Oh yes! Oh yes! London: Fire and Destiny!!!

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Peter Ackroyd to do a television series about London for BBC2! Oh yes! Oh yes!!!

How happy am I?

When oh when is it coming soon, oh foul temptress, Auntie Beeb?

(Is this part of BBC2's plot to steal its thunder back from Channel 5 now that they've been ordered to show less home makeover shows?)

― Super-Kate (kate), Thursday, 29 April 2004 18:03 (twenty-two years ago)

(Where does Peter Ackroyd fit on the Triumvirate of Trouble? Or is he just simple ILX's patron saint?)

― Super-Kate (kate), Thursday, 29 April 2004 18:05 (twenty-two years ago)

SIMPLY, rather.

― Super-Kate (kate), Thursday, 29 April 2004 18:05 (twenty-two years ago)

no no you were right the first time

― The Huckle-Buck (Horace Mann), Thursday, 29 April 2004 18:05 (twenty-two years ago)

Ackroyd is anything but simple.

― Super-Kate (kate), Thursday, 29 April 2004 18:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Revive now that the British are awake...?

Does ANYONE care about this except me?

Or are you all too busy anticipating THE TRUTH about Arthur or something?

― Super-Kate (kate), Friday, 30 April 2004 08:53 (twenty-two years ago)

I remember when Ackroyd was a guest of Danny Baker they couldn't stop talking for weeks after about how bad he smelled. I hope the BBC are making him over first.

(Fire I am all about, but destiny is a bit more troubling).

― Pete (Pete), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:15 (twenty-two years ago)

Why worry - they can't transmit smell over the telly, can they?

― caitlin (caitlin), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:18 (twenty-two years ago)

SMELLEVISION IS HERE!!!

― Super-Kate (kate), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:19 (twenty-two years ago)

(I mean, they really need it for his chapter on the Fleet River, don't they?)

― Super-Kate (kate), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:19 (twenty-two years ago)

I would be happier if it were Iain Sinclair, but I suppose Ackroyd will have to do. *sigh*

― Liz :x (Liz :x), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:26 (twenty-two years ago)

p.s. what next, London the T-shirt?

― Liz :x (Liz :x), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:26 (twenty-two years ago)

Sinclair would be unwatchable.

― Super-Kate (kate), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:29 (twenty-two years ago)

But that would be teh funny!

― Liz :x (Liz :x), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:29 (twenty-two years ago)

T-Shirt will be this on a Scratch n' Sniff panel:

http://www.randomhouse.de/specials/ackroyd/images/72dpi.jpg

Agreed Sinclair >>>>>>> Ackroyd but still want to watch this.

― robster (robster), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:30 (twenty-two years ago)

I think Sinclair's rather a good telly presenter, I like how he is sometimes obviously excited and trying to keep calm for the cameras.

Smelly Pete should be good too though, yes.

― Tim (Tim), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:36 (twenty-two years ago)

Oi! Ian Sinclair would not be unwatchable! (Seen him too many times doing readings to agree, plus 'Asylum' is a genius film.)

But yes, I've been eagerly awaiting the TV series too - first heard about it on Amazon, of all places, while buying the picture companion to London: The Biography as a Chrimbo pressie.

Quick Googling has an online TV mag saying it starts this Friday (i.e. tonight) at 9pm, but that's snooker, so... next week? It's only a three part series though, I think. Barely enough time for him to draw breath...

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Friday, 30 April 2004 09:52 (twenty-two years ago)

Oops! By "unwatchable" I meant "unreadable".

― Super-Kate (kate), Friday, 30 April 2004 10:51 (twenty-two years ago)

Hooray! This coming Friday!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctwo/listings/programme.shtml?day=friday&service_id=4224&filename=20040507/20040507_2100_4224_37510_50

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Sunday, 2 May 2004 12:36 (twenty-two years ago)

7th May! Hurrah! I'm marking my diary! No one bother me next Friday around 9pm!

