BBC promote search of Lost Episodes

[B Thomas]

Jun 5, 2011 10:28:18 GMT John Fleming said:

There was talk, on this forum if I recall, that "Under Fire" was shown in New Zealand in 1986. Have any investigations been made into this possibility? Even if the master had been junked in the meantime VCRs were commonplace by that time so there's a chance that if the story is true then someone may have taped and kept it.

News to me, I would have been watching at the time and don't recall any B&W eps shown at all...

[Gary Robinson]

Jun 5, 2011 12:05:21 GMT PAUL COTTON said:

The recovered episodes were on film(tele recordings), and were dumped outside a film studio. They should have been returned to Jimmy Perry/David Croft, rather than dumped. Not the fault of the BBC in this case.

The BBC should have still requested that they were returned unbelievable.

[Paul Cooksley]

The BBC website article is now updated!

Re: Dad's Army '100 episodes' quote now replaced with the word "Some"!

[Simon Smith]

Jun 5, 2011 15:23:39 GMT Paul Cooksley said:

The BBC website article is now updated!

Re: Dad's Army '100 episodes' quote now replaced with the word "Some"!

Yup, they updated it yesterday. (as someone said on this exact thread....)

[Andrew Doherty]

I am somewhat puzzled by this BBC article being displayed now, unless it is to do with the start of the two month Library of Congress British Television recovery season that starts on Monday, June 6th at the BFI Southbank.

Yours,

[Simon Smith]

Jun 5, 2011 12:05:21 GMT PAUL COTTON said:

The recovered episodes were on film(tele recordings), and were dumped outside a film studio. They should have been returned to Jimmy Perry/David Croft, rather than dumped. Not the fault of the BBC in this case.

I do not wish to seem confrontational, but did the BBC ever return prints/telerecordings to producers, rather than simply junk them? Or did the BBC only hold video recordings and ALL film was held elsewhere?

Also, the article now refers to well-known Kaleidoscope person Chris Kerry as "Chris Perry".

[PAUL COTTON]

Film prints were held by the film library. Video recordings by the engineering department. BBC Enterprises also held film prints of series likely to be sold abroad. Confusion between these three departments, as to who held what is apparently one reason why so many episodes of Doctor Who have been lost. I don't know if producers were regularly offered film prints or recordings prior to junking, but it may have well have happened. In the case of 'Dad's Army' Perry and Croft refused permission for their work to be junked, so the few episodes that were wiped, shouldn't have been. I believe that the episodes recovered in 2001(a private collector had rescued them many years earlier from the film studio skip), even had a note on one of the tins, saying something like 'return to David Croft'.

[Gary Critcher]

'Film prints were held by the film library. Video recordings by the engineering department.'
Really? When I worked at Television Centre (in a department of the Film & VT Library) both film AND videotape were ALL held at the Film & VT Library at Windmill Road, Brentford.

[PAUL COTTON]

Hi Gary

Yes, generalising about an industry I have never worked in is certaintly dangerous. But I believe the situation was a bit different in the early to mid 1970s, when most of the junkings took place. If I have upset any former or present BBC staff, I do apologise.

Paul Cotton

[avengers1963]

It does not bode well when the BBC send out an appeal for lost episodes and they can't even get their facts right. It begs the question do they actually know what's in their archive?

Don't get me wrong it would be great if this appeal brings about some recovered lost footage/episodes etc but when will 'Joe Public' get to see it? I for one would love to see existing episodes of the 60's/70's series The Troubleshooters and many other series/episodes from that era which are just gathering dust in their archive with not even a hope of them being shown on TV or released on DVD. Why? Is this a classic case of the BBC just hoarding stuff? The likes of Network DVD are doing a fantastic job of releasing an awful lot of forgotten ITV/ATV/Other UK regional programmes from the 60's, 70's, 80's and even the 50's. There is always a market for nostalgia and the BBC could do with greatly improving the release of more of their archived programmes.

[Gary Critcher]

'Yes, generalising about an industry I have never worked in is certaintly dangerous.'
It certainly is. As far as I know, the BBC Film & VT Library at Brentford was established in at least the mid-60's.

[Gary Critcher]

................and I started working for the BBC in 1976.

[markboulton]

I think Paul Cotton can be forgiven for what he says because he has repeated exactly what Steve Roberts and the DW Restoration Team have said on their website and used to say on their forum for over a decade. i.e. That until 1978 there was a Film Library and the Engineering Department looked after videotape, because until 1978 there was no mandate to keep a comprehensive archive. That was certainly what I believed. If indeed there was a combined, comprehensive Film & VT Library as far back as 1965, that renders most discussions about how such materials were handled as misleading at best, especially coming from other BBC insiders/experts.

You see, this is the problem I find when discussing anything with people who doggedly stick to *their* perception of the company or organisation they work for. It may be a high-profile organisation, yes, but also a large one, and another person's view or experience of working there may be entirely different. Someone *can* work at a particular place and have the wrong impression of how a certain function works, because they form a mistaken belief early on in their job, and carry on for years or decades holding on to that mistaken belief. It doesn't necessarily mean someone from outside the organisation can't research facts and actually come up with more truth than someone who was working there.

So if what was said was wrong, maybe issue should be taken with the RT.
I'll be honest, I don't know which story to believe now, but quite obviously even the insiders can't agree.

[Gary Critcher]

'even the insiders can't agree.'
LOL! True. Apologies if I've inadvertently muddied the waters.

[PAUL COTTON]

According to 'Wiped: Doctor Who's Missing Episodes' by Richard Molesworth, the film library began to add 2 inch video tape tape to its holdings around1974-1975(it was a gradual process apparently) I believe the combined Film and Video Tape Library dates formally from 1975, but I could be wrong. Paperwork quoted in 'Wiped' suggests that it was a new development.