Hello and welcome to another newsletter.
I must start by saying with running the fan club I have made some new friends via ON THE BUSES and got to meet people and do things I would have never thought possible. The way it is going there are even better things to come. I am also now a friend of the ‘Water Rats, more on this in the next edition and on the web site soon.
Web site hits now at 147,450 Wow! Thank you all, keep dropping by.
Also thanks to those of you who send in emails and letters and I always try to answer them all. I enjoy hearing from ON THE BUSES fans. Letters and emails come in from countries around the world including New Zealand, Australia, USA, Canada, Malta, Ascension Islands and Malta to name just some.
Although the club is about ON THE BUSES I often get questions asked about myself and TV comedy in general especially sit-coms and the lack of good ones appearing on our screens. (Your words not mine, although I tend to agree) You only have to see ratings for repeats of the old ones compared to new ones. Yes I know there are many more channels now etc; so in future editions and on the web site I will try to address this and your comments by having a kind of monthly diary page. As to the requests to write some comedy sketches and sit-coms I am in the process of doing this and may post a few sketches on the web site to get feed back before giving this more serious time and thought, as I do have a full time job.
Now some good news about a forthcoming TV series; - ‘Story of ITV: The People’s Channel 1955-2005’ A series of 5 x 1hr programmes presented by Melvyn Bragg but don’t let that put you off (just kidding) The one for On The Buses fans is on at 22:45 on Sunday, June 26th 2005. It is the one where I Tommy, Chris and Ian get to interview Reg Varney. We were down in Exmouth on a Loddeka bus for the interview. This was provided by David Sheppard and his dad. If you would like to see some photos of the event go to http://www.davidsheppardonline.co.uk/onthebuses.htm
I recommended you watch and set your videos or DVD’s to record and catch all 5 of the programmes. Here are the full details of the Series, (thanks Suzannah at Granada/LWT)
Sunday, June 5th Story of ITV: People ITV1 22:45
Sunday, June 12th Story of ITV: Drama ITV1 22:45
Sunday, June 19th Story of ITV: Business ITV1 22:45
Sunday, June 26th Story of ITV: Entertainment ITV1
22:45 Sunday, July 3rd Story of ITV: News ITV1 22:45
I have also had the pleasure of meeting Ronnie Wolfe and Ronald Chesney the creators and writers of ON THE BUSES. I was with Simon who is an author working on the ON THE BUSES book. Yes, there is going to be an ON THE BUSES book out before Christmas.
I know Christmas is a long way of but hey good news like this is worth mentioning.
The two Ronnie’s agreed to be interviewed and I was able to record it all on video for the fan club, more on this at a later date. It was a lovely day and I must say thanks to them both and a special mention to Rose Wolfe for the wonderful hospitality.
I am glad to say that Simon has promoted me to finally get all the ON THE BUSES episodes in to order. I just need to finish Series 4 and 5 (put them in the right order and the library will be complete)
I have also read the ON THE AIR magazine taster edition and I make no excuse for mentioning this excellent mag again. In the June 64 page colour edition it will have An interview with Stephen Lewis (Blakey) Behind the scenes of Last of the Summer Wine, Keeping up Appearances and much more including the classic soap Coronation Street.
To receive your free taster edition, simply e-mail with your full name and postal address to:
