The Enid Blyton Society

This shows the gorgeous Jemima in all her feminine glory! I wonder if George would have looked like this?

Certainly not as good as a boy! Much, much better!

[drooling again]

Wow! Just got hold of a copy of Black Dahlia, will post my comments somewhere.

I find Marco Williamson hot *blushing*

I cant understand why everyone critisizes Marco Williamson =- he was almost a copy of the illustrations tall mature and well behaved he was perfect ok he looked a bit older in the second series but even Anne did they were perfectly cast in my opinion better than the 70's series and ok I am a 90's child but these were set in the 50's and that is true to the books also they get older which is also true.
I think it would have been unrealistic if say they had filmed it all at once without the gap and they looked the same the thing of them looking older is something an audience could relate to because they themselves would have got older that is one of the great things I love about this series and also how they portrayed 50's kids so well when they were really modern kids is brilliant!
I think this series is undervalued because primarily the people who would have watched it just didnt make a big thing about it because there were other shows such as the demon headmaster that probably overshadowed it a bit and it was on itv. I think one day when the kids who did see it have grown up it will have a cult following probably because of Jemima Rooper who you can tell is going to be very famous the has has good parts simce being a child.

Perhaps the best television portrayal of Julian was by Peter Richardson in Five Go Mad in Dorset. This was first broadcast back in 1982 on the launch night of Channel 4. Both the Comic Strip team's spoof portrayal of the Famous Five and the embryo Channel 4 were considered to be very controversial but quite tame by todays standards. My parents were so shocked that they de-tuned Channel 4 from the family TV! (I soon re-tuned it!)

In his performance as Julian Marco Williamson displayed very similar characteristics to Peter Richardson's version, I believe that someone else on this forum has also mentioned this. Was it possible that the cast of the 90s series were given tapes of Five Go Mad in order to get into character? Certainly they had to watch the 70s series, Gary Russell referred to this in his article for the EBS Journal. http://abl.ab.funpic.de/gary/index.html (last main paragraph)

I too can see the day when the 1990s FF series will have more of a cult following, even more so if it ever sees an official UK DVD release. Imported DVD copies of this series are occasionally available on Amazon and Ebay.

This series was my favourite! Was interested that Moonraker states Timmy= "Nothing like the real one"-
I wonder if ,like most , I suspect, he has the Soper Tim in mind?
I seem to remember that Enid said in her (somewhat selective) autobiography that Soper's version was not as she imagined him..Still, I agree the big old Mongrel of the original books will always be "the real deal" to me!

Kirrin wrote: I think one day when the kids who did see it have grown up it will have a cult following probably because of Jemima Rooper who you can tell is going to be very famous she has had good parts since being a child.

Indeed! Take a look at this clip of a hilarious Jemima performance in the Sky TV series "Hex". This is the scene where her character Thelma impersonates an angel in order to fool a gullible student. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEDBsyxdy5g

And here's a performance from the 1990s series;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjYDOxWfVzQ
.

Great clip, Petermax!

EnidMakesMeHappy wrote:I find Marco Williamson hot *blushing*

Sorry but totally have to agree. Very dishy!!

He seems to have disappeared though! I can find Lots of Jemima, and nothing on Marco, Paul or Laura!
Does anyone know if there doing anything? Becuase one of the thing I would like to do is collected autographs of all four!!

If anyone has any leads they would be most appericated!!!

P-S

Unfortunately, I never saw the 1990's series as well. Though I hadn't heard of the series, before coming here. If I could get my hands on copied of them, I'd watch them.

Bannerman65 wrote:Unfortunately, I never saw the 1990's series as well. Though I hadn't heard of the series, before coming here. If I could get my hands on copied of them, I'd watch them.

Hi Bannerman65!

I got my copies of the 90's series off e-bay. Some of them are easier to come by than others if your going for videos! I got some of the videos for about two pounds plus posteage and packaging- Five on a Secret Trail only popping up once in a blue moon, and being very expensive.

The way to get the rare ones would be to purchase the Dutch DVD's. These come in two boxsets, series one and series two, except Five go to Smugglers top for some reason!

There's a thread on here that explains a bit more about it, I think Petermax was talking about it!http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/foru ... a&start=30

try these! Petermax is the one with all the links!

Hope this helps!

For less than half the price of the very rare VHS of Five On A Secret Trail, one can obtain a DVD box-set of the 90's series from a number of Ebay sellers. These are official releases for the Dutch market, but the soundtrack is in English with Dutch subtitles that can easily be switched off. All episodes are included except for Smugglers Top, which can quite easily be obtained elsewhere on Ebay.

I am sure you are all already aware of it, but in case someone doesn't know, Five On a Secret Trail was never actually commercially released. It was simply used as a freebie promo by W H Smith and unfortunately their stocks ran out very quickly. I find it annoying that it didn't even have a proper case and therefore looks totally out of place with the rest of the set. I guess as a freebie, WHS were out to save on costs!

A way around that though is to get the DVD, because the DVD's only lacking feature is the lask of Smugglers top!

Hope you don't ming me quoting you Petermax- it's only because you explained it a lot better than I did!

Tony Summerfield wrote:I am sure you are all already aware of it, but in case someone doesn't know, Five On a Secret Trail was never actually commercially released. It was simply used as a freebie promo by W H Smith and unfortunately their stocks ran out very quickly.

Thank you for that information Tony, the cardboard cover of Secret Trail did intrigue me somewhat. I paid slightly over the odds for this very rare tape prior to my discovery of the 1990's Famous Five series Dutch DVD box-set. Needless to say, I was somewhat annoyed!

Pippa-Stef wrote:Hope you don't mind me quoting you Petermax- it's only because you explained it a lot better than I did!

No problem.