RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARCHIVE 2011 & LOST SHOWS APPEAL FINDS

CLASSIC TV organisation Kaleidoscope has unveiled its latest list of finds made as part of its annual Raiders of the Lost Archives campaign, detailing all the missing British TV and radio material located in the last 12 months by the group along with the BBC, ITV, BFI and determined enthusiasts.

In addition, there are the fruits of the “Lost Shows Appeal” to reveal. Launched by missing episode hunter Charles Norton back in June of this year to tie in Kaleidoscope’s http://www.lostshows.com website, the appeal has proved a big success in tracking down recordings of otherwise lost TV and radio shows that until recently only resided in the lofts, sheds and cupboards of the general public.

Thanks to the two initiatives a wealth of long-lost shows, interviews and excerpts have been located both as audio and visual recordings.

Highlights of the Kaleidoscope Raiders’ list (spanning October 2010 to November 2011) include the Frankie Howerd Audio Archive, finds held by the Tim Disney Archive (including Sir Ian McKellen’s first TV appearance in BBC series Kipling), the latest BSB recoveries made by Ian Greaves, and comedy gems from the Graham Webb Audio Archive including the soundtracks to wiped editions of World of Beachcomber; Peter Cook’s ill-fated chat show, Where Do I Sit?; sitcom No, That’s Me Over Here, starring Ronnie Corbett; Broaden Your Mind; Monty Python precursor At last the 1948 Show; The Frost Report and many, many others.

Mention should also go to Wiped News’s columnist Ray Langstone, who, incredibly, has been responsible for over 100 finds during the last 12 months. Well done, Ray!

Meanwhile, the Lost Shows Appeal has also delivered a bumper crop of archive material to get excited about, including a massive haul of material that has been donated courtesy of the estate of late radio producer John Fawcett Wilson, and a  large quantity of unedited
(audio-only) television studio recordings and production tapes including editions of The Old Grey Whistle Test, Lulu, The Rolf Harris Show, International Cabaret, and The Morcambe and Wise Show.

Other finds include rare episodes of Radio Luxembourg’s 1950s’ Dan Dare serial and interviews with figures such as Benny Hill, Peter Sellers, film director Lindsay Anderson and Doctor Who star Jon Pertwee.

Already some more of this year’s rediscovered material is on its way to find new audiences. Episodes from the BBC’s 1967 Sexton Blake radio series are due to be released by BBC Audiobooks early next year.

So without further ado, here are the full lists for the Raiders of the Lost Archives 2010 – 11 and the Lost Shows Appeal 2011.

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Raymond of the Lost Archive

WIPED NEWS is delighted to welcome on board missing episode hunter Ray Langstone as a columnist.

As regular readers may know, Ray has made a number of exciting recoveries this year – all by using the internet.

His committment to tracking down lost footage is to be commended and I hope you enjoy following his ongoing pursuit of material and thoughts about the subject of missing episodes in general.

You can find a link to his column – Raymond of the Lost Archive – over on the menu to the right (entitled “Also On Wiped”).

Wiped! Doctor Who’s Missing Episodes

A NEW book examining how episodes of Doctor Who came to go missing, and then turn up again, is released this September.

Wiped! Doctor Who’s Missing Episodes is written by Doctor Who Restoration Team member Richard Molesworth and published by Telos Publishing.

You can find out more about the book, including a brief interview with the author, over in the Out Now section.

Here’s the official blurb:

In the 1960s, the BBC screened 253 episodes of its cult science fiction show Doctor Who, starring William Hartnell and then Patrick Troughton as the time travelling Doctor. Yet by 1975, the Corporation had wiped the master tapes of every single one of these episodes. Of the 124 Doctor Who episodes starring Jon Pertwee shown between 1970 and 1974, the BBC destroyed over half of the original transmission tapes within two years of their original broadcast.

In the years that followed, the BBC, along with dedicated fans of the series, began the arduous task of trying to track down copies of as many missing Doctor Who episodes as possible. The search covered BBC sales vaults, foreign television stations, overseas archives, and numerous networks of private film collectors, until the tally of missing programmes was reduced to just 108 episodes.

For the first time, this book looks in detail at how the episodes came to be missing in the first place, and examines how material subsequently came to be returned to the BBC. Along the way, those people involved in the recovery of lost slices of Doctor Who’s past tell their stories in candid detail, many for the very first time.

