Look and Read: Geordie Racer
Geordie Racer is a unit of the BBC schools TV series Look and Read from the 1980s, 1990s & 2000s, covering reading for primary school pupils.
Completely contemporary (to 1988) story set in Newcastle about the invigorating amateur sports of marathon running and pigeon racing, and the unsavory world of art theft, and about the Hilton family which manages to get itself embroiled in all three.
Spuggy Hilton isn't a Runner like the rest of his family, but is a keen pigeon fancier and owns one of the bonniest birds in NewCAStle. He and his friend Janie observe some suspicious activity, and link a spate of local robberies with obscure messages they find on some of the pigeons, but find they have even more problems when they go to spy on the crooks.
A local radio DJ called Mickey Stone also helped Spuggy in the story and did the teaching middles with Wordy from his studio, while Derek Griffiths played a hilarious 'High-Powered DJ' in some of the songs.
Wordy as DJ
Bug-Bopper
The Story
Young Richard Hilton, known as Spuggy, can't be bothered with the Great North Run, a running event that the rest of his family are taking part in, preferring to spend time at the local pigeon lofts with his favourite bird, Blue Flash. He meets a pigeon trainer called Baz and spends some time in his lofts, where he gets a look at several secret messages that Baz receives by pigeon.
Spuggy and his friend Janie link the messages with a series of robberies that have been taking place. Learning of the next robbery from a message, they go to spy on the robbers and Spuggy is shocked to see that his unemployed dad Ray is working as their driver. When Spuggy eventually talks to his dad about this, he finds that dad didn't know they were actually committing theft, he just wanted a job.
The final, big robbery is due to take place during the Great North Run, but when Janie discovers the details she is (accidentally) imprisoned by Baz. She gets a message to Spuggy by sending off Blue Flash with a message - the bird having been lost during a race and discovered by Baz, who planned to keep the prize pigeon for himself. Spuggy is able to summon the police and gets his sister Cath to chase the villains and get their stolen money back. Well, chuck it all over the street anyway.
Spuggy and Janie
Baz
Spuggy's family
Production
Later when they were looking for an actor to play Mickey Stone they thought why not use Rowell himself. Peter Rowell explained at the time, "I hold an Equity card, so they called me in for an audition - and I landed the part. I'll be playing the part of a disc jockey at Radio Newcastle - which should be right up my street!"[2]
The rest of the cast was filled with local actors from around Newcastle. Actress Madelaine Newton was cast as Spuggy's common-sense mam, Bev Hilton.
Then, searching for an actor to play his hard-working dad Ray Hilton, the production team called Tyneside-based Kevin Whately, who was establishing a high profile with leading roles in TV series including Auf Wiedersehen Pet and Inspector Morse but had worked with Sue Weeks a decade earlier on a drama serial called The Fiery Pits about the invention of a safe mining lamp on Tyneside, from the schools TV series Out of the Past. Whately was delighted to take on the role in Geordie Racer for schools TV again, and enquired who would be playing his wife - the production team were not aware he was married to Madelaine Newton in real-life! In fact Geordie Racer would be the first and only time to date that the couple played man-and-wife on screen[3].
Lien Lu was 12 years old when she played Janie Chung. She had come to Newcastle from Vietnam in 1979[4], though the character of Janie is sometimes referred to, outside of the TV programmes, as having a Chinese background - for example in the Geordie Racer novel where Spuggy narrates that "her parents are Chinese, but she speaks better Geordie than my grandad.[5]"
The hero of the story, schoolboy Spuggy Hilton, was played by Leon Armstrong, from the village of Whickham on the Gateshead side of the Tyne. At 11 years old he had already appeared in theatre plays including The Silver Chair and said "I heard about the TV audition, and Ken Hill who directed The Silver Chair, recommended me for it. (...) I don't think it will be as bad as appearing in front of an audience, and at least if you do something wrong you get another chance."[6]
However the role of Spuggy may have been entirely different, according to the autobiography of celebrated actors and presenters Ant and Dec (Buy from Amazon)
“I lay on the sofa, and I just kept thinking the same thing: "It could have been me. It should have been me. I should have been the Geordie Racer"”
— Declan Donnelly[7]
Dec describes getting down to the last two candidates in the auditions to play Spuggy, and that "not getting Geordie Racer broke my little heart (...) I cried for days - yes, days." He also describes how the role of a pigeon-fancying crime-solver may not have been ideal for him as he was terrified of birds, and how a subsequent encouraging letter from Sue Weeks persuaded him to remain an actor!
