There is something a little mysterious about the Absolutely Fabulous episode “Magazine”, you know. But to understand exactly what, we have to get deep, deep into recording dates. I am giving you ample warning to either strap yourself in, or leave quietly.
Still here? Excellent. So, most of the episode was shot in the normal fashion. There was location shooting done on the 6th February 1992, a studio pre-record day on the 17th March, and then an audience record on the 18th March. So far, so normal.
But one part of the episode needed to be recorded in studio a couple of weeks earlier than the rest of the programme. The paperwork states:
Pre-recorded Sc 4 on Wednesday 4th March 1992 due to Jane Horrocks being unavailable for Studio 5 dates.
The 4th March 1992 was the main studio record day for “Iso Tank”. The paperwork also lists four supporting artists for the office staff, and specifically states:
Used on Wed 4th March 1992 (For Prog 3 & Prog 5)
Don’t worry too much about those episode numbers; a combination of the paperwork treating the pilot as a separate production, and rearranging the final two episodes in the transmission order, means that they don’t match with how we think of that first series. The important thing is that the paperwork is claiming here that there were scenes shot in Edina’s office on the 4th March, and they appeared in both “Iso Tank” and “Magazine”.
Sure enough, there is an office scene in “Iso Tank” featuring both Jane Horrocks, and four supporting artists. You can count the SAs as Edina and Patsy walk through the outer section of the set:
Two supporting artists…
…and two more supporting artists
And following that, you have the scene with Bubble. (This is the episode where she is terrifyingly competent.)
The above is all very well. There is one huge stonking problem. Although she’s clearly present in “Iso Tank”, Bubble doesn’t appear in the episode “Magazine” at all. Which is bizarre. They specifically went out of their way to record a scene which featured Horrocks two weeks earlier, to work around availability issues, and then the scene doesn’t even make it into the final show!
Still, never mind. We can surely turn to our old friend, the Series 1 Ab Fab script book – published in 1993 by BBC Books – in order to find out what was cut. Remember, this was the book which preserved the original opening to the pilot, so a precedent has been established: this is a book which keeps whole scenes which were deleted in the final broadcast version of the episode.
Just one problem. Bubble doesn’t appear in the script for “Magazine”, either. And Horrocks isn’t mentioned in the cast list for the episode:
What’s going on?
At this point, I had a brainwave. The paperwork specifically mentions that the scene in “Magazine” that was pre-recorded with Jane Horrocks was Scene 4. So what is Scene 4 in the published script for “Magazine”?
Answer: it’s the scene where Edina and Patsy arrive at the magazine offices. Which definitely isn’t ex-BBC building White City One, right next to Television Centre, definitely not.1
There’s just no sensible place where Jane Horrocks could appear in this scene. Clearly, at some point, the scenes had been renumbered between the production, and the published script. Sure enough, if we look at the paperwork, the above scene is listed as:
Sc 5 Int/Ext Magazine Building Dur 1’01”
It’s Scene 4 in the published scripts, and Scene 5 in the production paperwork. Somewhere, we’ve lost a scene in the script book.
And then it dawned on me. What does Edina say in Scene 3 near the beginning of the episode, set in her kitchen?
PATSY: You going to the office?
EDINA: Yeah. I’ve got to sort out a few things about the shop, darling. It’s going very well, by the way.
So clearly, Scene 4 was originally a scene set in Edina’s office – the scene recorded with Jane Horrocks during the main record for “Iso Tank”. This scene was then cut from the final show, and the script book actually followed suit and cut it too… and then renumbered every subsequent scene in the episode.
Which is all very well, but the script book didn’t cut the three scenes which were recorded and then dropped from the pilot. Why the change in procedure here? I have no idea. My only possible suggestion is that the book’s editors noticed that Horrocks wasn’t in “Magazine” as she was a main cast member, and made what they saw to be the appropriate amendment. As the deleted scenes in the pilot contained characters which were either featured elsewhere in the script, or were played by a one-off guest cast member, perhaps they simply didn’t notice.
Whatever the reason, it’s incredibly annoying that the scene was cut from the book. We’re denied a little bit of extra Ab Fab, presumably because somebody decided to get a tidy mind, if only temporarily.
Never mind, at least we’ve solved one mystery. The other one, of course, is: what was in that scene? Sadly, for now, I have to fail you. But if anybody out there has a camera script for Ab Fab for the 4th March 1992, you’re sitting on something interesting. Shove us a photocopy.
With thanks to Tanya Jones.
Sadly, although the main building is still there, the frontage was drastically changed in a redevelopment a few years ago. ↩