No more rumours, no more misinformation, no more fan gossip. The truth about Doctor Who’s missing episodes can now be told in full!

• Wiped! Doctor Who’s Missing Episodes, by Richard Molesworth, is out September 2010, priced £15.99 (+p&p). You can order a copy from Telos Publishing.

Massive Haul Of Clitheroe Kid Episodes Rounded Up

He might have been just 4ft 3ins tall, but Lancashire entertainer Jimmy Clitheroe was a big star of the airways with his hugely popular BBC radio show: The Clitheroe Kid.

More Time With The Kid Himself

Clitheroe took advantage of his diminutive stature to play a cheeky schoolboy who lived with his family at 33 Lilac Avenue in an unnamed northern town.

The Kid was always getting into trouble for his schemes and sharp tongue, or for listening at the keyhole and getting the wrong end of the stick. Often his only reward was the right end of Grandad’s slipper.

The Clitheroe Kid ran for 17 series (a pilot series and 16 subsequent series) between 1957 and 1972, totalling 290 30-minute episodes. But of those, only 15 unedited shows (on open reel magnetic tape) and a further 28 edited editions, from BBC transcription discs, still reside in the archives, according to Missing-Episodes.com.

But there are many more episodes floating around in the ether and since January 2006 Derek Boyes of clitheroekid.org.uk has been hot on their trail.

To date he has managed to round up over 100 officially missing episodes from various sources. You can see a list of his finds here.

Speaking to Wiped about his amazingly impressive haul, Derek said:

“I was first introduced to The Clitheroe Kid on the radio when I was eight years old. My father was a keen radio comedy listener and said ‘I think you might enjoy this ‘ and brought me from elsewhere in the house to listen to the radio.

“I was captivated by Jimmy’s cheeky comedy and for a few weeks listened to the show religiously. It was extremely popular in it’s heyday – attracting 10 Million listeners at its peak

“Then being a boy, football or something else took it’s place. But deep down a love of the character (and the memories) remained and I re-discovered him on MP3s in this computer age.

“That’s when, impressed by what an OTR (Old Time Radio) enthusiast had already achieved in preserving the show, I decided to do my part.

“I believe the BBC only have around 13 complete (as in un-edited shows) and they regularly air about 31 shows on BBC Radio 7. Lots of shows are missing.

‘When I started my search in 2006, 132 shows from poor to good quality were then doing the MP3 circuit. I was impressed by what another collector had achieved with the show so I joined an OTR forum and contacted him.

“We became a partnership on this project and spurred each other on. I set up a website (www.theclitheroekid.org.uk); started writing to letter columns in local and regional newspapers informing readers of the search; trawled the net and contacted anyone and everyone that may have had tapes of the show.

“Those episodes available on the net had been accumulated by the time I joined the search. My finds came via reel-to-reel recordings, cassettes and BBC transcription discs.

“Some missing shows turned up on home-recordings given to the North West Sound Archive and others were sent to me by people who had read of the search in their local paper.”

Derek says the sound quality of the recordings varies from ‘good’ to ‘poor’. “We simply do the best we can with what we have,” he continued, “but we have released all finds from abysmal quality to good.

“People want to hear the shows whatever they are like but the search is endless. We are always looking for better quality on those we have, and to find more missing shows.

“I have got a share in 14 transcription discs. These are not yet all released. They are not new shows to MP3 collectors but will provide good quality recordings.”

Considering his favourite discoveries, Derek said: “I really enjoyed ‘The Loving Neighbour’, a 1966 episode with Molly Sugden. It’s very funny and would have been a shame if  it had never surfaced.

“We also completed the run of 1970s episodes when we found an episode called, ironically, ‘The Not-So-Artful Dodger’.”

For more information on the hunt for lost episodes of The Clitheroe Kid, click here.

• If you help Derek with his search to find more missing episodes of The Clitheroe Kid, email him at: thekidhimself@hotmail.co.uk

Photos From The Celestial Toymaker Discovered

The current issue of Doctor Who Magazine (issue 408) features some never-before-seen photos from missing ’60s story The Celestial Toymaker.

For the latest issue, the long-running magazine’s regular ‘The Fact Of Fiction’ feature looks at the classic William Hartnell adventure –  broadcast in four parts from April 2nd – 23, 1966, and starring a young Michael Gough as the eponymous villain.

It includes revealing set-photos and publicity pictures from the serial taken from negatives located in the BBC’s Photo Library a few months ago by regular DWM contributor Derek Handley.