“It was quite difficult, because you can't make pigeons act.”
— Jim Nicholson
Noted local pigeon expert Jim Nicholson, of Whiteleas Pigeon Club, was brought in as an adviser. As well as talking about the birds and racing in the documentary spots for several episodes, he also provided the lofts and the pigeons seen in the drama, and advised the actors how to handle them. He recalled, "we had to keep swapping over the birds and finding smaller ones for the kids which looked the same as the larger ones the adults were holding.[8]"
Sadly the birds were hit by a real-life crimewave. On 6th April 1988, a year after the drama was filmed and a couple of weeks after the TV finale had been broadcast, thieves forced the door of Jim's loft and stole 18 birds including the champion Blue Flash, cutting off their rings so they couldn't be raced again[9].
The main part of the drama was filmed in and near Newcastle in April 1987, around the Easter holidays[10]. Many of the filming locations around Byker, Gateshead, South Shields and Whitley Bay are mapped out below. The crew received a tough inner city welcome as nine of their hire cars were reportedly broken into, including one intended to appear on TV as Mickey Stone's car[11].
After the main part of the drama had been filmed, on Sunday 21st June 1987 the key scenes for the climax of the story were filmed during the actual Great North Run event, with real runners surrounding the actors playing Ray and Cath as they compete, plus footage from the BBC's own televised coverage of the event. There are some more notes on how this was arranged below.
Later still, the teaching middles for each episode featuring Mickey Stone in a reconstruction of his DJ studio alongside the Wordy and Bug-bopper puppets, were recorded at the BBC Studios at Elstree in London[12].
Not for Kids
Notable Mentions
Tipping Point
“The educational children's TV programme Geordie Racer was mainly set in which British city?”
— Ben Shephard
Although memorable to its millions of loyal school viewers in the 1980s and 90s, Geordie Racer remained in relative obscurity to the popular culture zeitgeist, rarely mentioned in newspapers, magazines or reference books. Until in 2018 contestants on the popular ITV quiz show Tipping Point were asked to name the city in which the story took place by presenter Ben Shephard (himself an erstwhile schools TV presenter, from the series Maths 4 Real!)
In fairness the correct answer to the question is guessable from the word "Geordie", and contestant Grace did give the correct answer - and go on to win £2,550 at the end of the quiz!
The episode in question is series 8, episode 13 of Tipping Point, first broadcast on 24th January 2018.
BBC Breakfast
On 24th September 2017 the BBC News Breakfast programme marked 60 years since the first BBC schools TV broadcast by interviewing Charles Collingwood as the long-time voice of Wordy, and Andrew Tomlinson, head of the contemporary service BBC Teach.
The interviews were illustrated with short clips, with Wordy represented by scenes of the puppet with Peter Rowell from Geordie Racer. This was a nice tribute for this story to be chosen from all the possible clips across the years, though quite an odd choice given that Rowell had been jailed by this time (as noted in the Not for Kids section above).
Locations
Geordie Racer took great pride in its use of real-life locations around Newcastle upon Tyne and emphasising "good NE ingredients" such as pigeon fancying, stotty munching and the Great North Run - the aim being that "there'll hardly be a child in the country who won't know exactly where Newcastle is!"[13]
Spuggy's flat
is on the Byker Wall housing estate, its exact address written on the door as Spuggy returns home in episode 1.
The Grainger Market, where Spuggy and Janie go to buy pigeon feed and stotties, is in central Newcastle. Spuggy buys his bird seed from Robinson's Pet Stores, and Janie gets the stotties from a Greggs bakery. The children visit the market because they like the atmosphere and environment of the stalls - they could instead have visited the Byker shops, including a pet store and a Greggs, just a few minutes walk from Spuggy's flat!
