One thing I’ve been thinking about recently is the danger of assumptions when it comes to figuring out shit about old telly. I’ve always made it a point of order to invite people to correct or challenge me on my writing here… whether it’s a minor point, or something which upends a whole article.1
My recent piece on A Small Summer Party had a query which falls somewhere in the middle of that continuum. After I spent a great deal of time examining the difference between the 50-minute broadcast version and the 60-minute DVD version of the show, Smylers asked the following question in the comments:
“You describe changes as being from the broadcast version to the DVD version (which makes sense, as the order you experienced them in), but is there any evidence as to which was made first — or indeed why they bothered to make two versions?
If the longer version were made especially for the DVD release, that would obviously involve far more work than simply putting the existing broadcast version on the disk. So either that was a commercial decision that the DVD would sell more copies (making enough additional profit to pay for the extra work) with the “Director’s Cut”, or Hugo Blick was sufficiently irked by the TV edit that they were prepared to put the effort in to ensure that their vision of how it should be was finally out there.
The commercial potential-reason feels weak to me: the release was primarily of series 2, and surely most potential purchasers would buy it even if all the episodes were as broadcast.
The other possible chronology is that the show was originally made as a 60-minute edit, but the BBC then asked them to cut it down to 50 minutes for scheduling reasons.”
Which is a highly sensible question… and not something I’d even thought about, despite picking through the programme in such detail that I spotted the addition or removal of single shots. That’s my brain for you.
I tossed off a quick reply:
“So in this particular case, I believe that the DVD version was made later, for the simple reason that I think the final scene shows a clear rethink of how to approach things. It feels like a true, after-the-fact Director’s Cut.”
Ahem. Wrong. In fact, I could not have been more wrong. As Paul Hayes then went on to reveal in the thread:
“It appears from the listings on the BBC archive that the hour version is a /71 edit, and the 50-minute one a /72.”
In other words: the first version edited of the programme was the 60-minute version which ended up on the DVD, and the second version was the 50-minute one, which was what was originally broadcast, and which is currently on iPlayer.
Not content with that – after all, I’ve already been caught out once on this – I did some further digging. The /71 version is indeed identical to the DVD version, aside from the end credits.2 And the /72 version is definitely what was broadcast back in 2001.
I also have some EXCITING dates:
- The /71 version is dated 16th July 2001.
- The /72 version is dated 8th August 2001.
- The programme was broadcast – in its /72 edit – on the 3rd September 2001.
- The DVD was released – in its /71 edit – on the 14th June 2004.
In other words, we can confidently state that the hour-long version released on DVD wasn’t created for the DVD, and certainly wasn’t Hugo Blick’s “second take” on the show. It was the very first version created. It just took nearly three years for us to be able to watch it.
* * *
The above is absolute fact. The rest of this piece is probably best classed as informed speculation. Because I can’t ignore the obvious question: was the programme originally intended to be broadcast at an hour long?3
There seems to be plenty of circumstantial evidence that indicates yes, beyond the fact that the 60-minute version was delivered first:
- If we look at what was broadcast that evening, A Small Summer Party was at 9pm… followed by, erm, a 10-minute filler of Alistair McGowan’s Big Impression. And a repeat of it, at that. That filler looks uncannily like something which was parachuted in, to fill the originally-intended slot.
- The Evening Standard published on 7th August 2001 refers to the upcoming programme “A Small Summer Party, a one-hour version of Marion & Geoff”. By the 21st August 2001, The Guardian was referring to it as “a 50-minute special”.
- As reported by Martin Fenton, the original VideoPlus+ code for the first broadcast of A Small Summer Party recorded the full hour, including the Alastair McGowan filler.
As to why the BBC ended up broadcasting a 50-minute edit rather than the 60-minute version… well, we could do all kinds of guesswork, but it’s probably safer not to. Suffice to say that I think it’s interesting that the hour-long version on the DVD is specifically labelled as a “Director’s Cut” – unusual language for a TV show release at the time.
There’s surely a story there. I’ll get someone on the record about it one day.
I’ve only ever had to pull a whole piece on here once in 15 years. I really should rewrite that damn thing properly. ↩
The credits are all on individual cards, as opposed to scrolling, although the scrolling credits which ended up being used are also tacked onto the end as an option. ↩
It’s at times like this that you really wish the DVD release of A Small Summer Party had a commentary from Blick and Brydon. Not least because their commentary track for Series 1 is one of the very best commentaries a comedy series has ever had. Seriously, it’s magical. Hunt it down if you haven’t heard it. ↩