Kids! Back in 1999 you couldn’t get them to take off their VR shades for love or money. Not to mention their shiny metallic jumpsuits and their all-night parties in their government provided luxury accomodation! Well Shades may seem amusingly off-target in its predictions but its themes about political protest, apathy and the line between peer pressure and being part of a friendship group are still relevant concerns for drama.
Welcome to a city tower block converted into a government-run ‘Youth Unit’. The youths, at an age when they might be studying, training, working or protesting, have been ‘ bought off by the government -this being paid for by the ‘ New Wealth’ created by the development of new microchip technology. The shades of the title are dark glasses, the donning of which enables the youths to pursue his or her own dream, career or obsession. But when Sheena starts to research a young CND protestor from 1982, her curiosity starts making her ask uncomfortable questions about their seemingly idyllic life.
Shades was shown on BBC1 on 11th May 1982 at 9.25pm, written by Stephen Lowe, and stars Tracy Childs, Stuart Mackenzie and Neil Pearson.
It was a pleasure to be joined once more by my old friend John Isles to discuss this, the most obviously science fictional of the six plays. It takes its cue both from Eighties fears about the bomb and the example of the Greenham Common protests, and Aldus Huxley’s influential novel Brave New World.
My friend Rik Hoskin has told me about an intriguing new UK theatre event that might be of interest to readers:
Professional storyteller Jason Buck will deliver an official adaptation of 2000AD‘s Slaine: The Horned God, based on the story written by Pat Mills, as a theatrical performance at Oxford Playhouse on 19th September. Tickets are available to buy now.
The Oxford performance is a preview show for a tour later this year; a show adapting a tale of Celtic heroes, villains, monsters, magic, dragons, demons, goddesses and gods for the stage, it’s been created by Jason in partnership with 2000AD and Rebellion.
Originally created by Pat Mills, “the godfather of British comics”, and his wife Angie Kincaid, Sláine has captured the imagination of comics readers for generations.
Set in a “time which is not a time” when Britain was rife with magic and mischief, this one-manproductionof Slaine: The Horned God brings together the epic heroic exploits and divine transformation of the one who would be High King of the Tribes of the Earth Goddess.
This production reimagines ancient mythologies and brings to life the traditional art of storytelling for modern audiences.
Jason Buck has been a performer most of his adult life, including gurning, comedy and sword swallowing, but his passion lies in stories.
“There’s nothing like getting lost in a story, the pictures in your head are better than film,” the prize winning storyteller says.
A teller of tall tales, a weaver of whimsies and a fashioner of fables, Jason draws on traditional favourites and new ideas. His stories are told in the oldest and best ways – as live performances for modern audiences.
Based in the West Midlands of England, as well as a global online audience, Jason has performed across the UK and mainland Europe, blending traditional and contemporary motifs, vocal sound effects and pure, unadulterated fantasy.
I’m pleased to share with you that I am the guest on the latest episode of the podcast Doctor Who – Too Hot for TV, hosted by Dylan Rees. Together we are looking back at two unmade stories from the 1960’s – Farewell, Great Macedon and The Queen of Time. Both have been recreated as dramatised audiobooks by Big Finish. I’m particularly happy with the way this one has turned out. In fact I think it’s the best of my three guest spot so far because I sound more confident and fluid and there’s a lot of interesting Doctor Who behind the scenes details to talk about.. You can listen to the episode here https://www.buzzsprout.com/864883/episodes/17368333-s5-e33-just-a-bit-of-tea-with-a-wee-lassie and all the major podcast apps.
Farewell, Great Macedon was submitted by Moris Farhi to the show’s script editor David Whittaker during the first season in 1964. It features the First Doctor as played by William Hartnell. Unusually amongst the so called “lost stories” of Doctor Who, it exists as a fully written script rather than just an outline, which helps make this adaptation feel just a bit more legitimate. Nigel Robinson, a skilled adapter of early Doctor Who stories, wrote the audio version and Big Finish mainstay Lisa Bowerman directed William Russell and Carol Ann Ford, who played two of the Doctor’s first companions. John Dorney guested as Alexander.
