08-04-2019, 12:03 AM
(08-02-2019, 12:05 PM)MercuryZap Wrote: Fascinating!
Are these the tapes Terry Jones rescued from being junked or did he make copies from these?
Maybe I’m wrong but I thought the BBC wiped the masters.
Cheers
M
It's a bit unclear what happened, some say Jones made copies on the off chance the BBC wiped them but the BBC kept the masters anyway. The 2" tape in that video hasn't been played since 1979, for unknown reasons, the BBC made a lower quality copy which they used for broadcasts since then.
The BBC were notorious for wiping old TV shows, there's still around 100 Doctor Who episodes still missing. But be thankful Monty Python weren't on ITV, as the individual ITV regions were notorious for wiping shows. They had offers from Thames Television and London Weekend Television before they went to the BBC, a lot of the early shows from both of these companies, (which started in 1968), are missing believed wiped. The Thames offer didn't happen, as Thames didn't have a studio available for 2 years, while London Weekend's deal was soured when they learned David Frost wanted to be executive producer, and they were sick of living in Frost's shadow since The Frost Report, to the point where they put Frost's phone number on screen in Episode 2 of Monty Python!
