DVD Review: The Royal Collection

The Royal Collection 4-DVD Set  (Main Feature: 467 min)
Released by BBC Home Entertainment on May 21, 2013. SRP $24.99 (DVD)
Subtitles: English SDH 16:9 Stereo

I think I have more than a passing interest in the Royal family. No, I don’t have a ton of collector plates around my house with pictures of Queen Elizabeth II on it nor did I tune into Prince William’s and Kate Middleton’s wedding but I have to admit I enjoy a good documentary on the Royal family if I can find one. I have been watching this type of documentary for a number of years but wasn’t sure what I would get with this new set.

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This is an interesting title to release as I would have thought something like this would have been more appropriate last year with the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee but I have to say that this is a very welcome title. The Royal Collection is a collection of BBC documentaries made over the last few years and it is broken across four discs. The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, King George and Queen Mary: The Royals Who Rescued the Monarchy, Queen Victoria’s Children, and How To Be a Prince.  One thing that immediately grabbed my attention was that the price is very reasonable for 4 DVDs. It reminds me of those DVD sets you buy in Walmart that has something like 12 discs for $20 but the difference here is that it is released by a very reputable organization and the documentaries are made by the BBC which is one of the best documentary makers in the world plus who would know British royalty better than the BBC? Here is a breakdown of what you get on the set.

Queen Victoria’s Children 180 min

I will go through this set  in chronological order. This documentary is broken up into 3 parts: Best Laid Plans, A Domestic Tyrant, Princes Will Be Princes. We start out with the arranged marriage between Prince Albert and Queen Victoria. Queen Victoria had a rapturous appetite for intimacy and because of it had 9 children. The documentary tells us how cold Queen Victoria could be to her children but how hands on Albert was towards them.

One thing I didn’t know was that not only was Prince Albert very involved with his children’s upbringing but he was ridiculously strict with them, especially the boys. It makes for an interesting story about how the children were raised but it still didn’t stop some of the children from having a scandalous life of their own. Especially as one of the scandalous children was none other than the heir to the thrown Edward VII.

King George and Queen Mary: The Royals Who Rescued The Monarchy 116 min

This is a very interesting program. It is broken up in two parts: King George V and Queen Mary. It is a great look at their lives and how they brought up their children. A big part of what George needed to do was to bring the monarchy back to have moral values than it did while Edward VII was on the throne but that was just a small part of what King George needed to accomplish.

What surprised me was that I never really thought how World War I really decimated the royal landscape in Europe. Up until then, Royalty in Europe would marry royalty in Europe. Once World War I broke out that would change. Kaiser Wilhelm II was cousins to both George V and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. The UK Royal Family was face with a real problem. King George was afraid that the people of England would turn on him and his monarchy since there is German in them. The Royal Family changed a lot about themselves including changing the name of the royal house from House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to the House of Windsor which is more British sounding.

The Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II 50 min

This is the shortest of the documentaries but I think it is the best. It may be worth the entire price of the set by itself. It talks about the coronation but it is incredibly in-depth. There are a lot of behind-the-scenes anecdotes from Maids of Honors who were in the ceremony. There is a lot of background information. It really goes into detail of how engaged Queen Elizabeth II was in being a part of the coronation and how uninvolved the Duke of Edinburgh sometime was during the planning of this event.

It covers a ton of stuff that is really interesting including the way rows of bleachers were built into Westminster Abbey to accommodate all of the people who needed to be there. One of my favorite moments was when one of the Maids of Honors were talking about how Queen Elizabeth II would watch someone else at rehearsals for the coronation to play Queen so she could see how she might look and there are pictures to back that up! This is one I will easily go back to again and again.

How To Be A Prince 116 min

Produced in 2003, this documentary focuses on Prince William turning 21. To be honest, I wasn’t expecting to like this one because the subject matter isn’t really that interesting to me but I was wrong. It doesn’t just cover Prince William but also looks back at other Princes such as Charles. Not only was it interesting but it gave me a lot more respect for Prince William. He was not just a playboy who travels the world but has done a lot of good thing and has gone on some great goodwill missions to underprivileged countries.

Over the course of two episodes it looks at the upbringing of the Prince and then in the second episode asks the question about how will the prince help the monarchy of the future. I was surprised to see a young Piers Morgan, now at CNN, interviewed. It seems like most people interviewed agreed that if William has to wait until 50 to become king, there will be no monarchy.

Packaging:

I think the packaging for this is really quite good. Each documentary is in its own amary case and all housed in a sleek red box that is tastefully designed. Each of these DVD is available separately but when this collection is bought, it also includes a replica of a booklet for Queen Elizabeth II’s Coronation, featuring original photography from the ceremony. It is a really nice and sturdy book that is 32 pages and is a reproduction of the photographs and print. I think it’s a wonderful extra for this set.

I am really happy with this 4-disc set. It has amazing documentaries that I plan to watch more than once and the nice replica book of the coronation. The price is right and it is all produced by the BBC which is really good enough for me. If you have an interest in the Royal Family, the price is right, why not check it out?

Next review: Up on deck for reviews: Blu ray release of Series 1-5 of George Gently released by Acorn Media plus some Doctor Who Blu Rays: The Snowmen and Series 7 Part 2.

Have a great week!

Do you have feedback, article requests or want to talk about a program but do not want to leave a public comment? Feel free to drop me an e-mail at FTA13867@gmail.com

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A Royal Command Performance of The Good Life

As usual in May, I take a look at last episodes of seasons or series. I love doing this because I am fascinated with how TV series end their run. I am curious about how writers decide to wrap up their characters and story lines. Yet sometimes, a series may just end but leaves us, the viewer, with the impression that the character’s lives just go on and on. We get that with the very last episode of The Good Life. There isn’t any real finality to the lives of Tom, Barbara, Jerry or Margo but yet it is one of the most unique final episodes of any TV series and in some ways one that left me a little depressed.