The TARDIS lands in the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, where the travellers meet Alexander the Great who welcomes them with hospitality. But history teacher Barbara realises that they have landed a few days before Alexander’s death and with the TARDIS needing to recharge before it can leave, the four friends find themselves caught up in court treachery. It’s a splendid story and for me one of the high points of Big Finish’s Doctor Who range.
The Queen of Time features the Second Doctor, as played by Patrick Troughton and was written by Brian Hayles. Hayles had written several stories for the series and this proposed adventure owed a large debt to one of them, The Celestial Toymaker. This time Catherine Harvey adapted the detailed plot outline and Lisa Bowerman once again directed. Former companion actors Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury performed it, with Caroline Faber as Hecuba.
The Doctor and his companions are mysteriously invited to meet Hecuba, the Queen of Time and sister of the Toymaker. Trapped in her realm, the Doctor must ward off Hecuba’s romantic overtures, whilst Jamie and Zoe face a series of deadly puzzles. This is something of a misfire for me and I enjoyed getting into why I don’t like it.
As well as recommending Too Hot for TV as a great podcast anytime, I’ll take a moment to remind you that Dylan’s second book Myths and Legends, a deep cut into independent filmmakers Reeltime Pictures, will be out soon. You can find out more here.
Before I go, my friend Rik Hoskin has had a new short story published in the premiere issue of Goblins and Galaxies Magazine called “Tournament in Frow” and you can find out more below:
Hope you are well. Apologies for it being a bit quiet around the blog this year, but I’ve been working on a few projects so that I can have a bit of a podcast event in the not too distant future. It’s a mini-season of Play for Tomorrow and I want all six episodes in the can, to guarantee I can release them weekly. In addition, I’ve recorded two further installments on Codename: Icarus and The Tomorrow People, which hopefully follow soon after. Meanwhile at work I’ve been working on my first authored VR projects, as opposed to just being a consumer of other people’s apps. And there’s some other activity that I can’t talk too much about yet. So there’s going to be more regular posting soon. I also thinking of releasing some old reviews which have never been in print before but which I think have some value. Speaking of reviews, I talk about Boris Karloff: The Man Behind the Monster in the latest episode of the Official Talking Pictures TV podcast.
Rik Hoskin is as busy as ever. Amongst his output are two short stories, one for an anthology and another for a fiction magazine.
Behind the Revolving Door: An Anthology of Choices is a forthcoming book from Celestial Echo Press.
Each of us makes a multitude of choices daily, some minor and some with major consequences. Do you eat cereal or oatmeal for breakfast? Skip it entirely? Do you or don’t you wear your lucky shirt to the sports event? What do you think the consequences would be if you didn’t wear your lucky shirt?
This anthology will be a collection of stories that will take you on a journey with the author’s protagonist as they make a decision. We will ask for stories that take them through a trial and force them to take an action, to make a choice. For example, the character comes to a fork in the road. Do they take the right path or do they take the left? Does the character find a wallet on the ground? Do they open it? Return it to the owner, or keep it? What are the consequences? Do they encounter a second choice, going back through the revolving door? Do they find classified information, implicating a family member in a coup? What do they do with it? What happens next? Is the character hiking through the woods, and finding a portal, not knowing where it will take them if they enter? What happens? Is it so bad that they try to return, hence going through the revolving door? There are many, many ways this theme can be interpreted.
They have invited five authors, some award-winning and some award-nominated, including Rik. The remainder of the stories will come via open submissions and they anticipate a September release.
Meanwhile the publishers of Cosmic Horror Magazine are launching a new title that promises to be a spiritual successor to Weird Tales – Goblins & Galaxies Magazine. Rik will have a story in the premiere issue which is currently launching on Kickstarter: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/crtyra/goblins-and-galaxies-magazine
We are passionate about turn-of-the-century pulp magazines like Weird Tales and have tried with each issue to pay homage while also amplifying modern story-telling techniques and diverse voices. We want to bring that same approach to a brand-new magazine emphasizing Sword & Sorcery, Dark Fantasy, and Science Fiction.
