Carolyn Seymour and the New Counter Measures team at the Big Finish studios
CAROLYN SEYMOUR RETURNS to the world of Big Finish audios, in two adventures from The New Counter-Measures series that have just been released.
These two instalments were recorded back in June 2019, several months after the completion of Seymour’s work on the ninth and final series of Survivors audio box sets.
Seymour reprises the role of Lady Suzanne Clare, the Counter-Measures team’s recurring nemesis. Clare is a scheming and ruthless arms-dealer and trader in alien technology, who’s possessed of both cunning and charm.
Clare’s schemes lead her to become entangled with both the Movellans and the Daleks, and to become a (somewhat untrustworthy) associate of the Counter-Measures group.
Seymour’s character appears in both of the new stories, which bring to an end the current run of The New Counter-Measures audio adventures. The cast also includes Simon Williams, husband of Lucy Fleming, who plays the role of Group Captain Gilmore.
ROGER MARSHALL, THE well-respected genre TV scriptwriter, who penned the series two Survivors episode “Parasites” has died at the age of 86.
Born in Leicester in 1934, Marshall began a career in television after graduating from Cambridge University. He quickly found his niche as a prolific scriptwriter, and would go on to write scripts for The Avengers, The Sweeney, The Professionals, Lovejoy, London’s Burning and many other TV series from the 1960s to the 1990s.
Marshall co-created the 1974 series Zodiac (which starred Anton Rogers); and the 1984 show Mitch (in which John Thaw took the lead). He also created the 1984-85 canal-barge-set crime drama The Travelling Man. However, his most widely-respected creator credit comes from his work on the down-at-heel private eye drama Public Eye (1965-75), which he co-created with Anthony Marriott, in which Alfred Burke starred.
Marshall also wrote the film scripts for the Amicus productions What Became of Jack & Jill (1972) and And Now The Screaming Starts (1973).
Survivors producer Terry Dudley recruited Marshall to write a single script for the second series. The result was the highly-regarded “Parasites”, a tale of crime, deception and murder, which sees the Whitecross community threatened by an escaped prisoner and his partner-in-crime a former prison warder. The episode is also distinguished by an all-too-brief guest starring appearance from Patrick Troughton (the second actor to play the part of The Doctor in Doctor Who).
Although his script for “Parasites” was one of the highlights of the second series, and translated to the screen extremely effectively, Marshall did not particularly enjoy the experience of working on Survivors. “It was a messy production,” he told Action TV magazine when he recalled his efforts in 2005, “but memorable for me in that I got to write about barges for the first time.”
As part of his research for “Parasites”, Marshall spent time learning the mechanics of canal travel at the Stoke Bruerne Barge Museum near Towcester. It was knowledge that he later put to good use in framing the premise of The Travelling Man.
Marshall was not invited to contribute any scripts to the third and final series of Survivors, but does not appear to have expressed interest in doing so.
Marshall, who had been suffering with Alzheimer’s and Vascular Dementia for some time, died on 1 April 2020.
CAROLYN SEYMOUR WILL be a guest at both days of the upcoming Nottingham EM-Con 2021 convention, being held at the city’s Motorpoint Arena on 1-2 May 2021.
Seymour will be offering both autographs and ‘photoshoot’ opportunities for visiting fans, both of which can be booked in advance.
We’re happy to welcome Carolyn Seymour to our guest line up for EM-Con Nottingham. Carolyn has many credits to her name, most notably are the ones in Star Trek: The Next Generation, Babylon 5, and Star Trek: Voyager. Others include roles in Quantum Leap, Space 1999 and many others. Gamers will know that more recently Carolyn voiced the roles of Queen Myrrah in Gears of War, and Dr Chakwas in Mass Effect.
While none of the convention’s promotional material mentions Seymour’s involvement with Survivors, the event is a great opportunity for fans of the series to meet up with Carolyn face-to-face.
Almost thirty convention guests have been confirmed by the EM-Con team so far, including Blake Harrison (Inbetweeners), Hannah Murray (Game of Thrones), Norman Lovett (Red Dwarf) and John Ross Bowie (Big Bang Theory). Other names will be announced in the coming weeks.
Tickets for the show, which are available in ‘General Admission’ format along with four ‘added feature’ bands (Bronze to Platinum), can now be purchased online from the EM-Con site.
Note: This event was originally scheduled for 2-3 May 2020, and then rescheduled to 18-19 July 2020, before being rescheduled again to 1-2 May 2021. The event finally took place on 28-29 August 2021.
A NEW eBOOK published today by the Divergent Wordsmiths team, celebrating twenty years of creative audio work by Big Finish, includes a chapter on the company’s acclaimed nine series of original Survivors adventures.
Written by Rich Cross, the editor of the Survivors: A World Away site, the short chapter recounts the development, release and reception of the 36 new Survivors audio dramas released between 2013 and 2019.
Other chapters in the book focus on Big Finish’s Torchwood, Doctor Who and other related releases.
DENIS LILL IS out and about “treading the boards” once more in a national touring production of The Lady Vanishes, a new adaptation of the classic 1938 Alfred Hitchcock big-screen thriller. Very appropriately, this latest live version has been brought to the stage by the Classic Thriller Theatre Company.
