Why is the BBC going to produce a 'new' Bergerac series? - should they leave it where it ended?

John Nettles as Sgt Jim Bergerac in the BBC series 'Bergerac'

There are plenty of good television writers in the UK and lots of good new ideas, so why is it necessary to revisit old TV concepts and write new episodes for new casts?

The BBC is said to be considering a new series of the Bergerac detective series which ended in 1997. 

For those of us who watched the eleven series of original programs, we know how good it was and enjoyed the programs. 

(The danger is that any mediocre 'up to date' continuation of a previously successful series shows how wrong it was to try and reproduce something and when compared to the original, how people tend to prefer the original best.)

Back in the day when Bergerac or the Sweeney was originally filmed, society was different, there weren't the politically correct minded with the diversity tick box culture much in evidence.

When the BBC's Bergerac series ended, it ended. John Nettles went on to Midsomer and a successful new career as DCI Barnaby.

When the last of the original Bergerac's ended, Jim Bergerac played by John Nettles had then left the force and was making a living as a private investigator.

So to try and write a new series putting Jim back in the force seems 'odd'?, the question is what are the BBC looking to achieve by rehashing a once successful concept when we know how the original ended? 

is Jim asking 'You've got to be joking Barney'?

The recent outing with Dad's Army and Porridge should really put the tin hat (no pun intended) on well intended 'continuations'. It would be like bringing the Sweeney back.

The Sweeney - No one but John Thaw could be Jack Regan

What they should be doing is not to announce a 'new' version of an old and popular series, which elicits groans of 'leave it alone' from most of us who saw the originals, but embrace new series' based on new concepts.

Ashes to ashes spawned two incarnations and worked successfully

Ashes to ashes was an example of where this worked brilliantly.

Ashes was a modern-made series portraying policing in the 1970's in one of its series and then in the second (following the success of the first), portrayed the characters in the 1980's.

It worked well. It did the job. It wasn't trying to rehash Softly Softly task force or Z cars.

One of the complaints at the time of the original Bergerac series, was said to be the belief that people's idea of Jersey was that there seemed to be too much crime being portrayed!

As the late Charlie Hungerford would have uttered 'Bloomin' Ada. 

John Lennon warned of the dangers of 're-heating the soufflé' when mentions of reforming the Beatles was mooted, perhaps the BBC should let old series lie?

We don't need another virtue signalling tick box politically correct diversity rehash of something that was great in the time it was made. I shall stick with the originals.

Youfilm - has the Internet killed film and music as a career choice?

'Flying Squad'  a Tin Hat films production -

a retro film similar to the Sweeney series of the 70's -

in my opinion, this 'youfilms' approach is the future.

Then there was YouTube

YouTube is a great resource for old videos of things gone by, but at what cost is the Internet killing off future talent?

I can remember in the 1980's when I was in a pub band with some friends I was at school with, that all we needed was to go to a pub where an A&R man from a record company was likely to go and see if we could get lucky and get signed. 

Much the same had been the case since the late 1950's when luminaries like Tommy Steele, Cliff Richard and Marty Wilde had been talent spotted.

I remember going to music shops and seeing someone trotting out a note perfect rendition of something on a guitar and likely that was all they were good for, the music shop player I called them.

Fast forward about 30 years and we got television shows like the X factor and the like. It hasn't surprised me to see that some of the performers have been outed as semi professionals or even professionals who are looking to make it bigger. Not the amateur performer who does it and thinks they might have a chance.

Going on youtube you can see countless people copying note for note music performances, but then you don't get the same amount of original material.

The music industry took a real hit when applications such as ITunes and Spotify started up, bands could circumvent the old A&R circuit and get 'discovered' on the Internet and then sign a contract when they had an established audience and greater pull. And get a better deal in the round.

The advent of the digital music download has hit the big companies who sold CDs, DVDs and the media packaging cases too. But, the trend for 'Big Noting' your CD and DVD collection by having it on show in your front room, has meant an upsurge in physical media unit sales.

The future of film

So how will films fare in the future? You can find any number of films on youtube and under a 'fair use' policy, it seems getting around copyright issues?

Films today are big business and big money. The cost has always been there, but is there not now a trend for the 'art house' film making its presence felt?

About twenty years ago, I was involved with a group of 1940's scene enthusiasts and we made a short video on a preserved steam railway, they later wanted to do a film set in the winter of 1944, but there were changes in the group membership, so it never got much further.

Recently I came across a company called Tin Hat films, who were making self financed small films. I saw their 'Flying Squad' film, a sort of version of the Sweeney for want of a better description.

It was impressive, they had the 'right' cars, the right sets and proved that a small independent unit of enthusiasts could turn out a quality, professional film for little finance. The problem is how to get the investment back. Would 'the industry' support these people or see them as some sort of 'black leg labour' taking away jobs from the 'established' arena?

With an episode of something like 'Morse' or 'Lewis' likely to cost a million pounds an episode to make, quality productions clearly cost, but only the large television networks have the pockets deep enough for them. True, these get sold around the world, but is there not also a place for the smaller players?