What I personally consider the final episode of The Good Life ran in May 1977 with an episode called The Anniversary. It was the two year anniversary of Tom and Barbara deciding to give up their lives as what would be normal suburban life and become completely self-sufficient. This means that Tom gives up his job and both he and Barbara make everything themselves. What they cannot make they will barter. It had been a tough 2 years with the final episode having their home ransacked. It was a very serious end to a series that had been so funny yet also poignant as Tom & Barbara even after all of this decides to stick with the self-sufficiency lifestyle. They even toast the occasion to the good life.  It is a marvelous ending to a TV series but it wasn’t quite over yet.

The Good Life returned around Christmas of that year with Silly, But It’s Fun…. This Christmas episode had the Leadbetters sharing Christmas with the Goods because the Leadbetters had no decorations, food or drink due to an oversight. Would this be the final episode of the series? No, not yet and the next one was going to be really interesting.

When I’m 65 TX: 10/06/78

How interesting does it get? Not only is this really is the final episode of the series but it is done in a way of such grandeur that has not been seen on any comedy before. This is a Royal Command Performance. What this means is that Queen Elizabeth II was in the audience along with The Duke of Edinburgh. This is a very interesting production because the actual episode, When I’m 65, actually feels very secondary to the whole production.

The episode starts off with a shot of BBC Television Centre as it appeared back in 1977 and shows the Royal Rolls-Royce entering the BBC Television Centre grounds containing the Quees and Duke of Edinburgh. The whole event has a commentary given by Brian Johnston who was a commentator for the BBC from 1946 to 1993. He did a lot of commentary on cricket matches and was a very well-known voice to millions. To my knowledge, this episode wasn’t always included in the syndication package for PBS. If it has, maybe it was just the episode stripped out. I have to admit, I didn’t follow the series that closely on PBS in the 1980s but when I was watching it in the 1990s I saw it, I was really surprised.

I didn’t pay too close attention to some of these series in my TV Guide when they were on PBS, at least not The Good Life. I didn’t always look in the listing magazine to see which episodes were going to air that week. I was watching the series and one night I tuned in and it was the Royal Command Performance! Why this was so interesting to me was that it had BBC television Centre in it and literally showed us what the studio was like prior to record an episode of The Good Life! I by no means have ever hid my love for BBC Television Centre. Obviously in many BBC programs, the iconic building would show up from time to time. I rarely got to see inside so it was really fun to watch cameras following the Queen into the main reception and eventually into TC6, studio 6, which is where they recorded the episode. I have been now spoiled with a ton of imagery of the inside of BBC Television Centre over the past year leading up to its closure so to be honest, there is a lot less of the interior than I remembered in this special episode. Back when I first saw this I thought it was the bee’s knees. It’s still cool but there is just a lot of footage of the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh meeting people. Not exactly riveting viewing for me but if you like it, great.

One of the highlights of this section is when production assistant Brian Jones explains to the audience how television production works. Everyone in the studio is dressed in their finest which really gives the production a very momentous feel to it. It’s odd though as, to me; some of the shots of Brian explaining the process of making television seem soft and out of focus. It seems like it is just one camera. The only people who are not dressed up are the actors because they are dressed for their roles in the production. Brian Jones walks us through the sets, if you were in the audience, where you could view footage that was already shot or from sets that needed to be “double banked” which means sets that are hidden behind other sets outside the view of the audience could be seen on small monitors above all the action. It really shows us how minimal these productions really are when produced. When I watch these shows, I don’t count how many sets where in the episode but watching Brian Jones, it shows that there really isn’t that many at all. Brian does introduce Richard Briers who in turn introduces the rest of the cast. When it is just Richard and Brian talking, Richard makes some joke about Jimmy Saville and I am not sure if it is a Jim’ll Fix It joke or not. Trust me, I am not alluding that his joke had anything to do with the unfortunate information that came out about Saville over the last year, it’s just the joke made no sense to me.

After about 10 minutes of set up, the episode begins. Basically the episode focuses on how Jerry is planning on living with Margo once in retirement. He is getting a physical and realizes he is not in as good of health as he thought. All this got Tom to think about how he going to provide for Barbara when they reach pensioner age. As it is, they don’t make any money at all especially trying to be self-sufficient. This had really got him worried so he decided to go to his bank and try to sort out this problem.

Courtesy of John Archbold

At the bank he speaks with the bank manager, Mr. Downs, about the bank giving Tom £2,000/year which the bank will then own his home once he dies. Of course now there are programs which are actually along these lines but back then not so much so. Mr. Downs does not see the benefit for the bank to go along with this plan. For example, part of Tom’s plan includes an age Tom and Barbara will be dead for the bank to take over their house. Mr. Downs inquires what happens if their deaths are not so punctual and they live a lot longer. Needless to say, Tom leaves the bank without a plan but does take £3 out of his account to buy flowers for Barbara. Granted he only had something like £3.80 in his account.

The episode ends with Tom and Jerry trying to outdo each other by running a race. Jerry is on a health and exercise kick to get into shape and thinks he can easily take on Tom. Tom thinks he can easily take on Jerry and suggest an even more ambitious route than Jerry did for their race. The next day, they start the race and they are off! They eventually can’t handle the running anymore; each one is completely exhausted and they stop into the nearby pub! Margo and Barbara are waiting at the finish line outside their houses when the see Tom and Jerry neck and neck running towards the finish line. It’s a tie! Both of their egos are intact and they turn to go into their houses but are stopped as a taxi comes up to them. The driver yells out to them that one of the two left their wallets in the car!