Lill plays the role of Charters, one of a pair of cricket enthusiasts sharing the ill-fated train journey through the country of Bandrika. The play has been commissioned by the Bill Kenwright company, responsible for numerous touring theatre shows within the UK. Lill has been a cast member on many previous productions, including a number of the Agatha Christie plays for which the firm is especially well regarded.
The tour began in Swindon in early September, and has moved on to runs in Weston-Super-Mare, Bury St Edmunds, Coventry, Cambridge, Derby and Darlington. The tour continues with runs at Horton, Exeter, Brighton, Yeovil, Torquay and Croydon, and concludes in Eastbourne in early December.
A review in the Teesdale Mercuryby Arts Critic Andrew Mercury offers a very positive assessment:
Cricket loving Charters, Denis Lill, and Caldicott, Ben Nealon […] bring a touch of comedy to the proceedings and show we perhaps have not changed that much as the Englishman abroad.
The set (Morgan Large) effortlessly transforms from the station to the interior of the train and back again. The atmosphere is enhanced with subtle lighting (Charlie Morgan Jones) and sound (Dan Samson). Direction by Roy Marsden is slick throughout.
The intrigue and suspense of The Lady Vanishes will keep you on the edge of your seat as you follow the twists and turns trying to spot the red herrings.
This new production is directed by Bill Kenwright regular Roy Marsden (who appeared as a cast member in the third series of Survivors back in 1977 as The Captain in “Long Live the King”).
For full information on dates and locations, and to buy tickets online, visit the The Lady Vanishes site.
Charters (Denis Lill) and Caldicott (Ben Nealon) in The Lady VanishesA production still of the full cast of the new production of The Lady Vanishes (Lill, right)Iris (Scarlett Archer, left), Ms Froy (Gwen Taylor), Charters (Denis Lill) and Caldicott (Ben Nealon) in a scene from The Lady Vanishes
MY REVIEW OF the ninth and final series of the current run of Big Finish’s original full-cast Survivors audios has now been published on the Cultbox site.
The review concludes:
There’s still great potential here, as the UK begins to emerge from the dark ages of The Death, for more stories set in this uniquely realised dystopia, should sufficient numbers of those who have yet to purchase copies of this extraordinary audio series belatedly recognise the error of their ways. If that doesn’t happen, this will remain a stunning finale for what must be celebrated as a consistently compelling audio drama.
REVIEWS OF EACH of the four episodes of the final series of Big Finish’s full-cast Survivors audios have now been published on the S:AWA Big Finish mini-site.
The Farm (Jane Slavin) Living under the rule of the Protectorate can be hard, even more so when your true purpose is hidden from you…
Hearts and Mines (Christopher Hatherall) If the Federation can pull off an audacious sabotage mission, the Protectorate will suffer a major setback…
Fade Out (Roland Moore) A Protectorate attack on a Federation group holed up in an abandoned cinema will have devastating consequences…
Conflict (Andrew Smith) The showdown between the Protectorate and the Federation will settle the future direction of a country emerging from the shadow of the apocalypse…
THE NINTH AND concluding series of full-cast original Survivors audios has been released by Big Finish today.
The fourth episode final series is available to buy (in both CD and download formats) from the Big Finish website.
To celebrate the nine series’ achievement, Big Finish are offering discounts on several of the earlier series – with series one available from £8.99 (download) and £9.99 (CD); series two to six available for £12.49 (download) and £14.99 (CD); and the Survivors audiobook (voiced by Carolyn Seymour) available for £7.99 (download) and £9.99 (CD).
These offers are in place until 23:59 (UK time) on 1 July 2019. To take advantage of these discounts, visit the Survivors – The End?discount page on the Big Finish site and enter the code JENNY.
THE NINTH AND final series of the current run of full-cast Survivors audio dramas will be released by Big Finish tomorrow (25 June 2019).
The four episodes of series nine are available to pre-order in both download and CD formats, direct from the Big Finish web site.
The first fifteen minutes of opening episode “The Farm” (written by Jane Slavin) are included as a free “drama tease” preview in the latest episode of the Big Finish podcast (23 June 2019).
Reviews of each of the episode will be published on this site in the next couple of weeks, and the author of this site will publish a review of the series on the Cultbox site shortly.
One day to go… (published 24 June 2019)Two days to go… (published 23 June 2019)Three days to go… (published 22 June 2019)
IN THE LATEST issue of Big Finish’s free-to-download full-colour magazine Vortex, the Bookclub feature turns the clock back to June 2014 and revisits the release of the first series boxset of original Survivors audios.
As a selected Bookclub title, the first four episodes of Survivors are currently (June 2019) on offer to purchase as a digital download for the reduced price of £9.99. Follow the link in Vortex to take advantage of the offer, and head over to The Big Finish Bookclub group on Facebook to join the discussion.
Vortex 124 – Survivors series one Book Club retrospective
The ninth and final series of Big Finish’s full-cast Survivors audios is released in June 2019 and is available to pre-order in both download and CD formats, direct from the Big Finish web site.