The marvellous Dylan Rees has guested on two episodes of Very British Futures and I’ve been a guest on three episodes of his Doctor Who Too Hot for TV podcast. A few years ago he published a book about the so-called “Wilderness Years” of Doctor Who called Downtime. Now he’s shortly to release a brand new book in a similar vein – Myths and Legends: The Reeltime Pictures Story.
This is the inside story of Reeltime Pictures, from the earliest days of its acclaimed Myth Makers VHS tapes, through the production of its ambitious dramas and documentaries. Boasting a wealth of quotes from many of those involved, the book tells the story of one man’s passion and dedication to develop a valuable archive of material chronicling the complete production history of classic Doctor Who.
Chatri Art, the man behind the marvellous music for my podcast has been in a productive phase recently and releasing several new songs on bandcamp.com I can recommend the following:
THE VOLCANOS / SESSIONS 1972-3 by Chatri Ahpornsiri and Maybin Marwell and Tony Harris, check it out here. “Unreleased and improved sound of the music from the early 70’s with added sound, until now. I hope you will enjoy the noise we make.”
I am delighted to announce a new episode of my podcast Very British Futures. The first hopefully of a revived run of the show, after several months of concentrating my time on Bolton Little Theatre and my job at the university.
A for Andromeda and The Andromeda Breakthrough are fairly obscure today, compared to programmes like Quatermass or Doctor Who, but during 1961-62 they were popular successes for the BBC. It seems appropriate to talk about them now, at a time when Netflix has had a success with 3 Body Problem, another serious SF show about alien contact being conducted through radio communication. Written by noted astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle and TV producer John Elliot, the series begins with radio astronomers detected a message from an alien intelligence. That would be profound enough, but the message turns out to be a blueprint for a new kind of computer, more powerful than anything on Earth. Building the computer in turn creates new life, first an octopus like being, then a beautiful woman they christen Andromeda, based on the body of a murdered female technician. As politics, the military, and a ruthless tech company called Intel (no relation) become involved, maverick scientist John Fleming fights against the alien AI, whilst falling in love with Andromeda. The sequel takes the surviving characters to the Middle East, where a new computer has been built and Intel intend to dominate the world with its technology. But Earth’s weather is running out of control, thanks to Fleming’s interference and only the computer can save us, if it wants to.
Joined by Nigel Anderson and Brian Clark, friends I had worked with on the very first episode covering Pathfinders in Space, this has been a very interesting production to research and produce. After recently covering several high-profile shows, it was good to tackle something a bit more off the beaten track. You can listen to the results on all the major platforms, including YouTube, and find out more about the series, plus the BBC4 remake and the 70’s Italian version by visiting the podcast’s website at: https://westlakefilms.uk/verybritishfutures/
Rik Hoskin has been in touch to tell me about his involvement in a new PC computer game. He is the script editor and consultant on a live-action comedy dating game Forgetting Emily. To quote the blurb on its Steam store page: “When is it time to move on? Before your ex gets married to someone else… right? You play as Alex, a struggling musician invited to his ex-girlfriend Emily’s wedding. It’s in Turkey. It’s in one month. You said you’d bring a plus-one… so the countdown’s on, because you don’t have one. Filmed in live action, you see through Alex’s eyes as he makes decisions that can land him just about anywhere as he tries to find his ideal date for the wedding. The trouble is, Alex doesn’t have much money, and it seems like everyone who offers to help is also conspiring against him … which is to say, YOU!”
Congratulations to Rik as he adds even more strings to his creative bow. If you would like to find out more, check out the game’s website https://www.forgettingemily.com/
Hello there! It’s another quick round up of news from myself and friends this time.
After Hangmen was an enormous success for Bolton Little Theatre and myself personally getting some of the best notices I’ve ever had for playing Syd Ambleside, I have gone back into the control box for the next play of the season – Player’s Angels by Amanda Whittington.