The special ends with the Queen meeting with each of the actors and production staff and then she goes home. The actual episode itself is alright but only alright. To me, everything that made The Good Life was not in there. There was nothing about Tom and Barbara trying to make ends meet by working out in the back garden. I suppose because this was a one-off episode that the production team made a conscious decision not include ripping up someone’s garden just for one episode opposed to a whole series. That being said, even with all the characters in it I just did not find it overly funny. The Good Life is a hilarious series but there really wasn’t any laugh at loud moments for me. It was alright but almost seemed like it ran out of steam. There was the scene with Tom talking in the kitchen looking into the fire with Barbara with him moaning about becoming an old man and Barbara puts a blanket over him and has him clutch a an umbrella that looks like a cane. Tom realizes what he is describing is what Barbara made him look like. It’s contrived and it was trying too hard which is not a characteristic of this series. A lot of the story seemed that way to me. I really felt it’s heart wasn’t in it.

I did notice that in a few scenes Barbara was doing a lot in the background that was kind of like doing chores. This falls more in line with what I thought was missing from the episode, for example at one point in the kitchen she is cutting up potatoes and in another scene she is sewing. Margo at this stage basically has a To The Manor Born haircut. She looks more like Audrey fforbes-Hamilton than Margo Leadbetter. It’s funny because when I saw this performance for the first time, it was the first time I ever saw this series with its original title in the title sequence. Over in the US, it was always Good Neighbors. The title sequence was changed for transmission over here in the US. Of course on the R1 BBC DVD sets they have the correct titles but the series was originally released on R1 on Acorn Media and they used the old PBS syndication masters which had Good Neighbors on the title. Those episodes even had the Lionheart logo at the end of the episodes. The R1 DVDs have the title of Good Neighbors on the packaging but the actual episodes on the DVDs have the proper title sequence. The reason that it was not brought over to the US as The Good Life was because there was a short-lived Larry Hagman series called that and didn’t want to confuse anyone. At least that is what I have always been told. I suppose with the series still in syndication in the US, it is still called Good Neighbors since that what so many people has known it as for so long.

The subject of the episode left me a little uneasy. This is the first time I have watched The Good Life since Richard Briers passed away in February of this year. The episode talks about these characters dying and even Tom working out a plan so both him and Barbara can have money to live up to the age of 85. Richard Briers passed away at age 79. It’s pretty lame to not separate a character from the actor but in this case it is really difficult. I thought the same with Paul Eddington when I watched this the first time. When I worked at the corporate campus of Best Buy there was a guy who I worked with named Peter. He always reminded very much of Richard Briers or perhaps more so Tom Good. Peter is a guy who has good energy and even when dealt with stupid or bad situations, he didn’t let it get to him. He always found a way to solve problems with a kind word or perhaps being a little silly at his own expense just to make things better. He is a good guy who I think of every time I watch this series. He eventually became my boss for a while and then he left to work somewhere else. I have lost touch with him over the years but I think if anyone has the qualities of Tom Good, there doing alright.

The Good Life was not just a BBC Comedy series, it became an institution. Families around London tried the self-sufficiency movement and some still live it acknowledging that this series was got them interested in trying out the lifestyle. The premise may seem very 1970s but actually could easily make for a great series today. It was about two people who wanted to live their lives their own way on their own terms. How many people can say they truly do that? Raise your glasses for a toast. To, the good life!

I consider the final episode of The Good Life to be The Anniversary. I write a little bit about it here.

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Next week: I will publish my fifth article in the 50WHO series of articles celebrating 50 years of Doctor Who. This time I focus my attention on Matt Smith as I recall the time I sat down with him at a bar in New York and had drinks. Well, not just Matt but Karen and Moffat too.

Have a great week!
Do you have feedback, article requests or want to talk about a program but do not want to leave a public comment? Feel free to drop me an e-mail at FTA13867@gmail.com

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DVD Review: The Visitation - Special Edition

Doctor Who: The Visitation Special Edition 2-DVD Set  (Main Feature: 95 min)
Released by BBC Home Entertainment on May 14, 2013. SRP $34.98 (DVD)
Subtitles: English SDH 4:3 Mono (Main Feature)

On a Friday night, twenty-eight years ago a 10 year old boy was sitting in his room when his mother called him out to the kitchen. It was late on an August night; perhaps 10:30pm. She called him into the kitchen because there was a series on TV she had never seen before. It was a strange mix of historical and sci-fi and she knew her son might be interested in seeing it. The series this young boy started to watch was Doctor Who and the story he found himself watching was The Visitation.

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Obviously this story is about me. When my mom called me out to the kitchen, walking into the room I had no idea my life would change forever. For most fans, I am sure The Visitation may not be the story that they would use to introduce prospective new fans to the series but maybe they should. I think for me I was taken in by the visuals. All the costumes were strange and colorful. I fell in love with the Police Box that looked so rickety yet held so many secrets. I enjoyed the idea of younger people getting in trouble and needing rescue; I thought I could identify with it. I thought Peter Davison as the fifth Doctor was amazing and still is a favorite to this day. Then there was the Terileptil.

I suppose this is probably where readers might think I am going to give this poor creature a bashing. That would be a wrong and horrible thing to do. To this day, I find the Terileptils one of my favorite alien races in Doctor Who. People seem to forget that Doctor Who isn’t the only series that had dodgy effects in the history of television. I had been watching all sorts of programs that had unconvincing effects long before that fateful Friday night. Anybody ever see Land of the Lost? So, to be honest, I was completely impressed by the Terileptil. Even though it was a mask, his face moved and he didn’t go “roar”! The Terileptils were smart and they admired beauty. The lead Terileptil would speak with eloquence and softness yet could switch instantly to rage. Kind of like me.