This 'youfilm' type of product is not new, but in my view, it is the way forward - that is a gathering of people with the resources and talent to come together and create good films. Essentially a script, players, film, locations, props is the recipe to start with. 

Having written books for stage and film adaption, planning is also a big and important part of the project. 

With many actors out there already, is there the room for these independent productions? Indeed, Euston films that filmed the Sweeney was such a company and that was over 40 years back. 

My parents both worked for the BBC in the heyday of the organisation and I have been out on location to see the creative process taking place. The difference is the money. 

The small, 'youfilm' units need some money, but by a collective process and gathering, they can and do achieve results as good as some mainstream broadcast providers.

The question remains - in the 'youfilm' future, how do these smaller players fit in and can they make sufficient living from it?

I think they can. 

In the next 12 years one in three jobs is likely to be lost to automation, this is going to leave some people without livelihoods. This is where a Basic Income Guarantee payment will have to come in and will start a new 'cottage industry' situation - films will be a part of that.

The BBC as a publicly funded broadcaster is an anachronism now, in a world where there are countless commercial channels.

The BBC model will have to be rethought, it is a poll tax on viewing and should commercialise as much as possible to compete.

I thought twenty years ago that demand viewing would be the future, this has now come to pass.

That's funny - BBC comedy used to be in the days of Not the Nine o'clock news and Monty Python, is it now?

Not the Nine o'clock news -

the great comedy enterprise of the early 1980's

Turn on your radio at 6.30pm on BBC Radio 4 and it's comedy time, or not.

Apart from the 'I'm sorry, I haven't a clue,' a stalwart program that started in the 1970's and attracts a wealth of high calibre guests, the remaining offerings of today are frankly, crap.

The 'Now Show' on Radio 4, used to be funny, it is not any more. A move to a more 'diverse' cast line-up has let it fall in to the puerile rubbish trap.

I could go on, maybe the golden days of BBC comedy are gone, having been replaced by a 'diverse' and politically correct-friendly bland and tepid, unfunny mush.

With all of our once comedy greats now dead or retired, will we see the like of the Not the Nine o'clock news team again? I remember willing the days to go round until Monday night to enjoy as a young teenager, their anarchic style of comedy.

Great songs, great comedy, parodies and impersonations, a wealth of talent and writing, which later led to post NTNON careers, including acting, writing and production.

Where is the new comparable, clever talent now?

The Goodies - why no repeats for so many years?

Another great talent team was The Goodies, producing hilarious and sometimes bizarre comedy, some of it probably judged too 'sensitive' to re-broadcast today?

Rutland Weekend Television - Eric Idle's post Python series

The post Monty Python Eric Idle project 'Rutland Weekend television' based on a mythical small budget TV station in England's smallest county, is in itself a parody of television of the time and now, cash starved, shoe string, least cost option, staffed by proud people, trying to do their best in trying circumstances.

RWT never really got the publicity it should have, but like all these shows featured here, has attracted cult status.

Controversial and bleeped out!

Strangling animals and golf was deemed ok,

masturbating, not so

The Monty Python's flying circus team

The title of the enfant terribles of comedy must surely go to the Monty Python's flying circus team. Perhaps, collectively, the greatest waste of university education in one sitting, this band of refugees from the university Footlights reviews, evolved their talent in shows such as 'Do not adjust your set', before hitting the jackpot with Monty Python.

Their cocktail of the absurd rubbing shoulders with the normal, should serve as a master class to the writers of today and tomorrow.

Their comedy broke new ground, made up of writing teams within the program cast, their sketches sometimes barely worked, seemed to truncate without an obvious punchline and to some were just frankly, bizarre. Many are brilliant and revered today.

There was some real genius and their university education often peppered the comedy sketches with highbrow snippets, that if researched showed a level of education that is way beyond the puerile crap of today's so-called comedy.

Mary Whitehouse - the self appointed guardian of the nation

and a thorn in the side of many Broadcasters

Although Monty Python broke ground and pushed boundaries, they faced like many program makers, the scrutiny (and for some the wrath) of the late Mrs Mary Whitehouse.

Mrs Whitehouse, a suburban housewife from the Midlands, decided that boundaries of decency were being pushed too far in the liberal 1960's. Her ill advised 'Clean Up National Tv' campaign name, which if used as an acronym spelt something rather unfortunate, a word that she was unaware of apparently, was changed into the National Viewers and Listener's association, a far safer name, unlikely to get the local vicar hot under the dog collar.

Her crusade against immoral broadcast output often aided careers, to be 'blasted' by Mrs Whitehouse was often seen as a badge of honour to some broadcasters. History has shown that Mrs Whitehouse was often right in her arguments, she could see that the 'permissive society' of the 1960's would lead to later social problems. The 'progressives' disagreed and she was often lampooned, but history has proven her right.

It may seem that we have embarked upon a rose tinted journey into the past, but the past was better for comedy and television. They great days were the 60's and 70's, the like of which we are unlikely to see again.

