Colditz reruns on Yesteryear channel

[Rolf Steiner]

Apart from the odd isolated episode, I haven't seen this series in 35 years, so it's great to see it again and nice to see how well it still stands up as a well-produced TV drama. Curious though, how close to history did the scriptwriters stick? Over the four episodes this week, the Commandant has scored a couple of hideous own goals, firstly by allowing the inmates to put on a theatre production (useful cover for all sorts of covert goings-on, with the added distraction of cacaphonous noise allowing for bars to be filed thru etc etc), then allowing a choir of seasoned escapees to perform in the local church, with somewhat inevitable results. Was Herr Commandant the most naive man in Germany?? Last night's episode particularly good, a bad-egg type inmate appears in the form of a card-sharp, with tragic results all round. The future Doctor Legg from Eastenders features as a Feldwebel with a fatal weakness for gambling (funny bit of casting considering how Jewish-looking the actor in question is, but there you go). Anyhow, I'm hooked. Yesteryear channel, 10pm.

[phylo_roadking]

As well as a healthy leavening of fiction....the two series DO contain quite a lot of historical material; don' forget Pat Reid acted as technical advisor!

The theatre production element in particular....

Over the four episodes this week, the Commandant has scored a couple of hideous own goals, firstly by allowing the inmates to put on a theatre production (useful cover for all sorts of covert goings-on, with the added distraction of cacaphonous noise allowing for bars to be filed thru etc etc),

...was actually a major element of his OWN escape; if you remember, it's also included in the original "The Colditz Story" version of his precipitous departure from pokey!

[Rolf Steiner]

Sorry, that's the Yesterday channel, not yesteryear... from what I recall the 'glider in the attic' was also a true story? Can't tear myself away from this on weeknights... although I think I've missed the episode in which the bloke tries to get himself sent home on a fraudulent insanity ticket and drives himself genuinely insane in the process. Still, this week has had its highlights, including Major Mohn's rapid transition from propaganda-spouting reichophiliac to sneaky deserter, having failed to coerce the inmates into providing a good reference for him should he get picked up by the allies, through some extraordinarily stilted football banter (Carter's face is a picture when Mohn tries this), and bribing our lads with the gift of a Monopoly game...

[Worldwarstoday]

Great show, I very much enjoyed watching it for the first time. Jeremy Kemp was excellent in the 3 or 4 episodes he appeared in.

"Enemy at the Door" is also showing on YESTERDAY at the moment but I missed the first few episodes last week so have some catching up to do.

"Secret Army" is another great WW2 drama from the 1970s which is on Alibi regularly, although they only show the first 2 series for some reason so I've yet to find out how it concludes.

[Rolf Steiner]

Secret Army was genius - multi-leveled moral ambiguity, sympathetic and non-sympathetic characters on both sides, and of course Clifford Rose as Kessler, a nightmare splicing of Himmler and Grange Hill's Mr Bronson!

Not so sure about that Enemy At The Door thing, the casting of that bloke from Hi Di Hi as an SS officer isn't quite working for me!

[Richard Hargreaves]

Ho do ho.

Still at least Ted Bovis wasn't it.

Yesterday were running Island at War last year which wasn't bad at all - other than they chose to create a fictional Channel island... and film it on the Isle of Man (which is a damned sight wetter and colder than the real islands...). Only ran for one season as far as I remember - I presume the production costs were too high for ITV who chose to make more brainless reality TV dross instead.

[phylo_roadking]

...tho' it was let down by a Nazi Gene Hunt in a dodgy hair dye job!

[Rolf Steiner]

By crikey Ginger, they're showing it again! And this week, that great episode - the only one I'd seen in the interim since its original showing, as they chose to show it as a one-off in the 90s - of the Brit who tries to swing a passage home by faking insanity, but going too far into it and actually going over the edge for real. Quite a touching episode that one.