The children travel to various places on the Tyne & Wear Metro which had been opened just a few years earlier, starting in 1980. They travel from Spuggy's local, Byker, to Whitely Bay on the east-bound Yellow line when visiting St Mary's Lighthouse on the coast. Spuggy later tails Baz and Victor across the Tyne, from Monument to Gateshead Metro Station on the south-bound Yellow line.
The Swing bridge over the Tyne, which captures the villains, still stands but rarely opens anymore.
Two important historical sites around the city are also visited - St Mary's Lighthouse, on the coast north of Whitley Bay, is an automated landmark connected to the mainland by a causeway which is underwater for several hours a day. Private cars are banned from driving onto the island - as Ray Hilton does to collect Baz's loot.
Seaton Delaval Hall meanwhile, is an eighteenth century stately home owned by the National Trust.
Spuggy and Janie at Byker Metro station...
...and visiting St Mary's Lighthouse
Spuggy and his Mam visit the BBC Broadcasting Centre building, home to BBC Radio Newcastle.
Janie's dad's ship would not have been about to depart as she claimed, since it was permanently moored on the Gateshead bank of the Tyne. The retired vessel, still called the Caledonian Princess when filmed for Geordie Racer, was also known as the Tuxedo Princess and served as a nightclub.
Ray Hilton's allotment ("lottie") was actually in South Shields, close to the Holder Housing Estate and South Tyneside Leisure Centre. This is almost a whole Great North Run away from the Hiltons' home - though in one episode Spuggy's dad expects him to be able to walk home and back in under an hour. Perhaps Spuggy should have been a Runner after all!
Titles & Theme Music
Flying free, flying high,
Flashing wings across the sky,
Geordie racer, Geordie racer.
On the road, in the street,
Hear the sound of pounding feet,
Geordie racer, Geordie racer.
Don't wait, don't stop,
You're heading home.
Don't rest, don't drop,
You're heading home.
In the air, on the ground,
See them moving all around.
Running hard, flying fast,
See them all go rushing past,
Geordie racer - fly!
After the full song is heard at the start of episode 1, abbreviated versions are used for subsequent episodes with only the first two verses (ending with the last line - fly!) used as the opening theme song.
Episodes
| # | Title | Broadcast |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | Runners and Fliers | 12 Jan 1988 |
| 2. | Down in the Cellars | 19 Jan 1988 |
| 3. | Pigeon Post | 26 Jan 1988 |
| 4. | 'This is Radio Newcastle' | 2 Feb 1988 |
| 5. | Race Day | 9 Feb 1988 |
| 6. | Light of St Mary | 16 Feb 1988 |
| 7. | Lost Bird | 1 Mar 1988 |
| 8. | 'Have You Gone Daft, Man?' | 8 Mar 1988 |
| 9. | 'If Only We Knew When...' | 15 Mar 1988 |
| 10. | Run! | 22 Mar 1988 |
Broadcasts
| Year | Term | Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | Channel | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1987-88 | Spring 1988 | Tuesday, 10:15am | Friday, 9:52am | BBC2 | ||||
| 1989-90 | Spring 1990 | Tuesday, 10:15am | Friday, 10:05am | BBC2 | ||||
| 1990-91 | Spring 1991 | Tuesday, 10:15am | Friday, 10:00am | BBC2 | ||||
| 1992-93 | Spring 1993 | Tuesday, 10:15am | Friday, 10:00am | BBC2 | ||||
| 1994-95 | Spring 1995 | Monday, 10:40am | Friday, 10:25am | BBC2 |
CBBC Channel
Also broadcast on the CBBC Channel 'Class TV' service of schools programmes:
- 2002-03: Summer 2003
- 2003-04: Autumn 2003 & Spring 2004
- 2004-05: Autumn 2004
- 2005-06: Spring 2006
- 2006-07: Summer 2007
Credits
| Narrator | Michael Heath |
| Starring | Leon Armstrong as Spuggy Hilton Lien Lu as Janie Chung |
| Singers | Derek Griffiths Julie Stevens Colin Marsh |
| Written by | Christopher Russell |
| Music by | Roger Limb |
| Design | Paul Munting Katia Montillet |
| Reading consultant | Mary Hoffman |
| Assistant producer | David Meldrum |
| Producer | Sue Weeks |
