Whodunnit?

[J. R.'s Piece]

The series is a delightful little pop culture time capsule if one cares to put the pieces together. Lindsay Wagner was introduced as "star of the new series The Bionic Woman" and indeed, that show's first episode aired just days before her Whodunnit? appearance, so she must have been in the country on a promotional jag. Richard O' Sullivan, Brian Murphy and Yootha Joyce were all most associated Man About The House at this point and their respective spinoffs were, as Pertwee told us, due to start in the autumn.

As a Brit I felt a rush of vicarious embarrassment at the terribly cheesy murder mystery which played out during Lindsay Wagner's appearance It was set a century in the future, so there was lots of tinfoil and white clothing. And, of course, a robot butler. To my relief, Lindsay seemed to enjoy herself, though what she said upon her return home was anybody's guess.

Both Americans got top billing on their appearances, and I wonder if this was contractual since Americans were far more concerned about this kind of thing than Brits. Interestingly, both George and Lindsay correctly guessed the murderer and their motive. Could that have been contractual too?!

Returning panellists this year have included the wonderful Terry Scott, Sheila Hancock, the brilliantly eccentric Magnus Pyke (the sight of him seated next to the Bionic Woman was rather a bizarre one, and they seemed to genuinely enjoy each other's company

Lindsay Wagner was fine with me a few years back. I remember trying to get out of getting my photo taken with her and was ready to do a runner but the person with her insisted. I was trapped. But one of my friends, said that it went to an event at the Birmingham NEC that she was at and could hardly get a word out of her. Still goes on about it. Although she was chatty on the interview she recorded the next day. Whereas with Lee Majors was there four months earlier and he was chatty, grabbing arms and doing jokes, like pretending to pull my arm off, like he did to Bigfoot Mk1.

Graham Norton told the Daily Mail: “‘Lindsay Wagner. We flew her into London, but in hindsight she just wanted a free trip here to see her friends. On the show she was monosyllabic.’”

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

That's even more unsubtle than Empire! It sounds like something from a Despicable Me movie.

Based in Mogul House. Home to Mogul (Amal) Limited, Mogul (Arak) Gulf Limited, Mogul (Chemical Products), Mogul East Africa Limited, Mogul Eastern Trading, Mogul Egyptian Holdings,Mogul European Limited, Mogul Exploration Limited, Mogul Far East Concessions, Mogul Film Productions, Mogul Gas Development, Mogul Gas Exploration, Mogul Refineries (UK) Limited, Mogul Tanker Co. Limited, Mogul (Texas) Limited, Mogul Holdings and othe Exploration companies. But not Mogul Air/Air Mogul.

Oh, Norman Bowler ran a Mogul place in Canada. Arthur Pentelow was Mogul Managing Director.

I remember on Telly Addicts, someone identified a clip as being from The Troubleshooters and Noel Edmonds said no, the answer was Mogul. It wasn’t two different shows. While it was reformatted for series two, with Ronald Hines and Barry Foster being dropped, the title change was forced on to the show. Even on the DVD release of Mogul, it says The Troubleshooters. The theme (by Tom Springfield, who I hear had a sister called Dusty) was basically the same. Different opening titles though. ...YouTube...Mogul...plus colour...cough!

This site looks at the 136 episodes and books and Radio Times covers:

startrader.co.uk

startrader.co.uk is fast and easy to use.

www.startrader.co.uk

I have to go out now. I’d better get ready.

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

Sorry Lindsay! I’ll put a CD on now!

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

* I could, were I so inclined, point out that her right arm actually is the bionic one. But since she feels so strongly about it I'm not sure I'd dare

Oh marvellous. I'd love to watch it but it doesn't appear to be on YouTube.

Graham Norton on Lindsay Wagner: "But she obviously fancied a trip to London, I met her for lunch, I stroked her arm, I fed her and then she came on the show and just sat there like a bionic lump. She didn't speak."

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

A panel game on DVD? Oh - go on then.

