter post by the Writers Guild West.
Sharp’s entry on IMDB.com lists credits across various genres going back to the late 1950s. Many of his initial credits were for situation comedies, including The Donna Reed Show and McHale’s Navy.
The writer shifted to spy-fi in the mid 1960s as the spy genre became popular. Sharp was brought in to rewrite a first-season U.N.C.L.E. episode, The Neptune Affair, about a group of scientists trying to start World War III. Sharp shared the teleplay credit with John W. Bloch, who plotted the story.
Sharp’s biggest mark was on The Wild Wild West, which mixed cowboys and espionage.
Sharp wrote four first-season episodes. Early in the second season, he was brought aboard as story editor (formal title: story consultant), where he helped supervise and revise scripts. He had a total of 10 writing credits on the series.
One of his best was early in the second season, The Night of the Golden Cobra, which featured Boris Karloff as the guest adversary for Secret Service agents James West and Artemus Gordon (Robert Conrad and Ross Martin).
SHARP, Henry (Henry Enoch Sharp)
Born: June 25, 1912, New York City, New York, U.S.A.
Died: January 9, 2019, Encino, California, U.S.A.
Henry Sharp’s westerns – writer:
Mackenzie's Raiders (TV) – 1958
The Wild Wild West (TV) – 1965-1968
Here Come the Brides (TV) - 1969