Show Notes
The second episode of this new series of their podcast sees Andy and Martin visit sleepy Barsetshire and the quiet cathedral town of Barchester, where ecclesiastical and romantic intrigue is going to set tongues wagging and cassocks whirling.
This 1982 adaptation of two of Anthony Trollope’s beloved Barsetshire series, The Warden and Barchester Towers, entitled The Barchester Chronicles boasts memorable performances from Alan Rickman as the slimy Obadiah Slope, Geraldine McEwan as the controlling Mrs Proudie, and Nigel Hawthorne as the overbearing Archdeacon Grantly. The plot concerns a newspaper’s crusade against the Church of England’s practice of self-enrichment which targets the unassuming and harmless Mr Harding (Donald Pleasance). But this battle is as nothing to the threat that Is later posed when a new Bishop (Clive Swift) is appointed, a weak man who is in the merciless grip of his domineering wife, Mts Proudie, and his chaplain Obadiah Slope. Slope does not only have his eyes set on ecclesiastical grandeur but also the hand of Signorna Madeleine Neroni (Susan Hampshire) until, that is, he discovers that Harding’s daughter Eleanor (Janet Maw) may be a better bet.
The cast list also includes Barbara Flynn, Cyril Luckham, Denis Carey, Ursula Howells, John Ringham and Phyllidda Law and the series is adapted by Alan Plater whose Beiderbecke trilogy and Miss Marple: A Murder is Announced we celebrated during our first run.
Neither Andy, nor Martin expect to enjoy the series that much, but they are to be pleasantly surprised by this adaptation which is regarded by Trollope fans to be a faithful and worthy version of two of his most celebrated novels.
More from An A to Z of UK Television Drama
[Spoiler alert! This series is almost 50 years old but we will be revealing - around 90 minutes - in who spectacularly dies in the literal cliffhanger to episode 7. You have been warned!]
After a brief hiatus, Andy and Martin resume the second season of A to Z with the letter V. Admittedly cheating a little, their choice was 'Vote, Vote, Vote for Nigel Barton', the second of two autobiographical Dennis Potter plays from 1965 in The Wednesday Play strand. They also cover the first play, 'Stand Up, Nigel Barton'. Both feature Keith Barron as the title character who we follow from childhood, to university, to a reluctant attempt to stand as a Labour candidate in the General Election.
Andy and Martin travel back in time to the summer of 1965 and the adventures of HR consultant Drew Heriot and his sister-in-law Anne as they face up to the machinations of 'Undermind’: aliens who have brainwashed British citizens in order to cause national unrest ahead of their imminent invasion. Their various schemes include: spreading pirate radio misinformation; inciting youth violence in a seaside resort; influencing the works of a popular children’s author; the distribution of suicide-inducing birthday records; interference with the printing of exam papers, and most abominably of all, the assassination of Eamonn Andrews! Yes, really.
This month Andy and Martin review the highly regarded 1987 BAFTA-winning Scottish drama Tutti Frutti, written by John Byrne and starring Robbie Coltrane and Emma Thompson.
Twenty-one years after their first recorded interview on the first Survivors DVDs back in 2003, Andy catches up with Carolyn Seymour who played Abby Grant in Survivors.