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Patrick Malahide was nominated a for a BAFTA. His bum caused a sensation at the time I seem to recall....................
I've just sent for this �7.99 inc p&p
Funny how things work...I started a thread yesterday.. "A Kind of Loving"
That started me thinking about Joanne Whalley (as you do) Next thing I'm doing the online ordering thing...where will it all end
I've spent a small fortune since I joined this forum
I hope The Singing Detective is as good as I remember..
Patrick Malahide was nominated a for a BAFTA. His bum caused a sensation at the time I seem to recall....................
Originally Posted by Caine
I've just sent for this �7.99 inc p&p
Funny how things work...I started a thread yesterday.. "A Kind of Loving"
That started me thinking about Joanne Whalley (as you do) Next thing I'm doing the online ordering thing...where will it all end
I've spent a small fortune since I joined this forum
I hope The Singing Detective is as good as I remember..
It’s a classic. (The Singing Detective ) My daughter bought me a copy last Christmas. I love it.
A great show! Wonderful acting, great script, etc.
Wish more television was this good.
BBC cancels re-screening of Dennis Potter series over fee disagreementFee negotiations between BBC and Potter estate break down with gap between two parties at no more than �5,000
BBC cancels re-screening of Dennis Potter series over fee disagreement | Culture | The Guardian
A superb investment for anyone to own this; I watched it first time around and it was unmissable from week to week. Some parts were quite terrifying: The scarecrow/walking corpse entering the hospital ward at midnight..
Humour too: The main character (Michael Gambon) asking for a bedpan: The Jamaican night Sister (Sharon Clarke) retorting: "Can't yo get it yourself?" as she kisses her teeth, wandering down the ward on her way to collect one!
Last edited by scenesixty; 13-11-11 at 09:34 AM.
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BBC Four - The Singing Detective - Upcoming episodes
To coincide with the re-screening of the series on the Beeb. And it's sobering to think that it's twenty-five years ago.
The Singing Detective: addictive and avant garde
Nick
The Singing Detective: addictive and avant garde – even 25 years on
Dennis Potter's masterpiece, repeated on BBC4 from this evening, makes even the best current drama look like amateur hour
In January, every US TV station – cable and network – shows off its forthcoming programmes. This year, there was a lot of deserved self-congratulation. Dustin Hoffman's Luck (HBO) is an impressive study of the murky underworld of horse racing and mob tactics; Smash (NBC) is an ambitious take on the High School Musical/Glee trope about the backstage antics of a Broadway musical about Marilyn Monroe; Kiefer Sutherland's riff as the father of a mute Aspergers sufferer sets post-9/11 American parenting in a sharp, cruel context. Everyone agrees, we're in a golden age of TV.
BBC4, meanwhile, has a show coming up that makes these epics look like amateur hour. The Singing Detective meshes the finest bits of Glee and Smash with the edgy darkness of Dexter and Breaking Bad, and features a wizened Tony Soprano-style figure at its core. It breaks every TV convention: the star, played by Michael Gambon, is a podgy middle-aged man raddled with skin disease, battling hallucinations and dark memories of childhood abuse. And yet the tempo is upbeat – even merry – and the tale is hypnotic and addictive.
Philip E Marlow lies in a hospital bed that could be in a 70s sitcom. His dreams enter 1940s noir, with mystery, song and thrills. His memories of growing up in post-industrial mining towns blur in and out of both settings. It's sort of a musical, sort of a thriller, sort of a comedy … it's the pinnacle of the golden age. The golden age of the 1980s, that is.
Dennis Potter's masterpiece is 25 years old but still feels avant garde. It's got the kind of confidence in the audience and in the medium that American writers are only just discovering. The smouldering Brit-made-good Damian Lewis – talking in Los Angeles about his Golden Globe-winning cable drama Homeland (coming to More4 this month) – said it was a shame that we don't have the writers to pen that sort of stuff in the UK. Well, we did once.
The Singing Detective's influence is hard to quantify but its not stretching things too far to say that it helped create the current Golden Age. Steve Bochco, Alan Ball and Charlie Kaufman all cite Potter as a key influence. Robert Downey Jnr starred in a flawed remake of the show in 2003 – although, let's be honest, if it's got Downey it's a gem.
I'd go toe to toe on The Singing Detective as a desert island DVD of best-ever TV. How many shows get props from the Manic Street Preachers, Franz Ferdinand and Elbow while framing the works of post-modern novelists like Paul Auster? (Auster's New York Trilogy riffed on identity and hallucination – with author and detective characters swapping roles, much as Marlow swapped with Marlow in Detective. Auster published in 1987. The Singing Detective was out on PBS a year earlier.)
Of course you could say – and probably will – "Why, oh why, can't we do it any more?/Where is the next Dennis Potter coming from?/It's all Thatcher's fault/Sod you BBC"… but that all misses the point. This is one of the best pieces of TV you'll see in your life. The Iron Lady wouldn't be as it is without it. True Blood likewise. Forget the context. Just watch this show.
Yes I also remember it with pleasure. Those were the days when I could get excited about a TV series & could hardly wait for the next episode.
The man was a genius......I also liked "Blackeyes" he did next...
It's a very good series. At the time it first aired I wasn't allowed to watch it so caught up with it on DVD. From there I watched most of Potter's work and have rated him since as probably the greatest TV dramatist. His work is so varied and clever.
Avoid the film remake though. Robert Downey Jr is no Michael Gambon.
Quality series but very strange,the young nurse is stunning too!
Sorry, can`t stand any of Dennis Potters work, especially this one!
Don`t think it`s much of a drama, or whatever it`s supposed to be, just annoying jumbled up eccentric TRIPE!
Last edited by faginsgirl; 02-02-12 at 10:57 PM.
It's delirium-I've had weird waking dreams like that when I had the real flu(not man flu) at the age of 17-I thought my bed was tipping up and was clutching for dear life,I also thought there was a cow on the outside windowsil and was paranoid about the possibilty of my watch being stolen-that's the truth and it lasted three days! Ha ha!
Oh no! How can you say that! It was MAGIC!! couldn't wait for the next episode-light years before DVD players/discs-It had everything: Musical fantasy/danger/intrigue/humour/ ad infinitum.
The memorable schoolteacher scenes-(Janet Henfry) "Come out to the front boy!" "We are going to find out-supposing it takes all day we are going to find out- which nasty disgusting little boy did this horrible thing!!"
Sharon Clarke:Jamaican Night Sister on men's ward:Who shines her torch on a patients face when he requests a bed pan "Can't you get it yourself?" as she kisses her teeth in vexation. Pure joy to watch!
A simply wonderful series - along with another product from the same era, Edge of Darkness. The BBC sure don't make them like this any more (although some American TV gets it right, such as the absolutely superb Breaking Bad).
I think Joanne Whalley would be a bit miffed to be identified simply as "the young nurse", jaycad!
I've not seen her in anything other than 'The Singing Detective' but had read that she'd buggered off to the USA to talk in a fake accent and spin the wheel of fortune of stardom or anonymity unless she married a star....I think Joanne Whalley would be a bit miffed to be identified simply as "the young nurse", jaycad!
I completely agree - add plank gambon to the mix - total disaster !
She was an active and successful actress long before the move to the States (see her IMDB CV) but I guess marriage to Val Kilmer made a move to the USA inevitable. I particularly remember her in A Kind of Loving, Edge of Darkness, Scandal and appearances in many series like Bergerac, Juliet Bravo etc. Lovely girl, too.
Sadly-not true..
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