Stuff is unfeasibly excited...well, maybe excited's not quite the right word...to announce that November 1st sees the release of a personal TV guilty pleasure, a cheesy kid's TV show first broadcast in the UK in 1971, a show which came as an unusual diversion from my usual diet of Irwin Allen shows, Gerry Anderson extravagnanzas, Timeslip, Freewheelers and, inevitably, Dr Who. I'm talking about 'Here Come The Double Deckers', a musical/comedy series about a gang of kids whose den is an old London double decker bus (hence the name!) in a remarkably-clean junkyard in a studio set masquerading as London. Led by Scooper (Peter Firth...you know him as Harry Pierce, grizzled MI5 boss in 'Spooks' today) this motley group embarked on all sorts of wacky adventures across 17 episodes, every one of which was either punctuated by or climaxed with a song'n'dance number; the show even spawned an LP which remained wedged to Stuff's dansette for far too long. Anyway, this show may mean nothing to you but it's a bit special to me for all sorts of mad nostalgic reasons. If you vaguely remember it check out the title sequence clip below and if you've never heard of it and think it sounds like a pile of corny old toot then move along, there's nothing to see here for now...
2 comments:
Thank you!
I came here looking around for Doctor Who stuff (I'd followed the link from a post of yours on Gallifrey Base) and stumbled upon this, finally finding the name of this half-remembered show I almost thought I'd just dreamt.
This was on early Sunday mornings (here in Canada) before my parents were awake and no rambling vague descriptions* ever rang any bells for any of my friends.
Not remembering the title made internet searches futile, so at least finally I have that (them having the double-decker bus I remember, but for some reason it never occurred to me to search by it, though god knows how many pages of results concerning bus history and London tourism I'd have had to slog through).
I suppose the possibility of an R1 release is pretty unlikely, but at least I'm now sure that it's a memory and not a delusion...
*Based mostly on the pulley-and-string conveniences they'd devised for themselves, which stuck in my mind the most somehow.
Glad to be of service! I've been able to lay my hands on a preview DVD of the series and it really does bring the memories flooding back, memories of simpler times and...well, just nicer people. Lovely , warm little series, a joy to revisit. Hope you're able to get your hands on it somehow.
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