Some Pwetty Photos, Magazines, and Sneering
I can't believe I've never come across this before. During a random Google search, I stumbled upon www.bbcprograms.com - a BBC America site dedicated to the sale of BBC programmes to PBS stations for syndication. In particular, I (predictably) got this page. It might be a bit cheap complaining about silly mistakes, like Series VIII not being mentioned in the cast list, or the fact that Andy de Emmony was never a producer (he directed Series VI) - but then this is an official BBC page selling the series, and there really isn't any excuse for errors. I suppose it's not too bad, though.
But the main reason I comment on this is that there is a lovely photos page, with lots of hi-res, clean images. (The quality isn't always what it could be, but the size of the images usually makes up for that.) There's similar stuff for lots of BBC programmes that are sold to America - The Brittas Empire photos page is a particular joy.
But that isn't the only decent thing on the site. There's also online (in Word and PDF formats) copies of The Insider, "the BBC Sales Company's quarterly syndication newsletter, filled with the latest interviews, reviews, facts and updates on the people and shows your viewers love to watch." This comes across as a fanzine more than anything else, and is none the worse for that. I've not had time to read many of the Dwarf bits, but from what I've read "The Red Dwarf Dictionary" isn't worth bothing with, wheras the Robert Llewellyn interview, whilst not particuarly enlightening, is still quite interesting. The articles about other shows seem to be far better. "The Brittas Empire: A Fawlty Towers for the 90s" is a pretty good article, and for once not a lazy stupid pointless comparison; there genuinely are similaries. Although the bio that accompianies that "Barrie was welcomed back with open arms when he rejoined Starbug as a full-time member of the Red Dwarf crew for Season 8", when in fact he never rejoined Starbug at all; he appeared on the resurrected Red Dwarf.
I'm sorry, I know that very cleverly draws things full-circle - but that is possibly the most pathetic nitpick in the universe. Sigh.
Comments
I did come accross this a few weeks back. Forgot to mention it. Sorry. I was impressed with the photos of other BBC series that dont get fancy (and much appreciated) websites like Red Dwarf, such as the Vicar of Dibley, One Foot in the Grave, etc. Great stuff.
Posted by Thomas A Evans at December 27, 2003 09:44 PM
I keep promising myself that one day I'll do something on One Foot in the Grave as I'm a very big fan, but I regularly have ambitions beyond my means.
I'm still trying to hunt down a copy of the pilot - it's essentially the first episode but Mrs Warboys is played by Valerie Minifie (Angela in Men Behaving Badly). That's an excellent piece of comedy trivia, isn't it?
Posted by Darrell Jones at December 28, 2003 12:43 AM
I know what you mean, Darrell; I've got loads of stuff I want to do things on (Hippies, The Powerpuff Girls, and Central pres to name but three) - and no time to do any of it at all. I should set aside one day each week to try and do something different from just pissing around on the internet and doing G&T.
Posted by John Hoare at December 28, 2003 07:48 AM
I found those HUGE "The Brittas Empire" pictures a few months ago. All of the "The Brittas Empire" pictures are "EEEEEEEEEEHHHHXCELLENT"!!!
Posted by Jessica Malcolm at December 28, 2003 12:38 PM
There is an article called "Red Dwarf: The Whole Smegging Story...So Far" at:
http://www.bbcprograms.com/pbs/insider/archives/mar00.doc
There is a Chris Barrie interview at:
http://www.bbcprograms.com/pbs/insider/archives/june01.doc
Posted by Jessica Malcolm at December 28, 2003 02:35 PM
On the subject of Brittas, I watched the first series straight through without breaks in the early hours of this morning for little reason.
Posted by Darrell Jones at December 28, 2003 07:58 PM
Hate to be thick, but who is Angela in Men Behaving Badly? Do you mean Anthea from Garys office? Very interesting though! Id love to see that.
Posted by Thomas A Evans at December 28, 2003 08:38 PM
I did mean Anthea, yes. I was going to correct it in my previous post but thought it a bit self-indulgent to do so.
Posted by Darrell Jones at December 28, 2003 09:43 PM
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