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Danger UXB

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7.2/10
TV

Country of origin
  
United Kingdom

Final episode date
  
2 April 1979

Program creator
  
John Hawkesworth

8.7/10
IMDb

Composer(s)
  
Simon Park

Original language(s)
  
English

Network
  
ITV

Danger UXB httpsimagesnasslimagesamazoncomimagesMM

Created by
  
John Hawkesworth and John Whitney

Based on
  
Stories by Major A B Hartley

Starring
  
Anthony AndrewsJudy GeesonMaurice RoëvesIain CuthbertsonJeremy Sinden

Cast
  
Anthony Andrews, Judy Geeson, Maurice Roeves, Deborah Watling, Kenneth Cranham

Danger UXB is a 1979 British ITV television series set during the Second World War developed by John Hawkesworth and starring Anthony Andrews as Lieutenant Brian Ash, an officer in the Royal Engineers.

Contents

The series chronicled the exploits of the fictional 97 Tunnelling Company. which has been made a bomb disposal unit, and specifically 347 Section of the company, to deal with the thousands of unexploded bombs ("UXBs") in London during the Blitz. As with all his fellow officers, Ash must for the most part learn the techniques and procedures of disarming and destroying the UXBs through experience, repeatedly confronted with more cunning and deadlier technological advances in aerial bomb fusing. The series primarily featured military story lines, with a romantic thread featuring an inventor's married daughter, Susan Mount (Judy Geeson), with whom Ash falls in love, and other human interest vignettes.

The programme was titled and partly based on the memoirs of Major A. B. Hartley, M.B.E, RE, Unexploded Bomb - The Story of Bomb Disposal, with episodes written by Hawkesworth and four screenwriters. The series was filmed in 1978 in and around the Clapham, Streatham and Tooting areas of South London. Lt. Col. E. E. Gooch, RE (AER), Rtd. was the technical adviser.

The programme appeared on the US PBS as a segment of Masterpiece Theatre from 4 January – 5 April 1981. It was also screened in Australia on the public broadcaster ABC Television and in New Zealand on Television New Zealand.

Cast

347 Section, 97 Company
  • Anthony Andrews as Lieutenant Brian Ash, section bomb disposal officer
  • Maurice Roëves as Sergeant James, section sergeant
  • Ken Kitson as Corporal Samuel Horrocks, a large but timid section NCO
  • Kenneth Cranham as Lance Corporal Jack Salt, a married man anxious about the safety of his wife and children
  • George Innes as Sapper Jim Wilkins, section driver, a conniving petty thief and scrounger who avoids as much work as he can
  • Gordon Kane as Sapper Gordon Mulley, also Ash's batman. He falls in love with the landlady's daughter.
  • Robert Pugh as Sapper 'Tiny' Powell, a coarse and often bullying Welshman who plays the piano
  • Robert Longden as Sapper Copping, a religious lad who thinks deep thoughts
  • David Auker as Sapper Baines
  • Martin Neil as Private John Brinckley, a replacement from the Non-Combatant Corps
  • John Bowler as Sapper Scott, a replacement
  • Bryan Burdon as Sapper Binns, a replacement who in peacetime was a stage actor and comedian
    • 97 Company, Royal Engineers
  • Peter Cartwright as Major Luckhurst, commanding officer
  • Ken Farrington as Captain 'Fannie' Francis, second in command (2IC) and later commanding officer
  • Royston Tickner as Lieutenant Hamish Leckie, adjutant and Scottish veteran of the First World War
  • Jeremy Sinden as Lieutenant Ivor Rodgers, Ash's good friend, later 2IC and commanding officer
  • Steven Grives as Lieutenant Ken Machin, a replacement bomb disposal officer
  • Osmund Bullock as Lieutenant Alan Pringle, section officer
  • David Shaughnessy as Lieutenant Tim Carter-Brown, section officer
  • Nick Brimble as Lieutenant Gresham, section officer and junior officer in the company
  • Norman Chappell as Corporal Mould, mess corporal, who is constantly twitted by Ivor Rodgers
    • Others
  • Iain Cuthbertson as Doctor Gillespie, a boffin specializing in defeating German bomb fuses
  • Judy Geeson as Susan Mount, Gillespie's married daughter
  • David Buck as Stephen Mount, Susan's codebreaker husband
  • Moyra Fraser as Aunt Do-Do, Brian's surrogate mother
  • Marjie Lawrence as Mrs. Baker, landlady of Brian's billet
  • Deborah Watling as Norma, Mrs. Baker's daughter and Sapper Mulley's paramour
  • David Wood as Lieutenant Roger Symes, 81 Company RE section officer
  • Christopher Good as Captain West, RE
  • Nick Tate as Lieutenant Chris Craik, Royal Navy, a bomb disposal officer specialising in naval mines
  • Tim Pigott-Smith as Harry Winthrop, Dr. Gillespie's associate at Cambridge
  • Deborah Grant as Elspeth, Brian's paramour while stationed at Cambridge
  • Geraldine Gardner as Mickey, a cabaret dancer who fancies Lance Corporal Salt

    • Episodes

    The series was first broadcast between 8 January – 2 April 1979 on Monday nights at 21:00.

    Books

    Hartley's book provided many of the plot details. Danger UXB, a novel based on the series and written by Michael Booker, was published by Pan Books in 1978, and an annual was published by World Distributors in 1980. A nonfiction book of the same title intended as a companion book to the series written by M.J. Jappy was published in 2001 by MacMillan Publishers.

    Production

    Many of the bomb-disposal scenes were filmed in what appeared to be deep, freshly dug holes lined with wooden shoring (the way real bomb disposal often happened). In fact, these scenes were shot using two different physical sets intercut: a short above-ground wooden fence that appeared to be the top of the shaft down to the bomb (but was not in fact excavated); and a 30-foot above-ground hollow wooden tower with a muddy area inside at the bottom (often shot from above, looking down). A side of the bottom was also removable to facilitate "bottom-of-shaft" close-ups.

    References

    Danger UXB Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA


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