Nostalgia TV Drama on '50s & '60s LeMans Sparked by Shelby Book

LOS ANGELES - February 11, 2011: Wallace Wyss, a California-based auto historian, reports that his latest biography of Carroll Shelby is slated to become the basis for a TV series. The book, SHELBY The Man The Cars The Legend, made its debut in 2007. Last month Tony and Ridley Scott, the Hollywood action film producers of such films as "Top Gun" and "Gladiator," announced plans to co-produce a new TV series based on racing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the fifties and sixties and based on the book by Wyss.

"Retro is now a big trend in TV," says Wyss, "and some have speculated that this series could be like 'Mad Men on wheels.' I think, once the Scotts get into researching the subject at length they'll find there's some great stories to tell. I know from my own personal standpoint, I have evolved in my interest to where I am now a helluva lot more interested in the stories of the people--the engineers, the designers, and the drivers-- than I am in the specifications of the cars themselves."

Over the last three decades, Wyss has written three books about Carroll Shelby, a one-time failed East Texas chicken farmer who became a legendary race driver and car builder. Wyss recalls first becoming aware of the Shelby Cobra when, as a high School undergrad in Detroit, he and his buddy cruised the famous road, Woodward Avenue, every night, frequently seeing a white 289 Cobra. "It was always in the distance--we never could catch it," he recalls.

Although he is not privy to the direction the producers will go in, Wyss predicts that, despite the title of the book, the miniseries will likely not center on Shelby specifically but on the conflict between the young drivers for firms like Ferrari, Aston Martin, Jaguar, Mercedes-Benz and Ford. "The drivers came from all over the world, so there could be interest from networks in several countries in carrying the series," says Wyss.

Wyss also doesn't know if their emphasis will be on the '50s or the '60s. "The most interesting era to me is the mid-'60s when Ford, a giant automaker, challenged Ferrari, a tiny automaker with more racing experience at LeMans," says Wyss, "but I don't know which era will be the main focus." Wyss also co-authored Ford GT40 and the New Ford GT, another book covering LeMans racing.

"But on the other hand, " says Wyss, "Now that it's more than a half century after the fact, fans might also like to see the mid-'50s when that original group of brave young Americans like Carroll Shelby, Phil Hill, Dan Gurney and Ritchie Ginther all went over to Europe at the same time on their own nickel with the intent of wresting away the factory drives in Ferraris, Porsches and other European cars from Europe's best. I predict for those previously unaware of this era of racing history, there will be a newfound appreciation of not only the cars but the drivers who risked so much."

Wyss also predicts that, if the series is a success, "it could spawn interest among newcomers to the world of sports cars in the cars of the '50s and '60s, the personalities, and hopefully in books and art on those subjects."

For his next project, Wyss is working on a series of mystery novels about a Ferrari-collecting detective, "and beating the bushes for a literary agent."