saving the payments they had to make to me for the film rights." Charteris actually pokes fun at The Falcon in his 1943 novel The Saint Steps In, with a character making a metafictional reference to the Falcon being "a bargain-basement imitation" of The Saint.) George Sanders appeared in the first four Falcon features. When Sanders tired of B leads, he bowed out of the series in The Falcon's Brother (1942). In the film, Gay Lawrence is killed by assassins, prompting his brother Tom Lawrence to become the new Falcon. The brother who stepped in as the Falcon's replacement was portrayed by Sanders's actual older brother, Tom Conway. Producer Maurice Geraghty later revealed that RKO executives had recruited Conway simply as a way to induce Sanders to make one more Falcon picture, after which the series would end. "So it was astonishing to them when Tom Conway caught on right away and carried the series on – even outgrossing the pictures George had made." After The Falcon's Brother, Conway starred in nine more Falcon films through 1946. As with other series of B mystery films, the plot of a Falcon movie generally revolved around a particular locale that the detective was visiting. An oft-used gimmick in the Falcon series was to tack "teaser" epilogues onto the ends of films. In each teaser, a previously unseen woman would approach the Falcon, usually in desperation, and signal the title and locale of his next movie. A teaser rarely had anything to do with the plot of the upcoming film, since that film had not yet been produced. The Falcon was revived for three more films, all made in 1948, but these featured the earlier "Michael Waring" character as created by Drexel Drake. However, he was referred to as "Watling" and the credits still claimed he was based on a character created by Michael Arlen. Actor-magician John Calvert played "The New Falcon" in three low-budget features produced by Film Classics. The character went on to appear (as Michael Waring) in radio and television – Charles McGraw portrayed the Falcon in the 39-episode syndicated television series Adventures of the Falcon (1954–55). Film series Starring George Sanders as Gay Lawrence The Gay Falcon (1941) A Date with the Falcon (1942) The Falcon Takes Over (1942) (based on Raymond Chandler's Farewell, My Lovely) Starring George Sanders and Tom Conway as the Lawrence brothers; Gay is murdered