Red Dwarf
You're the last human being in space, with only your spaceship's computer for company. Then, years later it decides to bring back to life the rest of your crew - a hologram of your dead roommate, who you detest, and a creature that evolved from the ship's cat. That's the lot of Dave Lister, trapped aboard the mining ship Red Dwarf in this clever and sometimes poignant cult sci-fi comedy.
The thing about Red Dwarf is that it follows in the footsteps of Doctor Who in that great tradition of the high-concept sci-fi show with a budget of £12.75. But as the cult status of each series grew (there were eight in total), so did the budget, and our intrepid crew have visited many planets and experienced time travel, dimension jumps and even interspecies fornication. All in the name of progress, you understand.
Red Dwarf actually started out as a sketch on an 80s Radio 4 comedy series called Son of Cliche. Written by Grant and Naylor, the show actually contained a number of zany bits and bobs which they considered turning into a fully-fledged sitcom. For a while they focused on a sketch called Captain Invisible and the See-Thru Kid, before ultimately deciding on Dave Hollins: Space Cadet – a long-running bit about a human who winds up light years from Earth with only a talking computer for company. Hollins was changed to Lister for Red Dwarf because some footballer was rather thoughtlessly called Dave Hollins.
A host of famous names read for parts on Red Dwarf, including Hugh Laurie, David Baddiel and even Ronnie Barker. The ones who came closest were Alan Rickman and Alfred Molina (the veteran star who played Doc Ock in Spider-Man 2). They both auditioned for the parts of Lister and Rimmer, but the producers eventually felt that a few big names would upset the balance of the show, and unknowns would maintain the sitcom's integrity. Probably saved a bit of cash as well.
Comments (3)
davsor
November 6, 2008
12:04 a.m.
littlesmegger
October 27, 2008
3:55 p.m.
Peter1995
October 27, 2008
2:34 p.m.