Simply Media Release "Lost" Pilots on DVD

Simply Media are delighted to be partnering with leading TV archivists Kaleidoscope (The Classic Television Organisation) to release three rare and un-transmitted programmes on DVD for the very first time, featuring some of TV's greatest icons.

Steptoe and Son: The Offer
Released on DVD 13th August 2018

Steptoe and Son began in 1962 in the UK, and has since become a national institution.

In 1965, creators Ray Galton and Alan Simpson were approached byJoseph E. Levine to make a pilot for the US. It was never optioned and a 35mm print was given to Ray Galton as a souvenir. That print of the US pilot lay undiscovered in Galton’s basement until Kaleidoscope discovered it during a film shoot. 

Starring Oscar-nominee Lee Tracy (The Best Man) and Golden Globe-nominee Aldo Ray (From Here to Eternity), the unseen US Steptoe and Son pilot is now available on DVD for the first time. 

Special Feature: Footage from the Kaleidoscope documentary The Native Hue of Resolution featuring Ray Galton and Tessa Le Bars.

Frankie Howerd: The Lost Television Pilots
Released on DVD 13th August 2018

A two-disc collection of rare television pilots starring revolutionary British comedian Frankie Howerd

Howerd was a huge success in Britain, but couldn't make his mark in other countries. These pilots, made in the 1970s, provide a rare insight into his work abroad.

This collection includes:Up the Convicts - Episode Three, The Gong Show – Pilot & The Frankie Howerd Show (CBC) - 2 Episode plus special feature: Collection of rare interviews with Frankie Howerd from Ryan’s Roost, The Mike Douglas Show and The Merv Grffin Show.

You can find out more about Kaleidoscope here: https://www.tvbrain.info/

And you can find out more about Simply Media here: www.simplymedia.tv

You can follow me on Twitter @CarryOnJoan and on Instagram

Norbert Smith: A life - Released on DVD for the first time!

Harry Enfield’s iconic mockumentary, first shown on Channel 4 in 1989, is a hilarious send-up of both the TV arts biopic and the history of British cinema.
  

Rated 8.3 on IMDB and winner of the Popular Arts Award at the 18^th International Emmy awards in 1990.

Written by BAFTA-winners Harry Enfield (The Windors) and Geoffrey Perkins (Benidorm / The Catherine Tate Show).

Directed by BAFTA-winner Geoff Posner (Little Britain).  

Melvyn Bragg (as himself) arrives at the country residence of Sir Norbert Smith (Harry Enfield) in the week of his 80th birthday, to reminisce about a distinguished acting career that ranged from a whimsical Hamlet to a coveted role as the face of Sudso washing powder.

Sir Norbert’s patchy recollections, addled by drink, are accompanied by jovial clips from the thespian knight’s greatest hits – from comedy capers Oh, Mr Bankrobber!, Passport to Puddlewitch and Whimsy Galore! to the shocking tale of 1930s juvenile delinquency Rebel Without a Tie.

It's Grim Up North reprises the unremitting misery of 1960s social realism; while the WWII epic Dogs of Death finds Norbert joining an all-star cast determinedly drinking their way through the film’s considerable budget. In belated support of the peace movement, Sir Norbert stars in the Greenham Common-inspired Carry On Banging; and in his final role he gamely plays Nelson Mandela (as Alec Guinness was unavailable).

The extensive cast includes Josie Lawrence (Whose Line Is It Anyway?), self-parodying Carry On regulars Jack Douglas, Barbara Windsor and Kenneth Connor, and Renée Asherson – Lawrence Olivier’s screen wife in Henry V – as Lady Norbert.

And you can watch a trailer for this new DVD release here:

Norbert Smith: A Life will be released on DVD by Simply Media on 16th July.


You can follow me on Twitter @CarryOnJoan and on Instagram