This story takes us to 1666 where we start off with the Squire’s family. We find them living their lives on a warm evening. The Squire’s daughter Elizabeth notices amazing lights in the sky. It was really something to see but it is not long before trouble visits the Squire’s home. Some unseen entity is attacking their home. The intruder is firing lasers and hits their servant Ralph. Suddenly this warrior clad in colorful armor breaks into the home. The Squire, his daughter Elizabeth and his son Charles take up arms and fire on the warrior. This is a great sequence because it is obvious they will not survive yet they fight valiantly. We don’t see anyone fall or even get injured. They are fighting and the scene fades into something else. We get a view of the empty house. It’s actually pretty powerful because it confirms the belief that they did not make it out alive and they died fighting for their lives. It is also something when we get a real sense of what type of people these characters are in the first five minutes of the story. We get some nice comical moments such as Ralph annoying the Squire just for speaking to him with bad breathe. We see that Charles and his father probably argue much as Charles is pretty easily exasperated by his father. We get a lot of inter-workings of this family but they are gone from the story. Never to be seen again. What a powerful start to The Visitation!

Meanwhile, the Doctor is trying to get Tegan back to her own time so she can resume her job as an air stewardess. Regardless as how the Doctor tries to get her back to where she belongs, he gets her there a little early; like 400 years too early. Tegan throws a wobble and storms out of the TARDIS. Thankfully for us, the human race, she did because Great Britain is in the middle of what is known as the Great Plague. The plague ran rampant though England from 1665 to 1666 just when this story takes place. In total, around 100,000 people die from this disease. The Doctor and his companions are now in the middle of it. Apart from the tell-tales signs of the plague such as villagers creating purification fires, there is something more menacing going on. Villagers are leery of strangers during the plague but these villagers are physically harmful; they are being controlled.

Luckily the Doctor meets with an actor who has turned highway robber, Richard Mace. Mace is simply a wonderful character who is friendly and very helpful to the Doctor and his friends. The Doctor notices that Mace is wearing alien technology. In a barn that Mace has called “home” for a few nights, Nyssa discovers alien power packs. Suddenly things are starting to become more interesting as the Doctor is putting together the mystery.  Mace tells him about the strange lights in the sky from the other night, strange goings on at the Squire, the fact the power packs survive some kind of crash points to the distinct possibility that an alien may have survived…….

The alien is a Terileptil. As I mentioned above I have a wonderful soft-spot for this truly intelligent and articulate (in words only) creature. The one that is in the Squire’s house has made a base in the basement while his two companions are in London. They have a plan to make history a lot more deadly using the plague as a means for genocide. They need a planet for themselves and humans are not invited to join in.

This is a very slick and polished production from the 1980s. I honestly don’t look at it and think how badly this has aged. I am sure I am watching this through rose-tinted glasses but really this whole production is strong. This story is like a Reese’s Peanut Butter cup. It’s just like the old commercials where two people are walking down the street, one with chocolate and the other with peanut butter. They bump into each other and the one says, “hey you got your chocolate in my peanut butter” while the other says, “you got your peanut butter in my chocolate!”  The Visitation is the same way, “You got your Sci-Fi in my historical BBC drama!” while the other is saying, “You got your historical BBC drama in my peanut butter…..err I mean Sci-Fi.” The historical drama is one of the things the BBC does best, especially in the 1970s. To me, this is executed flawlessly. The costumes look great, the historical sets look fine to me but I am no expert. I found the whole thing to be authentic….at least authentic enough for me.

Production side for the Sci-Fi element is simply a triumph. Everything Terileptil has a sweet green light and ambiance to it. The Terileptils control room at the Squire’s house is alien but effective. I love how it is built into rock so you can see rock and also alien technology. It is bliss! I think the Terileptil escape pod is brilliant too. It is so well lit and wonderful. It looks outstanding. The director would have to be careful shooting on that particular set because of the lighting. The old tube cameras used would burn the light pattern to the screen so as much light as there was on that set, it needed to be avoided as much as possible. As I mentioned above, the Terileptil costume was a triumph for the series at that time. The movement of the Terileptil’s face was ground breaking for its time. As mentioned by Eric Saward in Writing a Final Visitation, he wished that Michael Melia voice, the Terileptil’s voice, didn’t sound so much like he was speaking through a mask. I understand what Eric is saying but I feel like the interaction between the Terileptil and everyone else was more natural. For example, the modulated voice of the Silurians in Warriors of the Deep is stilted and horrible which makes me happy they didn’t go that route.

One of the things that really piqued my mom’s interest into calling me in the kitchen to watch was the colorful costumes. She thought Davison’s costume was unique, we had never seen a Cricketer’s costume before, but more so the Android. She thought that was great. I agree it was pretty cool but I really liked it when the Android was disguised as Death. The scenes with the Android disguised as Death wandering through the greenery made a wonderful contrast between the lush living forest and the crushed black of Death itself. It is wonderful imagery that sets this story apart from so many others.

This story has some of the best guest artist in the series. It starts out with John Savident. He is best known for being in Coronation Street playing Fred Elliott. He is a known name in television in the UK. When I got to know who actors were by watching a lot of British series, I really struggled to remember seeing him in the story. In fact, it took me years to realize he was the Squire at the beginning of the story. It is a great performance but he is only in it for 5 minutes. Michael Melia is noteworthy as the Terileptil. With his voice and Eric’s script, it transforms a man in a rubber suit from a monster to someone unique and real. One does not want the Terileptil to destroy the human race but one sympathizes with his plight. The real highlight for me is Michael Robbins as Richard Mace. I think Mace is one of the best guest characters ever in Doctor Who. He is very charming and very loyal to the Doctor. I love it when Mace sees the Terileptil for the first time he has so much fear, he clutches on to the Doctor as a small child may clutch onto their blankey for safety.  According to Matthew Waterhouse on the commentary, Michael Robbins thought being in Doctor Who was the worst thing ever. He apparently was horrified about being in it. Then they all joked on the commentary that he came from On the Buses insinuating that’s hardly any better. Listen, both series are awesome! Even if Robbins didn’t want to be in it, he turned in a truly magical performance that helped cement a 10 year old into a lifelong love of the series. I was really annoyed when I tuned in the following week and they didn’t go back to pick him up.