In 1950’s Nottingham, John Player’s girls have the best jobs, the best wage and the best hairdos in town. And now, there’s a new face on the Navy Cut machine as 15-year-old Mae comes fresh from the country for her first job at the tobacco factory. Mae lodges with her Aunt Glad who sits alongside her on the production line but keeps her assignations with the young factory foreman to herself. Led by workmates Cyn and Vee, Mae takes her first steps into the world of the Player’s Angels: where a young girl can lose her halo and find her wings.
Running 22nd – 27th April, it’s a warm-hearted play about a group of friends supporting each other and facing a changing Britain, as the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II ushers in a new age. You can book tickets now from Ticketsource.
Rik Hoskin and Chatri Art have been busy with a project of their own, a graphic novel called The Vampire Invasion. Set in 1969, their wild story imagines an alternative history where Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin’s landing on the Moon triggers a retaliation from a colony of Nosferatu-like vampires who have been living on the dark side for centuries. It’s a very entertaining romp that recalls the best of Warren’s 70’s Creepy and Eerie horror comics. Renaissance man Chatri Art composed the theme for my podcast and his dazzling artwork has been featured in games and album art. He came up with the initial concept for this book when he was a teenager.
Rik also has a short story out this month in HyphenPunk magazine. The President’s Been Shot is a satirical cyber-punk with his trademark ingenuity. You can order it from Amazon Kindle or a PDF version from Ko-Fi.
Finally, my cousin Terrance McAdams has the second volume of his YA science fiction series out now. Biocode: Resolution finds Ciara and her friends discovering new twists to the mystery of a race of telepathic aliens who want to take over the Earth. Ciara has been seeing visions of her ancestor William on Captain Cook’s second voyage, but now she must travel into the past to save him and the future. Available now from all good bookshops.
Plenty going on this month but the biggest news for this blog is that there is finally a new episode of my podcast Very British Futures out there – The Day After Tomorrow.
Nothing to do with the dreadful 2004 Roland Emmreich film but everything to do with Gerry Anderson’s continuing efforts to conquer America. UFO had come close but after a strong start in the ratings it had faltered. Space 1999 was doing reasonably well in syndication but the question of a second season was still up in the air. Then Gerry Anderson was approached by George Heinemann, producer of NBC’s new youth orientated anthology strand Special Treat. Special Treat was a series of documentaries and educational family dramas, and Heinemann was looking for a way to dramatise Albert Einstein’s famous theories for children. The result was the 50 minute special The Day After Tomorrow. Hoping it might act as a backdoor pilot for a TV series, Anderson and writer Johnny Byrne (Space 1999, Doctor Who) added the subtitle Into Infinity.
It’s an entertaining family SF adventure and something of an unintended callback to the pioneering Pathfinders in Space series with its young protagonists and parents and the emphasis on science and engineering. The short running time means it moves at a fair clip, and it enjoys the same high-quality production values as Space 1999. For this podcast I tried to reach out beyond my usual circle and recruited Felicia Baxter from the podcast guest site matchmaker.fm Felicia turned out to be a wonderful guest and her fresh perspective and presence make this an excellent episode. It’s also the first of what I intend to be an extra format for the podcast. As well as the traditional discussions with a group of guests, I’d like to more conversational two handers like this, looking at more targeted subjects and shorter form TV plays.
My friend Rik Hoskin has had a good month too. His comic strip adaptation of the second book in The Wheel of Time saga is out now and there’s a new trailer online.
Dynamite Comic’s The Great Hunt, written by Rik Hoskin
In addition he has published a marvellous creepy short story by a scuba diving holiday that takes a strange twist in The Dive, published by Cornice. You can enjoy for free and I recommend you give it a read.
I’ve been improv acting as a simulated patient over the last few years, and the odd voiceover, but between October 21st and 28th I’m heading back to the stage as an actor in Blue Stockings, by Jessica Swale. The play is on at Bolton Little Theatre. This one of several productions of Jessica Swale’s popular debut play being staged nationwide that week.
