Why Thunderbirds is
still FAB |
Did
any person in the 20th century make so many children so happy as Gerry Anderson, asks Simon Heffer. |
By
Simon Heffer 7:00PM GMT 15 Jan 2011 |
Gerry Anderson
has confirmed that he is to make a new television series of Thunderbirds Photo: PA |
It is rare
that one can say one was in at the start of something big, but this week
I was reminded of a rare instance when I was. I was five years old, I
had had my fish fingers for tea, and I was parked in front of the television
on a Saturday evening. According to the newspaper, there was a programme
on that would excite children of all ages. |
An hour later, I felt
as though the whole landscape of what passes for my imagination had been
changed. I had just watched the first episode of Thunderbirds. It caused
an excitement of the sort that is possible only for the very young, and
it lasted for days. Indeed, every Saturday night was a renewal of the
miracle. In that age before video recording, it was impossible to be anywhere
else. |
The reminder came
the other day when the series’ creator, Gerry Anderson, announced to the
world that he was about to make another series. There were only two, and
the last was in 1966. Some of us have waited more than half a lifetime
for this moment. As for Mr Anderson, he is something of a legend. The
81-year-old has websites devoted to him and his work. His puppet shows
are shown all over the world, still, and the merchandise related to them
– cars, space vehicles and figures – sells like the proverbial hot cakes. |
Mr Anderson made several
other series, but nothing has resonated quite like the goings-on at Tracy
Island. Thunderbirds has thrilled generations of children. I was not the
only father of a certain age who, in the 1990s, made the supreme sacrifice
of sitting and minding the small ones in front of the television while
they, too, marvelled at the adventures of International Rescue. I bet
that if one were to watch most children’s programmes from the 1960s now,
they would look impossibly dated and dull. Mr Anderson’s are as fresh
as a daisy. |
At the time, I was
rebuked by my children for having lost along life’s journey so much of
the stuff that came with being a Thunderbirds obsessive. None of my model
vehicles had made it into my early middle age. Nor had my Thunderbirds
books, or my Thunderbirds game, which I seem to recall was about getting
The Hood before The Hood got International Rescue. |
To make up for this
deficiency, a large amount of folding money changed hands in order to
bribe a boy slightly older than mine into selling me his model of Thunderbird
Two, when one of my children decided that his life would end without it.
It was worth every penny. Then there was the hot afternoon in New York
when my wife and I chanced upon a shop in Tribeca selling vintage toys,
where we bought various rare die-cast models that drove our boys wild
with excitement. |
Which brings me to
ask the inevitable question about Mr Anderson: did any person in the 20th
century, even Enid Blyton or Richmal Crompton, make so many children so
happy? I was hooked by his earlier puppet shows – all employing his great
device of Supermarionation – almost as soon as I could walk. My earliest
televisual memory is of Supercar. Stingray was quite jolly, but like all
very small boys I always felt that Marina, Troy Tempest’s squeeze, got
in the way. (It was, so she tells me, Mrs Heffer’s favourite programme,
precisely for that reason.) |
Fireball XL5 was,
literally, out of this world, and showed Mr Anderson’s talent for dramatising
his futuristic adventures in that overexcited, cod-American way that children
thought was the sort of thing that their parents expected – and so made
us feel frightfully grown-up. And there was always an element of danger
in what Mr Anderson presented to us. As the voiceover used to say at the
start of Stingray: “Anything can happen in the next half-hour!” |
Thunderbirds was really
grown-up, though. It was not half an hour, it was an hour (including advertisements).
This was apparently at the insistence of Lew Grade, who – like the man
in the electric razor ad – had liked Anderson’s work so much he decided
to buy his company. He saw a test run of the first show and was so overwhelmed
by it that he demanded all the programmes be doubled in length. It must
be remembered that we watched these shows in black and white, even though
they were made in colour for the American market: but they were none the
less a stunning spectacle in their innovation, imagination and drama. |
Mr Anderson ensured
that all the elements we children discerned in whatever grown-up television
we had been allowed to watch were present in Thunderbirds: dramatic theme
and incidental music; well-developed plots; goodies and baddies; swaggering
Americans, at a time when the whole of Britain was in a cultural cringe
to them; and, of course, glamorous locations, all filmed on a trading
estate in Slough. |
Mr Anderson’s then
wife, Sylvia, a partner in his firm, managed to grab the most cultish
role in this cult: she was the voice of Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward,
International Rescue’s permanently cool, calm and collected London agent.
Second only to her in the cult stakes was her ineffable butler and chauffeur,
“Nosey” Parker, an ex-con gone straight and now pathetically devoted to
his mistress. I always presumed he was only ever a puppet because the
late Sid James was not free at the time to play him. His catchphrase –
“Yuss, milaydee” – has passed into the national iconography. |
Then, of course, there
was the nail-biting tension of the rescues themselves – a tension that
presents itself again and again, however often one watches the old episodes.
Many men in their fifties have spent decades wondering how a rescue craft
laden with kit could travel 10,000 miles in about half an hour, but that
will teach us to fail to suspend disbelief. |
Mr Anderson was speaking
last week because the Royal Mail, which is sadly not what it used to be,
has chosen to mark the show’s 50th anniversary with a series of stamps.
Unlike most who receive this accolade today, he actually deserved it.
He only holds the MBE, which is shameful. Perhaps the new series of Thunderbirds
that he has promised will lead to a knighthood. |
It is not clear, however, whether the new series will involve puppets or actors. There can be no debate: it has to be puppets, especially since Sid James is no longer available. We know what we like, and we know what we expect: episodes packed with rocketing machines, screeching cars and staggering puppets. Anything else would not be remotely FAB – would it, milaydee?. |
Deserving knighthoods and something good from Slough. Click below to launch this week's episode.... | ||
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