Tegan, Nyssa, and Adric are pretty good in this. Tegan, after all of this time still doesn’t grasp time travel but that is OK. She is naïve, irritable, brash but very loveable. Adric is, according to Nyssa, always getting into trouble. This poor character never had a chance even from the start. My advice to him is to find a massive spaceship and crash it into the Earth. Nyssa seems to know about everything and how to do everything. She is aware about Soliton gas, knows about android technology and can build a sonic booster. Nyssa and Adric can even fly the TARDIS! Who needs the Doctor?

Peter Davison is the Doctor. He is the first Doctor I had ever seen. I am not going to get silly to go as far as becoming Steven Moffat and saying he is “my Doctor” but I am very fond of this incarnation. He was young and heroic but not in the way that every other hero was at the time. He didn’t resort to violence nor did he have a gun. The Visitation is the second story Peter Davison recorded. He is still getting the hang of the role but that is part of the fun for the story. He gets agitated quickly, he can be condescending but it is all still charming. I have a lot of respect for the fifth Doctor and never thought of him as the “wet vet in space” as some papers did at the time.

Of course the main selling point of this release is the fact that this is a brand new restoration from the ground up. The film sequences (which there are a lot) are scanned from the negatives which make the production look lush. It is great! I had been hoping for this story to get this treatment for so long. The video shots are also good but they seem a little soft at times. I don’t know if too much noise reduction is implemented but some shots in the TARDIS don’t always look quite right. I noticed this mainly in Part One but it is nothing to lose any sleep over, plus it may just be my eyes. I noticed it while watching it on my HD set but of course it looked perfect on my SD set.

Extras:

I may say that the biggest selling point is the completely new restoration but others may not agree. I know some who love the extras and see the actual episodes as things they have seen before. When The Visitation originally came out, the Doctor Who DVD range was still finding its feet in terms of producing extra content. They were making all-new features but the evolution was still going strong. Some of the stuff on here is from the original release while some stuff is new:

Disc 1:

Audio Commentary: In this commentary, we get Peter Davison, Matthew Waterhouse, Janet Fielding, Sarah Sutton and Peter Moffatt. This commentary was from the original release. Yes, they can be blunt but it is very enjoyable. Davison has an interesting perspective on everything. Janet and Matthew contribute but don’t always have anything interesting to say and Sarah rarely speaks at all.

Film Trims: I forgot this was on the original release. It is a nice little feature that gives us a few extras moments. It’s fun watching these especially when I know the program so well; it is nice to see something so familiar yet brand new.

Directing Who – Peter Moffatt: Original release. Peter Moffatt was such a gentle nice man. He didn’t always understand what was going on with the scripts but he was a solid director. I know he has come under fire for some of the stuff he directed such as The Five Doctors but I think there are some wonderful moments in The Visitation and State of the Decay which are marvelous.

Writing a Final Visitation: Original release. Eric has an exact way of speaking which sounds like a surgeon verbally dissecting the topic he is talking about. In the DVD range, I feel that every time he has been outspoken about someone else, he has been fair about his own work too. Here he focuses on writing this story. Remember, when he wrote this he was not Script Editor yet.

Scoring the Visitation: Original release. Paddy Kingsland is interviewed by Mark Ayres. Composer to Composer. Two great minds meeting! The Feature is alright but awfully dry. Too bad really as it should have been really good. Also on this release is the opportunity to listen to the isolated score which is fantastic. There are some themes that seem very Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy which is not surprising considering the time it was made. The score has some great moments that are almost inspirational. It feels like those moments open up to some higher meaning. Listen to it when you have a chance.

Photo Gallery & Production Subtitles. Both wonderful as usual. The production subtitles are new with even more information added. Where do they keep finding the new stuff?

Disc 2:

The Television Centre of the Universe – Part One: This is new and wonderful. First off, it is Davison, Janet Fielding, and Mark Strickson with Yvette Fielding hosting. This program accentuates how the three leads get along. They are old friends who went back to Television Centre one last time. I am very sore over the closure of Television Centre as you can read about it in my article of Tales of Television Centre. This is a really nice piece that walks them through their day getting ready to record Doctor Who. It’s only Part One!

Grim Tales: This making of feature is hosted by Mark Strickson but that is kind of an understatement. This is very casual and loving piece about the making of the story. It is Mark Strickson hanging out with Peter, Janet and Sarah at the locations of The Visitation. They all get along so well and they have pretty good memories of the production. There are other moments with other people who made the series which is more factual base but this is really fun to watch. Look out for Peter, Janet, Sarah, and Mark re-creating a famous Matthew Waterhouse moment too!

Doctor Forever – The Apocalypse Element: If you are a fan of Big Finish, this is going to be fun for you. If you are not, it’s still enjoyable but not as engaging. I am not a huge fan of the range. Not because they are poorly made but I knew I could never keep up plus I guess I prefer my Doctor Who to be visual. That being said, I am proud to see how far Big Finish has come and I am really happy that they have done so well. Once again, I see people online bashing Ayesha Antoine for how she hosts these features. Why? I really like her in these. She is interesting and looks to me as if she reasonably understands what she is talking about. What is the problem? Of course, there is a shot showing her recording a scene for some Big Finish production. That’s great but it just shows to me how insular the whole brand is with those who work on it. The same people crop up in everything. It seems like the same 5 people make everything for the DVD range and Big Finish. OK, I know that’s over the top. We all know the number is 7.

