| Genre: | Adventure, Children's |
| Starring: | Michele Gallagher, Marcus Harris, Gary Russell, Jennifer Thanisch |
| Theme Music Composer: | Rob Andrews, Les Spurr |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Language: | English |
| Num Series: | 2 |
| Num Episodes: | 26 |
| Producer: | Don Leaver, Sidney Hayers |
| Camera: | Multi-camera |
| Runtime: | 25 minutes |
| Company: | Southern Television Portman Productions |
| Network: | ITV |
The Famous Five is a British television series based on the children's books of the same name by Enid Blyton. It was broadcast on ITV over two series in 1978 and 1979. It was produced by Southern Television in 26 half-hour episodes.
Production for the series began in 1977, with filming commencing during the summer of that year. The series was produced by Southern Television in a co-production with a German company. The episodes were recorded on location and on film (rather than the more usual video tape), making it the most expensive children's television series ever produced at that point.[1] Each story was adapted from one of the original novels and featured the same main characters; George, Julian, Dick, Anne and Timmy the dog.
The first series was produced by Don Leaver, while the second was produced by Sidney Hayers. The executive producer was James Gatward. The stories were adapted for television by a number of writers and directors and starred many notable actors in guest appearances including Patrick Troughton, Cyril Luckham, Brenda Cowling, Geoffrey Bayldon, Brian Glover, Ronald Fraser and an early appearance by Rupert Graves.[2]
The television scripts were amended slightly from the books to give them a contemporary, 1970s setting, with the actors wearing contemporary fashions, such as jeans, polo shirts and Speedos, instead of 1950s style clothing as described in the books. Of the original 21 novels, three were never adapted: Five on a Treasure Island and Five Have a Mystery to Solve because the Children's Film Foundation still had the film and TV rights to the books, while Five Have Plenty of Fun didn't fit in the production schedule.[3] Due to the success of the series, Southern Television were keen to make another season of episodes, but the Enid Blyton estate forbade them to create original stories.[4] One criticism of the series was that many of the episodes featured scenes set at night-time which were badly lit to the point that it was difficult to see what was happening. These scenes were actually shot in daylight, but a heavy filter was placed over the camera to give the impression of darkness.[5] The series was filmed mostly on location in the New Forest and partly in Christchurch, with many of the indoor scenes filmed in Exbury House, where the house doubled as many different dwellings.[5] [6]
The title song was the only original composition by Rob Andrews (music) and Les Spurr (lyrics). The incidental music was mainly taken from library music and from Drama Montage vol 1 & 2 by Brian Bennett.
The Famous Five was first broadcast on ITV on Monday 3 July 1978 at 4:45 pm. This was a year after it had been filmed and during production of the second series. The first episode was Five Go to Kirren Island (an incorrect spelling of Kirrin), although it was not the first episode filmed (Five Go to Mystery Moor).[5] The first series proved popular and, to capitalise on its success, the first six episodes of the second series (which had been filmed in the summer of 1978) were broadcast on Sundays in November and December. The remaining seven episodes of the second series were broadcast on Wednesdays from June to August 1979 (again, a year after production). The Famous Five was sold to many overseas countries such as Ireland (where it was repeated in 1981, 1983 and 1985), Canada and Australia and was dubbed into many languages for the European market such as German (the series having been part-financed by a German company), French, Italian and Spanish.
The series made its Australian debut on ABC television on Tuesday 22 May 1979 at 5:30 pm, with the remainder of the first series screened on weekday evenings from that date. Thus the entire first series had been screened by early June. The second series premiered in Australia, again on ABC, on Tuesday 4 March 1980 at 5:00 pm, as part of an afternoon line-up of children's programming, with new episodes following weekly. Episodes from both series were regularly repeated in similar afternoon time-slots on the ABC in the early-to-mid-1980s, before moving to a morning time-slot. The series was still being repeated as late as 1989.
The series spawned many merchandise items such as jigsaws and annuals, while Look-in magazine ran a picture-strip story each week for nearly two years.[4] The theme music (contrary to popular belief, not sung by the cast but by the Corona Stage Academy choir) was released as a single in 1978, but failed to chart.
The scriptwriters who adapted Enid Blyton's books for the first series (of thirteen episodes) were Richard Sparks, Gail Renard, Richard Carpenter and Gloria Tors.
Despite Southern Television's wishes to continue the series, no further episodes were made due to the Blyton estate's veto on the writing of new stories, although a new set of novels were published in France in 1981. These have been widely dismissed by fans of the original books, however. The four starring actors met up again in 1980 for a newspaper story on their progressing careers. By this time, only Gary Russell was continuing an acting career and he, too, soon gave it up. This was the last time the four met up although Russell, Harris and Thanisch have met a number of times since for interviews.
In 1996 the books were revived again for another British television adaptation by Harlech Television (HTV) and Tyne Tees Television. This time, unlike the 1970s series, it was set in the 1950s.[12] More recently, an animated version was made by the French company Marathon, which featured the children of the Famous Five.[13]
For many years, the series was not released on DVD due to confusion over the ownership of rights to the television episodes, as well as complexities with the Enid Blyton estate.[14] However, in October 2010, distributor Koch Media remastered the whole series and released it in Germany on Region 2 in a seven-disc DVD set (and on three Blu-ray Discs, respectively) with extensive bonus material including an interview with original cast members and their German counterparts who provided the voices for the German dubbed version.[15] France followed in November 2011 with two 3-DVD sets (but only with the French dubbed version and no bonus material), whilst the complete series was finally released on DVD in the UK in June 2012 by Koch Media. A new 45-minute interview (recorded earlier in 2012) with the original cast is featured on one of the Series 1 DVDs.
The series saw a previous DVD release in Australia in 2005 by Reel Corporation, when the company released this version with images from the 1995–1997 version (the "Five on a Treasure Island" episode from that version was also included).[16] The set was soon corrected (as a "revised edition") with images from the 1978 series,[17] and reissued again in 2011.