GRAHAM WARD ON RICHARD CARPENTER

First broadcast on FAB RADIO INTERNATIONAL at 19:00 on November 12th 2023

This week, we welcome GRAHAM WARD, yet another new voice to the ever expanding list of contributors to the VISION ON SOUND pool of talent, and, whilst we do start off today with my usual introductory interrogation about his own fascinating earliest television memories and so forth, we very swiftly move onto the topic that he primarily wanted to talk very fondly about, which is the television screenwriting career of RICHARD CARPENTER, who, after a brief career as a jobbing actor in the 1960s, is possibly best known to the general public these days for his work on HTVs stunning ROBIN OF SHERWOOD.

That particularly high profile 1980s hit still appears regularly on the daytime ITV channels, but, of course, fans of his work will also remember such delights as CATWEAZLE, THE GHOSTS OF MOTLEY HALL, THE ADVENTURES OF DICK TURPIN, a large contribution to THE ADVENTURES OF BLACK BEAUTY, and THE FAMOUS FIVE, and the swashbuckling adventures of SMUGGLER and ADVENTURER, and he could very much stake a claim for having reimagined the children’s historical adventure series, most often on the ITV channels, for more than one generation.

RICHARD CARPENTER sadly passed away in 2012, but leaves behind him a huge legacy of television work which, whilst remaining much loved by generations of Archive TV fans like the people who listen to this show, is still being discovered by new generations of fans even today.

PLEASE NOTE - For Copyright reasons, musical content sometimes has to be removed for the podcast edition. All the spoken word content remains (mostly) as it was in the broadcast version. Hopefully this won't spoil your enjoyment of the show.