― Super-Kate (kate), Sunday, 2 May 2004 16:23 (twenty-two years ago)

comments?

also, the walks on the website (http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/programmes/london/launch_ani_london_journeys.shtml) seemed a good idea for ILE non-beer-related shenanigans if anyone's interested. maybe this saturday before the carsmiles' do? should take less than an hour by the look of things.

― koogs (koogs), Monday, 10 May 2004 07:14 (twenty-two years ago)

erm... a bit meh, in the end I thought. I don't know why I expected anything more than was in the book(s), but I just didn't think the TV show added anything and didn't find Smelly Pete particularly engaging.

Plus all the faux-Sinclair camerawork (such as the bits where it ran round alleyways in the first person and sort of stop-motiony, or the meeting with 'Little Pete' at the end) just made me think how much better it would have been if Iain S had done it instead.

I'll still watch the other episodes obv (this week is "The Crowd") but hold out little hope for any decent screentime devoted to London's secret rivers. :-(

― aldo_cowpat (aldo_cowpat), Monday, 10 May 2004 08:44 (twenty-two years ago)

Fire and Destiny? Water and Darkness? This is like history meets London meets D&D (ie ideal for some of you lot!)

― Matt DC (Matt DC), Monday, 10 May 2004 08:47 (twenty-two years ago)

I have only ever read Hawksmoor and thought it such a pile of utter bilge that I haven't read anything else by him. It's the mysticism thing - makes me reach for my gun.

― Dave B (daveb), Monday, 10 May 2004 09:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Fire burns wood, wood floats on water, water puts out fire

― Battle Beasts (we battle for fun) (blueski), Monday, 10 May 2004 09:09 (twenty-two years ago)

I was a little irritated that Geoffrey of Monmouth was described as 'historian', in exactly the same way as Tacitus. One (I think) was writing about things that happened within living memory; the other was creating medieval myths for which he is the earliest surviving source, about things which supposedly happened a couple of thousand years earlier.

― caitlin (caitlin), Monday, 10 May 2004 09:14 (twenty-two years ago)

How did my penis get on this program????!!!???

― Pete (Pete), Monday, 10 May 2004 09:28 (twenty-two years ago)

You're thinking of "littlest Pete", pete.

― Markelby (Mark C), Monday, 10 May 2004 09:30 (twenty-two years ago)

Predictably, rather disappointing. Pity they didn't get Mike Skinner to present it (hey, Mike Skinner as Lytton Strachey - "Dora, I couldn't get my pills at any other time I had to get them quicksnap...no I can't remember the last time we did it" etc.)

― Marcello Carlin, Monday, 10 May 2004 10:02 (twenty-two years ago)

I enjoyed it. There were aspects of it that didn't work so well. Especially the whole "projecting old films on the walls of famous buildings" schtick. I know they were trying to "conjure up the ghosts of London" but it was not particularly effective, and not half as spooky or evocative as just the simple "filming spooky passages in London" bits. The best, most evocative bit was where they just went down into the basement of the Guildhall, down under the crypt, down a spooky passage and ended up in a Roman ampitheatre, that was very effective!

I liked the "sped up nightbus" bits, as HSA called them, but HSA didn't. But then again, I think the top deck of a routemaster is the best way to see London.

I like Ackroyd's style, so I like his presentation. He rambles and just links random things together, he was better than the "special effects".

The "expert witnesses" were K-rub, though. I like how he uses quotes as reinforcement in his writing, but it just didn't quite work. The actors were fine, but it was how they were all sitting in the SAME ROOM, as if he'd invited Tacitus and Virginia Woolfe and Wren in for tea. Too surreal.

But all in all, I enjoyed it. I just wish they'd had more of Ackroyd and less of the annoying special effects.

― Super-Kate (kate), Monday, 10 May 2004 11:35 (twenty-two years ago)

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