Back in October I had the opportunity to attend an ‘in conversation with’ event featuring Brian Cosgrove. I was VERY excited.
For those of you who are considering nipping off to Wikipedia to look him up, Brian Cosgrove is largely responsible for some of the best fun you can have in front of a TV; Jamie and the Magic Torch, Chorlton and the Wheelies, and of course Dangermouse. These were the TV treats of my childhood. A Northern happiness dragon; a mouse secret agent; a witch who lives in a kettle; a torch which opens up a psychedelic helter-skelter portal to another world in your bedroom… That was possibly my favourite bit of all, the titles to Jamie. A quiet moonlit street, a boy being tucked up in his bedroom, twinkly piano music – and then out comes the torch, a loud electric guitar chord sounds, and off he goes with his faithful companion Wordsworth into a world of noise and colour. Those of us without a magic torch had to read books under the covers to find our own secret world.
Anyway, back to Brian Cosgrove. He talked about lots of his shows, several after my time (I can just about remember Count Duckula), and what shone through the whole conversation was that his team had made the shows which they wanted to watch, and had a tremendous amount of fun doing it. I won’t give away all his secrets, but he told us how Fenella the witch gets smaller and then pops up in a different place and gets bigger again, and there was an expression of absolute glee on his face.
Sometimes I fret about whether I’m writing the right sorts of stories. Should I write about other things? Should I try this, or that? Should I be doing the same thing as other people, or something completely different? That’s when I forget to have fun and enjoy it, and write the sort of story that I like to read. And I’m never as happy with the result.
I remembered to take my Jamie DVD with me, and Brian Cosgrove very kindly signed it to me and my boys (who are also fans), ‘lots of love and fun’.
Here’s wishing you lots of love and fun, whatever you’re doing today.
The featured image is a photo of Jamie and Wordsworth, from the front of my highly-prized Jamie and the Magic Torch DVD.
Liz Hedgecock 