Retro : They Spy ‘Kung Fu’ : ROBERT VAUGHN AND PATRICK MACNEE TEAM UP AGAIN FOR THE ‘LEGEND’

The Man From U.N.C.L.E. raises a little “Caine” this week on Kung Fu: The Legend Continues.

Yes, grasshoppers, Robert Vaughn, the sexy superspy Napoleon Solo of “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.” fame, guests on the syndicated David Carradine series in an episode titled “Dragonswing.” But Vaughn’s not the only ‘60s icon dropping by. Patrick MacNee, who played sophisticated British spy John Steed on “The Avengers,” also is featured.

In “Dragonswing,” Kwai Chang Caine (Carradine) and son Peter Caine (Chris Potter) recruit a band of mercenaries to help them get rid of a gang of survivalists who are terrorizing a small town.

The plot’s a takeoff of the classic Akira Kurosawa film “The Seven Samurai” and its Western remake “The Magnificent Seven.” And Vaughn just happened to have starred as a hired gun in the “Magnificent Seven.”

But Vaughn says his ‘Kung Fu” character called Rykker doesn’t bear any resemblance to the one he played in “Magnificent Seven.”

“I’m not a coward,” Vaughn explains over the phone from his Connecticut home. “In the movie, he was a coward who found redemption at the end. This is strictly a black-cat guy with black gloves and a black coat--a black-hat heavy.”

In the new film, Rykker and MacNee’s Steadman have been friends for years. “We’ve been involved in various other capers throughout the world as vigilantes and so on,” Vaughn says.

For Vaughn and MacNee, making “Kung Fu” was a reunion of sorts. The two worked together 11 years ago in the highly rated CBS movie “The Return of the Man From U.N.C.L.E.” MacNee played stern U.N.C.L.E. (United Network Command for Law and Enforcement) boss Alexander Waverly, replacing series star Leo G. Carroll, who had died. “Return of the Man From U.N.C.L.E.” also was written and produced by “Kung Fu” producer Michael Sloan.

Vaughn says there’s been some discussion about doing another “U.N.C.L.E.” reunion movie with co-star David McCallum, who played spy llya Kuryakin. “Michael Sloan is anxious to do it,” Vaughn says. “He has been in contact with the Turner organization to try to get the rights to do another two-hour movie. He wants to do it, and I would certainly be happy.”

Basically, however, Vaughn says, he and MacNee’s spy days are long over. “ ‘Entertainment Tonight’ interviewed both of us,” Vaughn says. “They said, ‘What do you see in the future?’ I said, ‘We were talking last night with Michael Sloan about developing a series for Patrick and myself where we will sit behind a large desk with pipes and look at long banks of video monitors and send young men to their deaths.’ That’s our vision for the future--John Steed and Napoleon Solo, smoking pipes and sending young men to their deaths and working one day a week.”

Closer in the future, though, is another “Kung Fu” episode. Both Vaughn and MacNee recently completed “Dragonswing II,” which will air sometime next year.

Recently, Vaughn appeared in the Fox summer series “Danger Theatre” and finished a nine-month tour of Canada in the play “I Hate Hamlet.”

“I also just became the spokesman for First Alert, the home-security system,” he says. “Bill Conrad was the spokesman and I’m the new Bill Conrad.”

Vaughn also is at work on his memoirs, titled “Christ, Shakespeare, Ho Chi Minh as I Knew Them.”

“Like that title?,” Vaughn asks. “I’m looking to hand it in at the end of this year. I have been fiddle-faddling with it. I tend to throw out more than I keep, being a person who does a lot of rewriting.”

“Kung Fu: The Legend Continues” airs Wednesday at 9 p.m. on KCOP.