More than the drama or the guesswork I'm in this for the guest-stars. The IMDb entry for Whodunnit? is a veritable Who's Who of the British entertainment industry and I think my enjoyment levels will rise as does the number of familiar faces. The first couple of episodes have been fairly low on people I recognise. The highest rating on the excitement scale came in Episode Two when Howards' Way's Jan Harvey appeared, dolled up to the nines (it took me perhaps fifteen seconds to place her as she looked quite different to Jan Howard). Sadly though, she was not questioned at all during the panel sections, which is a shame as I wanted to see her ad libbing in character. Emmerdale's Alan Turner was questioned and did a very nice job of coming up with answers on the spot.

Richard Thorp had featured in a lovely moment in The Avengers when lead Julie Stevens fluffed introducing John Steed three times in a row and Patrick Macnee covered with “Call me Bert!” and shaken Richard Thorp’s hand. I’d seen Kenneth Haigh, Coral Atkins and Vincent Ball in lots of things. Paul Whitsun-Jones (The Purser) popped up in lots of my favourite sixties and seventies shows. Joel Fabiani beat him up on Department S. He was two villains on Doctor Who. Sadly just two years after Whodunnit?, he was dead at the age of fifty. Laurence Hardy, I was watching in The Avengers and Public Eye recently. Ivor Salter popped up as an assassin from Drake’s Department in Danger Man, in an episode where Drake is lied to by his superiors and someone gets murdered as a result. He was a villain in the first episode of Adamant Lives!, where the title character wakes up in 1966 after being frozen for 64 years. Still in his thirties at the age of 99. Ferdy Mayne was one of the most frequent guest stars in the ITC series, beginning in the mid-fifties and going through to the 70s, turning up in nearly twenty of them. And he appeared on the first season of Dynasty too. Geoffrey Burridge, I’ve seen in a few dramas and he guest starred in the first episode of the final series of Blake’s 7. They end up with his character’s base and ship, while he, like most Blake’s 7 guest stars, ends up dead. George Sewell starred in the last two series of Special Branch with Patrick Mower. They had worked together before on Gerry Anderson’s UFO, where Sewell had been second billed but then quietly dropped at the insistence of ITC New York, who said to drop the guy with the pock-marked face.. He was never told that he was dropped. They just didn’t invite him back. Patrick Mower had starred in series three and four of Callan but they dropped him and killed him off during series four, just after bringing Anthony Valentine back. Which caused a public outcry and caused Mower’s car to be defaced. The day after his exit aired, he was asked to fly to an interview with Eamonn Andrews. Andrews tried to get him to shave off the beard he had grown for the play he was now in, but Mower refused, as he needed it that night.

Edward Woodward comes across quite warm in interviews. As in you could point the camera at him and he could tell good stories for a half hour without a break. I’ve got some interview stuff of his. And he did perform in The Edward Woodward Hour.

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

Wait wait wait, a long-running oil drama series?? Was it a continuous drama or a new story per episode?

They brought in Willy Izard’s (Willy was there for the entire series) son to work for Mogul. He soon died. The final series saw more pressure put on Brian Stead to resign.

They deliberately shot the show to move fast. Producer Peter Graham Scott, whose onscreen credit of Mogul (the logo) is produced by Peter Graham Scott, said:”Oil was about movement, pressure, speed. Scenes would have to start in the middle where the meat was without actors drifting through doors, and cut straight to the next on the last word on the climax. I needed dynamic camera angles. Television cameramen were getting awfully lazy, offering up loose head-and-shoulder shots (easier to hold in focus) when asked for tight close-ups. On Mogul we would insist on tight shots and more camera movement.

There was a power struggle for years with Brian Stead and Alec Stewart. Because Stewart was after Stead’s job, Stead would sometimes send him on assignments where he wanted Stewart to fail, so he could get him out of the way. They also did overseas location shooting in India, Libya, Rome, Beirut, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, Thailand, Barbados and Trinidad. British Airways offered the crew bargain seats. There is an onscreen credit each week for the oil companies assisting production and allowing filming for the show. BP and Esso let them film on rigs and refineries. Shell provided a geological team to work on it

 

[J. R.'s Piece]

That's even more unsubtle than Empire! It sounds like something from a Despicable Me movie.

I like to try and find the name Mogul in the opening and closing titles. I’m sure it is in there somewhere.