1896. At Girton Colllege, female students are welcomed to study at the University of Cambridge for the first time. The Girton girls study ferociously and many match their male peers grade for grade. Yet, whilst the men graduate, the women leave with nothing but the stigma of being a ‘blue stocking’ – an unnatural, educated woman. The play follows them over one tumultuous academic year, in their fight to change the future of education. There is laughter, thwarted romance and bravery from both the women and their few male supporters. Whilst in the background is the suffragette movement, which ironically might do as much to damage their cause as support it.
I play Radleigh, one of Cambridge dons who is against encouraging women to study degrees, viewing it as youthful indiscretion which will destroy their future prospects of marriage and respectability. It is a fairly small part, appearing in two scenes but I must admit I was struggling to memorise my lines after leaving that part of my brain unexercised for years. But they are in there now and I hope my performance gets richer now with each rehearsal. This is all useful practice for a much larger role I’ll be taking on next year in Hangmen by Mike Bartlett.
I posted recently that Rik Hoskin had recently written the comic strip adaptation of Book Two of The Wheel of Time – The Great Hunt. He has recently had a couple more interviews published, where he talks about Robert Jordan’s writing and the experience of adapting such a famous, influential fantasy world.
Sixteen years since the last straight to DVD revival, twenty-five years since the original television series gave its last bow, Babylon 5 returns polished up as an animated special The Road Home. Is it the beginning of a new era, or a nostalgic curio for the die-hards?
Time has been kind to Babylon 5. It was never a series which relied on the quality of its effects and a movie quality production. It’s strengths was its unashamed respect of literary SF and the power of a good story well told. Matched with rich characterisation that allowed its flawed protagonists to both fail hard and triumph satisfyingly over the years, spending most of the intervening time in stories that were often imaginative and morally grey. After years of only being accessible on VHS and DVD, recent years have seen it return to wide syndication, availability on streaming services and after a long campaign by fans, a HD remastering, all of which has enabled it to be enjoyed by new generations of fans, some of whom were not even born when its final story Sleeping in Light went out on TNT.
Babylon 5 was influential in several ways. It was one of the first SF series to embrace CGI, using the groundbreaking NewTek Video Toaster, which made computer graphics feasible on a cable television budget. It popularised the concept of the story arc. Instead of self-contained, almost interchangeable episodes where the status quo would always be reset after an hour, creator and chief writer J Michael Straczynski (known as JMS to fans) planned a “novel for television” to be told over five seasons. The idea was mocked as vainglorious by many, yet the programme proved that there was an audience who would commit to the journey. Now it would be hard to find a TV series which doesn’t have ongoing threads. Finally there was the way JMS embraced the fledgling internet, specifically Usenet to communicate directly with watchers in a way that hadn’t been possible before. He gave us an insight into the writing and production process of an ongoing, often struggling TV series that was fascinating and educational, as well as building up a whole community around the show.
It’s that ongoing community and the recent revived interest which has allowed The Road Home to exist. That and apparently a new willingness at Warner Bros to exploit a franchise which it was previously content to sit on.
The plot of The Road Home taps into Hollywood’s current love of multiverses and alternative worlds. On his first official engagement off-station, President John Sheridan becomes unstuck in time as the result of a malfunction in the new tachyon-based power generator he is supposed to be inaugurating. Teleporting into the future and the past, he then finds himself travelling sideways in alternate versions of the Shadow War, where the Shadows or the Vorlons win, both with cataclysmic results for humanity and its allies. Worse, if he cannot jaunt home, the multiverse itself might collapse.
Rather like a wedding, how much the viewer gets out The Road Home depends a lot on how many faces you recognise. If the above synopsis seems confusing, then this animated movie will be a lot of sound and fury, signifying not much. As an introduction to Babylon 5, it’s too reliant on pre-knowledge for the vast majority. Yet thanks to JMS’ script and the obvious affection of the production team, at the same time it’s a film that contains everything that made Babylon 5 what it was, good and bad. Action and big SF concepts like quantum physics, nestle with pulp staples like ancient alien cities being discovered, powerful aliens being reawakened, and passionate declarations of undying love. Smart jokes like a galactic vista being interrupted by a search of socks, share time with clunky one-liners. B5 could be moving but it could be amusingly pretentious too and there’s some windy philosophy at “the Rim” of the universe, delivered with deathly, if mellifluous, tones, which could have come straight from an obscure prog rock album sleeve notes.