The new images are important as only episode four, ‘The Final Test’, still resides in the BBC archives, though soundtracks to all episodes exist and have been released by the BBC as part of their Radio Collection series. You can buy it here.

Doctor Who Magazine #408 (cover date 27 May, 2009) is available now, priced £3.99.

Will There Be More Official Missing Who Animations?

An animated resurrection may be in store for some of the missing adventures of Doctor Who.

One hundred and eight episodes of the much cherished sci-fi show are currently missing from the BBC archives. The black and white episodes, dating from 1963-9 and featuring William Hartnell and Patrick Troughton as the peripatetic Time Lord, were junked in the early 1970s – deemed to be of no further commercial interest.

But though the visuals may be long gone, the soundtracks have survived thanks to the efforts of fans making home recordings at the time.

Publishing company 2|entertain has previously released a Doctor Who DVD (Troughton’s 1968 Cyberman story The Invasion) featuring animations of (missing) episodes one and four, produced by Cosgrove Hall. But further releases seemed unlikely due to a major funding short-fall.

The Invasion

However, fans’ hopes of seeing further animated episodes have been given a boost thanks to comments made by Dan Hall, Commissioning Editor for the 2|entertain Doctor Who DVD range, over at Doctor Who Online.

Though promising nothing concrete, he reveals that there are plans for two further animated stories to be released.

He told Doctor Who Online: ‘Contrary to rumour, two further animated stories are in development. Two of the core production team have been working on these projects for several months now.

‘Solving this financial shortfall has been worked on these past 24 months. Low-cost animations that fall below standard are not an option, artistically or commercially. BBC Audiobooks provide brilliant linking narrations that fire the most active imaginations. Therefore, if animations are to be commissioned, they must be of a quality that does the brand proud.

‘The commissions are by no means guaranteed, but the stories have been decided and negotiations are underway.’

Wiped will keep readers posted on any further announcements.

Doctor Who trailer recreated with CGI

Along with episodes two – six of the story it promoted, a specially-recorded trailer for classic 1968 Doctor Who story The Web Of Fear is currently missing from the BBC archives.

Featuring Patrick Troughton as the Doctor, the trailer was broadcast at the end of episode six of The Enemy of the World to warn viewers the Yeti (and the Great Intelligence that controlled them) were coming back, scarier than ever.

Thankfully, an audio copy survived from an off-air recording made at the time and this has just been combined with cutting-edge CGI to give a faithful idea of what the original trail must have looked like.

It is the work of ‘life-long Doctor Who fan’ Iz Skinner. Speaking to WIPED, Iz explained how the idea for the trailer recreation came about after she started helping with the Loose Cannon series of missing Doctor Who adventure reconstructions.

‘Animation is one of my hobbies,’ said Iz. ‘I joined http://www.who3d.co.uk a couple of years ago and then got the recon(struction) bug.

‘The LC (Loose Cannon) guys found me at Who3D and asked me to help out on a few bits.

‘Working with the Loose Cannon team has been brilliant and a lot of fun – they were so knowledgeable and supportive. I hope to do more with them!

She continued: ‘I’d say Patrick Troughton was my favourite doctor, until David Tennant (swoon), and I was looking for a short piece to try out my 2nd Doctor model and my Yeti – so the trailer was perfect.

‘But it was the great line ‘If your mummy and daddy are scared…’ that really sold it to me.

‘There weren’t any visual references for the trailer. I’d seen a set photo which I used as a basis to create the set and I found part of the script in The second Doctor Handbook (Howe-Stammers- Walker) although I’d started working on the animation by this time, just following the audio.

‘I made the Doctor and Yeti models early last year, 2008, and did the lip sync and then animation later, at different times, so it’s difficult to say how long it took – I’d say it would have taken three to four weeks if I’d been working on it full time.

‘The announcement at the end probably shouldn’t have had the BBC globe ident over it (and apparently I made the globe spin a bit too fast – lol), but the trailer was just a bit of fun really.’

Iz’s trailer is set to be shown at the Gallifrey 2009 convention in Los Angeles in February and she revealed to WIPED that she is now working on the CGI recreation of a missing Doctor Who episode, title still under wraps, which she expects to have completed by the end of the year.

‘I love the idea that we can try to rebuild the past through animation,’ concluded Iz. ‘We’re so lucky that the audio of these episodes survived. ‘