Peter Jones

[bluesqueak]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at yahoogroups.com, "derannimer" 
<susannahlm at y...> wrote:
> Pip wrote: 
> 
> >The *best* for never understanding a word he was reading (while 
> >still doing a superb interpretation) was Peter Jones as the Voice 
> >of The Book in Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy.

> Derannimer:
> First of all, I just have to say, I *ADORE* those tapes. I cannot 
> express strongly *enough* how much I adore them. 
> 
> But second, what's this about Peter Jones never understanding a 
> word he read? Er. . . maybe if I were a Brit I'd understand this 
> reference. But I'm not, and I don't. Am curious. 

> Derannimer 

OK. The story is that when Douglas Adams wrote the original scripts 
for Hitch Hikers Guide, he described the Voice of the Book as having 
a 'Peter Jonesey sort of voice'.

[Peter Jones was a well known actor (in Britain) who did a *lot* of 
comedy, radio and voice over narratives]

The producer for the series, when he read this, did what all good 
producers do, and promptly checked whether Peter Jones was 
available. The exact conversation is unknown, but the words 'part 
written with you in mind' were probably used ;-)

So Peter Jones agreed to do the job. The problem was that while 
narration was no problem and comedy was no problem, Peter Jones was 
not a science fiction fan. In fact, Peter didn't read SF at *all*. 
He had, at this point, never even appeared in an episode of 'Dr 
Who'. Hitch Hikers Guide was his very first introduction to 
performing science fiction, and it wasn't even in the 'monster 
appears, you scream, die horribly, retire to the catering van for a 
cup of tea' genre that we all know and love so much [grin].

To add to the confusion, Douglas Adams hadn't quite finished writing 
the series, and script changes were happening right up to recording 
time.

So there he was, adrift in a genre he didn't know, playing not even 
someone reading a book, but an actual book that could talk (this was 
the late 70's, remember. Such things did not exist), with no idea 
where the script was actually going, and no idea what it was talking 
about.

And he survived. He'd survived Spike Milligan (one of the founders 
of surrealist comedy ); he knew that just because you don't 
understand the script it doesn't mean you can't give a good 
performance.

But just occasionally, if you listen to the recordings, you can 
*hear* the echo of bewilderment in his voice. ;-)



Pip