|
Bungo supplied by Pauline Clift, Pigeon advisers Jim Nicholson, Tom Young, Lyrics by Rosanna Hibbert, Gordon Snell, Film animation Richard Taylor, Graphic designer Peter Wane, Costume designer Dennis Brack, Make-up designer Jean Speak, Film cameraman Colin Munn, Film editors Ian McKendrick, David Painter, Sound Bob Roberts, Brian Clark, Studio lighting Chris Townsend, Studio technical co-ordinators Peter Granger, Michael Langley-Evans, CREW 5 Paul Kay, Videotape editor Steve Knattress, Video effects Dave Jervis, Production manager Michael McDermott, Location manager Terry Wright, Assistant floor managers Angela de Chastelai Smith, Diana Barton, Production assistant Susan Lawton |
Resources
Pupils' pamphlet
The story for classroom and individual reading by pupils, written by Christopher Russell
Illustrated with still photographs, and including a 'Geordie dictionary' of useful words such as howway, mebbies, and spuggy (which means sparrow).
Teacher's Notes
Notes and teaching suggestions for each episode, plus music and lyrics for six of the songs used in the programmes and further background on topics that might lead to project work such as pigeon racing, local radio and the Great North Run.
Written by Mary Hoffman
1988 notes
1990 notes
Novel
An expanded version of the story, narrated in the first person by Spuggy Hilton, with a 'paw-word' by Plod the dog.
Written by Christopher Russell, with illustrations by Aileen Raistrick, and first published in 1990.
Worksheets
Two worksheets, of increasing difficulty, accompanying each of the 10 TV episodes were released in a booklet of photocopymasters for teachers to reproduce in school.
The worksheets were compiled by Mary Hoffman and illustrated by Ken Astrop
Audio cassette
The story from the pupils' pamphlet, read Michael Heath who also narrated the TV episodes, followed by recordings of all of the songs including the theme tune, again introduced by Michael Heath.
Computer software
A computer game for classroom use was published by BBC Enterprises and Longman Logotron in 1988, with an updated version in 1994, compatible with BBC, Archimedes, Nimbus and IBM PC computers.
Players complete several word-based challenges as they race pigeons, investigate clues and take part in the Great North Run, all while attempting to catch the crook Baz.
The software was designed by Christopher Russell, programmed by Peter Smith and edited by André Peters and Nicola Bradley. The user guide was written by Mary Hoffman.
User guide
Title screen
Floppy disc
T-Shirt
A special blue t-shirt was available from the BBC TV Promotions department, featuring the Look and Read logo and Geordie Racer written over an illustration of the Tyne Bridge.
It initially cost £3 for children's sizes and £4.50 for adults, soon rising to £4 and £6 respectively.
Links
- Look and Read .myby.co.uk - Geordie Racer (archived 2007)An old fan website, written by me in the early 2000s
- Den of Geek - Geordie Racer: Revisiting an 80s Look and Read Classic
- BBC Programmes page for Geordie Racer
- Geordie Racer on Wikipedia
- Geordie Racer on the Internet Movie Database
Related programmes
- Book Box: Pigeon SummerAnother primary schools TV drama about homing pigeons from the same period
Sources & References
- BBC Schools Annual Programme Guides 1988-1995. London: BBC.
- Blyth News Post Leader (1987) 'His star role…' in Blyth News Post Leader April 9, 1987. p.9
- Dufton, Keith (1987) 'Keith Dufton's Show Chat: Good things come in threes for Peter' in Sunday Sun June 28, 1987. p.29
- Gateshead Post (1987) 'Schoolboy bids for TV stardom' in Gateshead Post April 2, 1987. p.7
- Hoffman, Mary (1988) Look and Read: Geordie Racer teacher's notes, London: BBC
- Liverpool Daily Post (1990) 'TV Talk: Help, the boss is killing my wife' in Liverpool Daily Post January 24, 1990. p.21
- McPartlin, Anthony & Donnelly, Declan (2009) Ooh! What a Lovely Pair: Our Story. Michael Joseph.