Demand TV availability has meant that broadcasting schedules are largely irrelevant as is the BBC licence fee, in an era of commercial broadcasting.

LAPD Hollywod Crime Fiction franchise for sale

Gangster Hotel: Just one of the LAPD based novels in the franchise

Crime fiction author Ed Van Meyer has decided to sell the successful crime fiction franchise he has based in the Los Angeles and Santa Monica areas of California.

The franchise majored with the movie length leviathan novel 'The Olivia Pages' case, a 360+ page epic which the real life tragic events surrounding Marilyn Monroe's untimely death in 1962 provided some inspiration for.

Ed Van Meyer said of Olivia, "I have always had a great regard and admiration for Marilyn Monroe and having read much about her life and seem many of the documentaries about her, provided me with much reference material. However, I wrote my own story in 'Olivia', those events of 1962 helped provide useful inspiration for me."

'Olivia,' twists and turns through a 1962 Cuban Missile crisis America, with the action taking place in San Francisco, Malibu and Los Angeles areas. It starts with a something or nothing burglary and attempted arson and twists out into a pacy all meat and no gristle hard boiler which concludes explosively in a 'modern' day 2002 Los Angeles.

Ed Van Meyer uses a core of characters who often crop up across his books. "My LAPD Detective 1200 series started because I bought a film prop LAPD Detective badge with the 1200 number on it. I was in the police years ago before an injury halted that career." Van Meyer states.

"So I looked at the badge in my hand and said 'tell me your story,' and it went from there. I fleshed out a location in Santa Monica, gave my small Detective Bureau a purpose, revisiting cold cases and responding to crime generally, so as no to limit it. I often use personal ideas, things I read about or draw on my own police experience in my work. Most writers never walked a beat or smelt crime close up. I have. That's the difference, I'm not getting this stuff secondhand, I lived it!" Van Meyer states.

The Detective 1200 books spawned a collection of  11 short stories, essentially written for television adaption as a series of three-quarter hour length programs, with an hour and a half feature length 'Christmas special'. No stranger to the spotlight as a musician for many years, his parents met whilst working in British Television at the BBC in the 1960's.

A second series of LAPD 1200 stories exists as a written out storylines ready to be made into new material. "They are never samey, I made the choice to ensure every storyline was different, the only common linking factors were crime and policing." He adds.

Spin off characters like LAPD Homicide Detective 1009 Baumer from some of the other LAPD works get their own books, two spinoff feature length books designed to be adapted as a mini series of hour and a half length films were written. 'The Fall and rise of Frank Lafferty,' features Baumer and uses a California law test case from 1945 in respect of a person who was presumed to be dead, but is he?

Similarly, in the follow up novel, Detective Baumer is dropped into a completely unfamiliar world of the underground world of BDSM, Gay fetish and Nazi fetish establishments to catch a serial killer stalking the Los Angeles Gay Community.

The novel called 'The Fagot of Herbs,' aka 'A fistful of Dildoes,' is an exploration of investigating an often off the track world and the need to apprehend killers quickly who hide in the unfamiliar masses.

"Fagot of Herbs is the name of a fictional restaurant in the book, I saw a cooking program on TV some years back in England and a visiting American chef was doing a recipe, live. He then said 'toss in a fagot of herbs' and I thought ' that might be useful' "

Van Meyer continues, "It wasn't a slant at the gay community, it is the sort of thing they do, send themselves up. I was certainly a fan of Clint Eastwood's Dirty Harry charachter and had him in mind when I wrote the story, the race against time theme as was explored in that first film using that character. Also the film about Harvey Milk provided me with another useful character, in this book, a Gay Mayor exploiting the killings for publicity." Van Meyer continues

 "I wanted to try and build the tension and action I had seen in films like Bullitt and Dirty Harry. You have to watch Bullitt about three or four times to really work out what is what and who is the Chalmers character really working for?" Van Meyer inquires.

As someone interested in history, Ed Van Meyer who has written about the Korean War and WW2, subjects he has long held an interest in, is no stranger to literary time travel.

"That is true, often I skip between the past and present in my works, it brings extra dimension to the work, often referencing historical footnotes and incorporating them into the work is satisfying." Van Meyer believes.

The most recent outing for his LAPD Detectives came with the 'The Gangster Hotel case' a nourish book set in early 1962 Los Angeles, also published as The Blue Hotel case. It features LAPD Policeman 744 who teams up with a young LAPD Detective Will White who later appears in the Olivia Pages book.

"The most satisfying comment came from a native Angeleno now living in Germany who said that reading my books was like being back at home, that was great to hear." He states. So why does Ed Van Meyer write we ask?

"I was retired from the Police due to an injury on duty, whilst I was looking for another job I started writing and cranked out 2 books in two months. My English teacher always said I was good at writing a story, so it just seemed a natural thing to do." He states.

"It will be sad to move the franchise on but I have other projects to do and also work with helping the American Indian peoples situation which is very worthwhile for me on a personal level and which I am hoping the sale of this will help to finance." Van Meyer states. 

The published works can be seen on Amazon's Kindle site.