There is also PDF materials and Sales sheet. I love these and they are essential. What do I wish was included? Continuity announcements from the time of broadcast on BBC1. I understand these might be difficult to put together…actually I don’t understand that but I personally would rather see this than some of the new content created for the range which I honestly think ties into how this brand is so insular. I think it not being on here is a very big missed opportunity.

Packaging: It comes in a standard double disc Amary case with a cover by Lee Binding. It does look like Peter Davison must be a liar because his pants are on fire, literally, but it is a zillion times better than what we had before. It is odd that the episode menu on the disc has screen grabs from a Tom baker story rather than a Peter Davison one. A mistake and hardly a big deal at all.

Here are some comparative screen grabs between the 2003 R1 Release and this new set. Click on the image and arrow to the next one to see next frame.

 

 

 

I know I said I loved this story so that makes me biased from the start. If you bought this before, I think the new extras are strong enough to warrant a re-purchase. I am disappointed there isn’t anything more historical or archival items such as continuities. The Aztecs and Ark in Space had some which made the overall package sweeter. I love anything on BBC Television Centre plus I am a huge proponent for better restorations so this is a great purchase to me. If my 10 year old self somehow knew that this story would lead him to a life-long love of this series resulting in meeting people all over the world, people who worked on the series and even a chance to get a copy of the very same story from the BBC to review, he would probably crap his pants. I will leave you with that visual.

For further readings from my blog about The Visitation check out:
50WHO: After All, This is How It All Started
Doctor Who 45th Anniversary

This week: The actual final episode of The Good Life truly was quite the occasion. It saw the cast getting together one final time and it was so big that the audience included Her Royal Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. This is one of the most unique programs made as we go through the process from walking through the front door of BBC Television Centre, sitting down in the audience and watching the recording of a television program. We look at The Good Life’s final episode When I’m Sixty-Five.

Have a great week!
Do you have feedback, article requests or want to talk about a program but do not want to leave a public comment? Feel free to drop me an e-mail at FTA13867@gmail.com

I am on Twitter: @FromtheArchive

Also please subscribe to my From the Archive: British Television Blog Facebook Page for updates about new articles. 

Peter Cushing is Sherlock Holmes!

It’s always exciting to write about Sherlock Holmes. The problem for me is when I write about it, it means more research I need to do. If I don’t have my stuff straight, I will hear about it and rightly so. I have gotten off alright so far but this could change at any time. This time it is also compounded because I am writing about a series that is or is not a carry on from a previous series. I am going to examine an episode of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes starring Peter Cushing.

This series generally started out as Sherlock Holmes in 1964 with a pilot being an adaptation of The Speckled Band which was shown as part of the series called Detective. In it, we see Holmes played by Douglas Wilmer and Watson played by Nigel Stock. It is a very respectable production which was brought back as a full series in 1965 starting out with The Illustrious Client. The series was shot in black and white on 405 2” videotape like all other BBC productions of the day. The series was afforded a great deal of location shooting with the series often having a dark atmospheric feeling to it. I think being shot in black & white really helped to move that along. The series has a very authentic feel to it.

Douglas Wilmer as Holmes is quite a special treat. He can be short-tempered but really believable. I find his adaptation of Holmes very genuine and some like him as he looks a lot like some of the sketches made of the character back in Arthur Conan Doyle’s time. The problem with the series is that Douglas Wilmer hated doing it. He hated the scripts and in some cases they were re-written by himself and Nigel Stock. He was dissatisfied with the amount of time he was given to rehearse for the series which was knocked down to 10 days of rehearsal time per episode. When the BBC came back to Wilmer to ask if he would like to do more Sherlock Holmes Wilmer said no.  Now, I am not sure about the timeline to this. I am not sure that he was asked when they came back to do the series in 1968 in colour or after he did the 1965 series. Regardless, it took over two years for the series to return. When it did, it was completely re-tooled. Everything about it changed from music to how it was produced. It was no longer a series in black & white but now full colour. Everyone on the production side changed. Only Nigel Stock returned as Watson but the biggest change of all was Peter Cushing was now Sherlock Holmes.

In the 1960s Peter Cushing was a big name. Of course, you could still argue that Peter Cushing’s status as an actor is legendary. This year is the 100^th anniversary of his birth. There isn’t one thing I have seen him in that I didn’t like. One early gem I saw him in before I realised he was in it was Laurel & Hardy’s A Chump at Oxford in 1940. Obviously I have watched him in roles from Van Helsing to Victor Frankenstein. I loved him in The Abominable Snowman and of course Dr. Who in the two Dalek films. He even plays Sherlock Holmes in the 1959 Hammer film The Hound of the Baskervilles. These seemed to be a casting coup to get such a name to do television.

A Study in Scarlet 16/09/68

Due to more BBC silliness, this episode is the first one of the series to exist. Now, I have made a few blunders numbering this episode. Last week when I was explaining what I would be writing about this week I said this is the fourth episode. That was wrong and I fully owned up to it when I was replying to Frankymole in the comments section…..except that is not right either or is it? There are two sources that I find pretty much spot on for British television reference when it comes to airdates. The first was one that I have gained so much information on over the years which is epguides.com. This Site has been around since the mid-1990s and it is invaluable to the likes of us who actually give a shit as to when something aired or what the name of the episodes were to a TV series.  The second source is the BBC Drama Guide published in 2011 from Kaleidoscope. As I have mentioned in numerous places that this guide is a little on the expensive side but if you want to know when programs aired, who was in it, what format did it originally exist in and what is the master format it exists in now, this is the publication for you. Kaleidoscope is the foremost authority in British television.

Kaleidoscope lists A Study in Scarlet as being episode two of the series and airing on 16/09/68 whereas epguides lists this as the third episode of the series and lists the date of 23/09/68. As much as I know that epguides do a great job, I will side with Kaleidoscope on this one. What’s the big deal, why does it matter? When it comes to television from so long ago, it can become very easy that details like this will be forgotten. Partially why I write this blog and why Kaleidoscope is so authoritative in this subject is so people have the correct facts and never forget even the minutest details of these series.

