HHGTTG returns

[ElyDave]

8th march

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2018/feb/27/the-hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy-bbc-radio-4

[hatler]

Thank you for that. It sounds like they're going to do it justice. Looking forward to it.

[Basil]

6:30 Thursdays R4

[TheLurker]

Forty years?  Bloody hell.  Digs in wallet for some Altairian dollars, comes up with only 29.  Damn.

Assuming the book features who's doing "The Book"?  They've got to get that voice right.

[Basil]

They did say who was voicing the book this morning.  Wasn't a name I recognised, but that is normal for me. 

[Mr Larrington]

They did say who was voicing the book this morning.  Wasn't a name I recognised, but that is normal for me.

John Lloyd, according to the R4 webby SCIENCE.  And Jim Broadbent as Marvin

[mattc]

A couple of related things currently out there.

From the archives: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p05y4h3v

A 15min thing with DNA's business partner: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07pj826


And 8pm TONIGHT: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09tbl2s

Don't Panic! It's The Douglas Adams Papers
Archive on 4

John Lloyd unearths the private papers of his friend and colleague Douglas Adams, and discovers more about the agonies he went through to write The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, forty years ago.

The papers, donated to St John's College, Cambridge University, include note books, ramblings, rants about how hard it is to write, unfinished scenes and passages never included in Douglas Adams' books.

John Lloyd co-wrote the first series of Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, which started on Radio 4 in 1978. He reveals that he and Douglas Adams had been commissioned to write the first novel together, following the success of the radio series, but Douglas decided to "give me the boot" and went on to write the books on his own. The novels have sold something in the region of 14 million copies.

Other contributors to the programmes include the original producer and now novelist Simon Brett; original cast members Simon Jones, Geoffrey McGivern and Mark Wing-Davey; and Paddy Kingsland of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop.

John also discusses how unpublished writings by Douglas Adams have just been used in a new series of The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, about to be transmitted on Radio 4.

A Bite Media production for BBC Radio 4.

(I couldn't actually find the latter using the bbc search functions. Pathetic  )

[clarion]

Geoffrey McGivern very welcome back (though I do like David Dixon's Ford), as is Simon Jones.  Peter of that ilk is, sadly, indisposed, but John Lloyd would do a marvellous job.  Better than William Franklyn, and definitely better than Patrick Moore.

Sad that Stephen Moore, the definitive Marvin, appears to be retired (though webby-science informs me he is rather older than I had thought).

Not too keen on Sandra Dickinson as Trillian, having been the most annoying thing about the TV series (aside from Zaphod's overpaid head).

[andrewc]

Geoffrey McGivern very welcome back (though I do like David Dixon's Ford), as is Simon Jones.  Peter of that ilk is, sadly, indisposed, but John Lloyd would do a marvellous job.  Better than William Franklyn, and definitely better than Patrick Moore.

Sad that Stephen Moore, the definitive Marvin, appears to be retired (though webby-science informs me he is rather older than I had thought).

Not too keen on Sandra Dickinson as Trillian, having been the most annoying thing about the TV series (aside from Zaphod's overpaid head).

A while back I was watching a BBC version of "The Tempest" ,  it took me a few minutes to work out that Ariel was being played by a near naked Ford Prefect !

[Torslanda]

Sandra Dickinson gives continuity, Susan Sheridan being also indisposed . . .

[Cudzoziemiec]

So, what did people think? I thought it was quite good, not quite what I was expecting, not as good as the original but then it wouldn't be: it's not new and I've lost the ability to listen with total concentration.

[Pingu]

I caught the closing credits and theme music 

[ElyDave]

I missed it last night so listened this morning without my attention fully on it.

I quite like that it wasn't a remake, but a picking up the story.

Seemed a little disjointed, but that could have been me - will try and catch the next few

[Basil]

Oops.  I haven't listened to it yet.

*Rushes off to do so*

[clarion]

It was a bit hampered by the amount of exposition required.  Perhaps future episodes will settle down.

Sandra Dickinson still grates.

[Mr Larrington]

Latest voice of The Book dies aged 76.  Bah!

[citoyen]

Sad that Stephen Moore, the definitive Marvin, appears to be retired (though webby-science informs me he is rather older than I had thought).

80!!! Blimey. That makes sense though - puts him in his mid-40s when he played Adrian Mole's dad, which is about right.

[citoyen]

Seemed a little disjointed

It was a bit hampered by the amount of exposition required.

Agree with both of these points. I listened to it last night and found that much of it didn't make sense, but then I gave up after the third book and it's some years since I read that.

Slightly weird/poignant that Stephen Hawking's voice was one of the last things I heard last night and one of the first I heard this morning.

[graculus]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43394758

Prepared. Treated. Diced, perhaps?