FLIPPIN' THE DAUPHINE*

Credit Dauphine was an international bank that served as a front for the spy organization SD-6 in 'Alias'. (Sydney Bristow was recruited out of college to work there as an office assistant in the L.A. branch where she would begin her training for what she thought was the CIA.) SD-6 was located on sub-level

But Credit Dauphine also showed up in the second season premiere of 'Eli Stone' as well.

Jordan Wethersby met with executives of Credit Dauphine, those in charge of mortgages, who were proud of the fact that they brought down the US economy. After telling them off, Jordan was trapped under rubble in a stairwell when a crane crashed into the building.

There's another interesting connection between these two series - Jordan Wethersby of 'Eli Stone' and Jack Bristow, Sydney's dad and an actual CIA agent, of 'Alias' are both played by the same actor, Victor Garber.

But this is not a case of Jack Bristow using - okay, I'll say it - an alias. It's a Toobworld conceit that many spies on TV series not only take the identities of middle-management corporate types (hoping to trade in on their supposedly colorless lives) but they sometimes even undergo plastic surgery so that they more closely resemble those unsuspecting citizens whom they're impersonating while on assignments.

We saw this happen in "Identity Crisis", an episode of 'Columbo'. The agent code-named "Geronimo" used the cover identity of A.J. Henderson, an advertising executive from Westport, Connecticut. And the CIA director at the time, who went by the code name of "Secret Agent X-9", must have undergone some plastic surgery to better resemble an advertising executive named Larry Tate, who also spent time in Westport, Connecticut.

So I'm thinking that Jack Bristow recognized the close resemblance to lawyer Jordan Wethersby and capitalized on it some more with a few cosmetic upgrades. This would have happened long before 'Alias' was first broadcast, which would splain why it was never brought up by his daughter Sydney. Before she found out that he was a CIA operative, he probably told her that he had to have the surgery because of a car accident or something.

BCnU!
Toby O'B

*Oh, that pun is horrible! That's why I love it......