In regards to this Sherlock Holmes story, this is a pretty straight forward affair. The episode starts off with two gentlemen, Enoch Drebber and Joseph Stangerson who appear on the run. They stop off at a hotel. What we get right away is the Drebber is enchanted with some woman and he decides to go back and get her. This is much to the distress of Stangerson. Drebber doesn’t listen to Stangerson and goes back for the girl. This takes him back to Madame Charpentier’s Boarding House because he is infatuated with the daughter of Madame Charpentier’s named Alice. Even though Alice does not look like she is against the advances of Drebber too terribly much, Drebber is eventually chased out of the boarding house by Alice’s brother Arthur. Drebber barely escapes by cab but things only get worse for him. He is so drunk that he really has no idea that the cab driver had taken him to some derelict building that is completely vacant. There he is murdered.

We cut to 221B Baker Street where we are introduced to the Peter Cushing incarnation of Sherlock Holmes. Holmes is very bored. There are no cases of merit for him and it appears that Watson is agitating him a little bit, “Watson, I find it hard to eat my breakfast, read my Times, and listen to outbursts.” Holmes and Watson are sent for by Inspector Gregson and Inspector Lestrade to help investigate a murder. That has improved Holmes mood greatly!

When Holmes and Watson arrive they find that the body of Drebber sprawled out on ground with no blunt trauma to Drebber. On the wall written in blood is the word RACHE. Gregson assumes the murderer was going to write out Rachael. Holmes isn’t so sure. I enjoy the subtle competitiveness between Lestrade and Gregson. It is fun to watch. It’s by no means overboard but adds a little dimension to the story. The two only get more agitated as the story goes on and Holmes run circles around them.

As they find out who the murdered person is, Gregson goes to Madame Charpentier’s Boarding House to find out what they know about him. They find out that there were two men staying there, Drebber and Stangerson. They were kicked out once Drebber started to put more advances on Alice. Gregson then finds out about the return visit from Drebber and the ensuing chase by Alice’s brother, Arthur. Gregson feel that there is enough evidence to conclude that Arthur is lying about what happened. Gregson believes that Arthur was successful in catching up to Drebber at the vacant building and murdered him. Arthur has been arrested.

Holmes believes otherwise. A gold ring was found at the murder scene which is significant and Holmes knows that the murderer will want it back. Holmes puts an ad in a couple of newspapers saying that a ring has been found and can be retrieved at 221B Baker Street from Dr. Watson. An old lady comes to collect it. It is in fact one of the worse old lady disguises ever seen on BBC television but in some ways that is the charm. Holmes starts pursuing the old lady as she takes a cab. When the cab stops the old woman has disappeared.  Holmes deduces that it is an actor who was playing the old woman because the acting was so believable.

Somehow in which I don’t quite understand that Holmes and Watson tracked down Joey Daly, an actor who dressed as the old woman who visited them the night before. He was bet the by the murderer that he couldn’t dress as an old woman to fool anyone. To prove he could, he was told to get the ring from the ad. Meanwhile, Stangerson is murdered. Lestrade nearly catches the murderer in the act. Two pills are left behind but Stangerson is stabbed with the word RACHE in blood on the wall above him.

Holmes is also getting important news as he received a telegram that gives us the identity of the murderer. Holmes and Watson receive a visit from a beaten down Gregson and Lestrade as their case has fallen apart. Obviously Arthur was not the murderer. They once again need Holmes’ help. Once he finds out that the two officers have found pills in Stangerson’s room, Holmes immediately takes them and begins a series of tests.

We get a visit from the Baker Street Irregulars lead by a boy named Wiggins; he was able to get a cab for Holmes. This is a very important cab because the cabbie is the murderer and his name is Jefferson Hope.  Hope is arrested and Holmes talks with him in Hope’s jail cell. Hope doesn’t want to stand trial. He has a heart aneurism and he doesn’t have long to live anyway.  Hope had been after Drebber and Stangerson because they abducted his girl Lucy. The two were to be married after he returned from a 3 month long job away from her.  Drebber married Lucy against her will. Lucy dies from a broken heart and Hope decides to hunt down Drebber and Stangerson. Because Hope doesn’t have long to live, once he gets Drebber at the vacant house he offers him one of two pills. One pill is safe and one pill is death. Whichever one Drebber doesn’t take, Hope will. The wedding ring was used as something Hope wanted Drebber to see before he dies. The pill Drebber takes is fatal. Then he goes to Stangerson to offer him the same pills but instead of taking the pill, Stangerson attacks Hope and as they struggle Stangerson falls on the knife and dies. Hope wrote RACHE on the walls of where the murders took place as a way for the police to think it was something different. RACHE is German for revenge.

Unless I am really missing stuff here, there seems to be an awful lot of information that we are not seeing in this episode. There is a lot of things that happen that just happen with no explanation on how we get there. How does Holmes and Watson track down Joey Daly? Who is Holmes working with to discover the name of Jefferson Hope? How does he get Wiggins to get Hope to Baker Street? Perhaps Holmes gave Wiggins a really good description? To me, it’s kind of a messy production in that way. I feel some details are glossed over a bit. On the book side, if Hope is so hell-bent on revenge why does he even offer Drebber a chance at life? He has been on Drebber’s tail for a year, it seems crazy that he would do all that to leave it to fate.