Tragically, the series has lost more than the usual percentage of cast members. The voice cast contains all the surviving regulars, led energetically by Bruce Boxleitner returning to the role of John Sheridan. It’s great to hear Patricia Tallman, Peter Jurasik, Claudia Christian, Bill Mumy and Tracy Scroggins in character once more. They are joined by a cast of creditable actors taking on other beloved characters and thanks to good casting and direction from casting director Liz Carroll and Matt Peters respectively, none of them jar in the ear. Sadly the episodic nature of the story means that few of the regulars get much time to shine, apart from Sheridan and Delenn, but there’s a lot of fun to be had with the return of fan favourite, the gnomic alien Zathras and most of the funniest moments belong to him.
Visually the film looks marvellous, enjoyably opening out and subtly updating the old locations on the space station and Epsilon 3. It has that recognisable Warner Bros look that’s been seen in many of their recent superhero cartoon movies, tall figures with great cheekbones. Just about everyone is instantly recognisable, although it took me a few moments to recognise Elizabeth Lochley. The production team cleverly incorporate several iconic visual scenes from the series, such as the launching of the Starfurys or the reveal of The Great Machine.
I’m reviewing the bluray release, which comes in a slipcase and has two extras, an enthusiastic commentary by Boxleitner, JMS and supervising producer Rick Morales, and an appreciative making of documentary B5 Forever with some interesting behind footage of the cast recording their parts.
During the documentary, JMS says he has ideas for future animated stories and I certainly hope this special is successful enough for more. As a victory lap and a celebration for long time fans, The Road Home is a treat that doesn’t disappoint. For newcomers, the pilot film The Gathering or the TV movie In the Beginning is still the place to start.
The Day of the Triffids aired on BBC1 in 1981 and became one of those SF television series that broke out of the genre ghetto and became part of popular culture, fondly remembered by many who saw it back then. Perhaps this shouldn’t be a surprise since the novel of the same name by John Wyndham had been a bestseller, remaining in print since it debuted in 1951. The series follows the story of a group of survivors living in a post-apocalyptic world after a meteor shower has rendered most of the population blind and given rise to deadly, venomous plants called Triffids. The main protagonist is Bill Masden, a young farmer who has ironically retained his sight due to being protected by bandages after a Triffid attack. As he navigates the dangers of post-apocalyptic England, he must also deal with the threat posed by the plants, which are able to move on their own and attack humans.
Like the book, the series explored themes of survival, adaptation, and morality. Produced by David Maloney, directed by Ken Hannam and adapted for television by Douglas Livingstone, it starred John Duttine, Emma Relph, and Maurice Colbourne.
I had an excellent time recording this episode with Rik Hoskin, and Chris and Ella Burton and we got unexpectedly deep in places when it came to the moral challenges faced by the characters. You listen to our debate by finding Very British Futures on YouTube, Spotify, Apple, and many more platforms. Or go to its page on the podcast website.
In other news, I am currently back on the sound desk at Bolton Little Theatre for the upcoming play Flamingoland which runs 20th to 27th May 2023. Written by ex-Coronation Street actor Deborah McAndrew, it’s the story of two sisters, their daughters, and a local pest control officer. Mari is terminally ill and spends her days organising her funeral and her will. Her sister Bridie wants her to focus on making the most of her remaining time. But the whole family is poisoned by a secret from their teenage years. Will bringing it out in the open help them to heal or is too late? Sound effects for this one are fairly domestic. Probably the biggest challenge was filming a video sequence at the open mic night at the Doffcocker Inn, Bolton, for the finale. But it gave me a chance to put a new 4K Canon XA50 camera and shotgun microphone through its paces.
The Phantom Frame 