Barbara Feldon said no to "Get Smart" and Agent 99 at first

Emmy-nominated actress, model and author Barbara Feldon joined host Kenneth Womack to talk about the "freedom and fun" of the 1960s, being a contemporary of the Beatles and her new memoir "Getting Smarter" on "Everything Fab Four," a podcast co-produced by me and Womack (a music scholar who also writes about pop music for Salon) and distributed by Salon.

Feldon, best known for portraying the striking, sophisticated superspy Agent 99 on Mel Brooks and Buck Henry's classic sitcom "Get Smart," started out as a showgirl and model in New York City before moving on to acting. In fact, she and her husband at the time, the charming Lucien Feldon-Verdeaux (whose shocking story she details in her memoir, which is available on her website), were living in a fifth floor apartment off Park Avenue when the Beatles arrived to play "The Ed Sullivan Show" (on which Feldon herself had previously performed as a dancer) in February of 1964. "We heard this roar coming up from the street," she explains to Womack. "And looking down over the parapet, we saw this mob of young women." When she asked what they were screaming about, someone yelled up, "It's the Beatles!"

Source: Nicole Michael/salon.com

Read More<<<