In the original story by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet is the first Holmes & Watson story. This is an introductory story for how they met and how they end up working together. The story is set in 1881 (published in 1887) and is two distinct parts “Part I: "Being a Reprint from the Reminiscences of John H. Watson, MD, Late of the Army Medical Department" and “Part II: "The Country of the Saints".  Holmes and Watson are younger than how they are represented by Cushing and Stock or for that matter Wilmer and Stock. Although this story is the first for the legendary Holmes and Watson, it is the second episode for the BBC Peter Cushing series. Unlike the original story, Holmes and Watson are established characters in this episode having worked together for many years. Also what is only vaguely alluded to in the episode is the idea of Mormons and the Church of Latter-day Saints. Doyle was under the impression that the Mormons did a lot of kidnapping, murder and enslavement which was not true but was represented as fact in the book. This episode tip-toe around this by saying that Drebber and Stangerson just kidnapped Lucy from Hope. They were from Utah but no mention is made that they were Mormons.

Peter Cushing in some ways seems to be the quintessential choice to play Sherlock Holmes. I suppose he really could play just about anything. He was an amazing actor and in so many ways very underrated. With Cushing playing Holmes, he was a generally pleasant person to everyone though there were moments of being aloof. I think he has a more humanity in the role than Wilmer; I think in some ways the two actors channel their own personalities into the character. Cushing is known for being gentle and some of this comes across in the role. Wilmer, I believe, is someone who can be outspoken and did not suffer fools gladly. That also came across in his version. Peter Cushing’s version had some very odd habits and one of my favourites is when he is taking notes at the scene of the first murder and Holmes is writing his notes on the cuff sleeve. There are also some interesting action sequences showing Peter Cushing can be quite physical. Holmes runs after the cab that has the old lady in it and it looked to me as if it were Cushing himself doing the stunt. Very impressive!

Nigel Stock is quite good as Watson. There isn’t much difference between how he plays it in this and how he plays it with Wilmer. I did think it was interesting that there are some moments that Watson is doubtful of Holmes’ powers of deduction.  That in itself interesting since this is the first Holmes story but as this is clearly not the first time they have met in this series plus clearly an established history has been made between them, it seemed rather out of place. Watson seems to be more egotistical than I have seen him before. Holmes starts to condemn himself for not noticing that old lady was really a man and Watson tells him not to get too worked up over it as after all, even he (Watson) was fooled by it.

The episode had a nice supporting cast. Lestrade was played by William Lucas. I recognize him as range from the Doctor Who story Frontios. Gregson was played by George A. Cooper who is a favourite character actor of mine. I have seen him in Steptoe and Son, Doctor Who as Cherub in the The Smugglers as well as a lot of other series of that vintage. I always enjoy him in any program I see him. It was interesting to see Ed Bishop as Stangerson. Many will recognize Ed Bishop as Commander Ed Straker from UFO. Overall I thought the acting was very strong. All the performances were believable and this episode is from a period of BBC television that excelled in this area.

The production itself is kind of a mixed bag. It’s a traditional colour BBC multi-camera studio production. Interiors are shot on videotape and exteriors are shot on film. It’s too bad that the series didn’t continue to use the theme music created by Max Harris from Douglas Wilmer series as it had a memorable theme to it. The Alan Fogg theme is nowhere near as good. The incidental music fine and it is actually rather reminiscent to some of Doctor Who stories from the 1960s that I can’t think of at the moment. I felt that the lighting used during night shots was exceptional. Very atmospheric but unfortunately it did not match the shots within the same scene shot on video which kind of muddied the effect.

I watched these from the R2 PAL DVD released in 2004. This is not the BBC Learning release though I doubt there are any differences between the two. There has been no restoration done to the video at all. The video image is pretty noisy and there are some odd banding issues on it too. A lot of times the light levels appear too low in some scenes which are causing some odd banding issues. Clearly there has been no DVNR or any PAL transform decoder applied to this release.  It is interesting to see that now buying the title from Amazon it is now an on-demand disc that will come to you as a DVD-R. I am not against a MOD type program from the BBC but I was rather hoping it would be for programs that have not already been released instead of programs that are not going to get a proper re-pressing.

Of course as this series is 1960s BBC television, there are episodes that are missing. Out of the 16 episodes made of this series, only 6 episodes exist. The Douglas Wilmer series that is an earlier production fares better as it is missing two episodes which each of the missing episodes have footage that exists. Though, as with many series that have missing episodes, rumours circulate about episodes of the Peter Cushing series that exist in Germany. Does it? I doubt it but I wouldn’t mind being wrong about that!

I enjoyed this episode but I am not a great fan of Peter Cushing as Sherlock Holmes. I prefer the Douglas Wilmer episodes. It appears that Peter Cushing himself wasn’t a great fan of his own performance in this series. The rehearsal time was cut down and he had said, “Whenever I see some of those stories they upset me terribly, because it wasn't Peter Cushing doing his best as Sherlock Holmes - it was Peter Cushing looking relieved that he had remembered what to say and said it!” That is too bad since Peter Cushing deserved better than that. Douglas Wilmer had worked with Peter Cushing after Cushing had finished working on Holmes and asked him about his time on the series. Wilmer says, “I asked him how he had enjoyed doing the Holmes series. He replied tersely to the effect that he would rather sweep Paddington Station for a living than go through the experience again. He had my sympathies!”

All quotes from Douglas Wilmer were sourced from an interview from Matthew Coniam with Douglas Wilmer published in 2009 from Movietone News. www.movietone-news.com.

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Next week: the tradition for this blog is that every May I do a theme month. That theme is always final episodes of a series. Next week I re-examine the final episode of a favourite series of mine, All Creatures Great & Small as I look at Brotherly Love. I wrote an article on it in 2010 and I am going to look back at it and update. We will see how that experiment goes.

Have a great week!
Do you have feedback, article requests or want to talk about a program but do not want to leave a public comment? Feel free to drop me an e-mail at FTA13867@gmail.com

I am on Twitter: @FromtheArchive

Also please subscribe to my From the Archive: British Television Blog Facebook Page for updates about new articles.