HOLD THE FORT

A fast-crumbling 26-year-old videotape of Robert Redford has been saved from oblivion in the nick of time.

The role was Captain Fort, an adversary of Andrew Jackson, in “Born a Giant,” a 1960 episode of the 1959-61 NBC historical series “Our American Heritage.”

“The oxide was flaking from the tape, and the tape was disintegrating as the transfer was made,” said Tony Chiango, curator of the MIT-based University Film Study Center, who produced a new version for its archives. Redford played “kind of slimy character” who tried (unsuccessfully) to persuade Jackson to use American ships for an invasion of Mexico.

“Redford has such a small part, but he does all right,” Chiango added. “He gets his close-ups--on tape, he’s a handsome devil!--and at the end, a narrator comes on and says, ‘Robert Redford can be seen on Broadway in ‘The Little Moon of Alban.’ ”