- Newcastle Evening Chronicle (1988) 'Just wild about Racer' in Newcastle Evening Chronicle March 8, 1988. p.11
- Newcastle Journal (1987) 'Stone me… it's Peter!' in Newcastle Journal March 24, 1987. p.5
- Radio Times listings. London: BBC.
- Shields Gazette (1988a) 'TV 'coup' for Jim's birds' in Shields Gazette January 6, 1988. p.13
- Shields Gazette (1988b) 'Top birds stolen in loft raid' in South Shields Gazette April 9, 1988. p.7
with thanks to Gill Warren, Gaynor Scaife and Sue Weeks.
- ↑ Blyth News Post Leader (1987) says "Christopher Russell, the writer, spent a day early last year watching Peter at work and based the Mickey Stone character on him." The producer did not recall whether they were actually interviewed on air or not.
- ↑ Newcastle Journal (1987) quotes Peter Rowell on being announced for the part of Mickey Stone.
- ↑ Liverpool Daily Post (1990) interviews Madelaine Newton about her career and the times that she has appeared in the same productions as her hsuband Kevin Whately, in which she notes in relation to Auf Wiedersehen Pet, "Yet again we didn't have one scene together and I was romantically involved with one of Kevin's co-stars. But we did appear on television as man and wife in the children's series, Geordie Racer."
- ↑ Newcastle Evening Chronicle (1988) says "Lien Lu, 12, who came to Newcastle from Vietnam in 1979, plays Janie Chung, Spuggy's best friend."
- ↑ "Her parents are Chinese" quote from page 10 of the Geordie Racer novelisation by Christopher Russell. There is also a contemporary, off-hand quote from Leon Armstrong in Gateshead Post (1987) before the story was filmed explaining that "I play a boy called Spuggie [sic], who flies pigeons and it's about him and his two friends, a Chinese girl and a boy called Baz who is really a robber."
- ↑ Leon Armstrong was quoted by Gateshead Post (1987)
- ↑ Ant & Dec discuss Dec's close call at becoming Spuggy in McPartlin & Donnelly (2009) pp.3-5
- ↑ Shields Gazette (1988a) includes quotes from Jim Nicholson about making the programmes. The club is identified in Hoffman (1988) p.2.
- ↑ Shields Gazette (1988b) reports that "The featured star of popular children's TV serial, Geordie Racer, has been stolen - and so has his understudy," and that "the thieves forced the door of the loft overnight on Wednesday."
- ↑ There was quite a bit of local press coverage of Geordie Racer as it was being prepared, filmed and broadcast, much of which is preserved by the British Newspaper Archive. Articles published in early April 1987 make it clear that filming has not yet begun: Leon Armstrong says "We haven't started filming yet, but I'm looking forward to it," in the Gateshead Post on 2nd April, and Peter Rowell says "The series will be a great challenge and opportunity and I'm really looking forward to working with some of the North East's best actors and actresses," in the Blyth News Post Leader on 9th April. By the time another interview with Peter Rowell was published in the Newcastle Sunday Sun on 28th June the drama had already been made - Peter says "There were so many people to do every job, If I touched my hair there was someone immediately next to me to pat it back into place." South Shields Gazette (1988a) specifies that filming round the pigeon lofts took place "for two weeks last Easter," and Easter Sunday fell on 19th April in 1987.
- ↑ Dufton (1987) recounts "The London crew didn't go away with too good an impression of Tyneside as during filming nine hire cars were broken into. 'They even broke into the one that had been hired for me to drive in the series'" (said Peter Rowell).
- ↑ Blyth News Post Leader (1987) says "The series will be filmed on location in Newcastle and at the BBC Studios at Elstree in London and will be screened next Spring."
- ↑ A feature on page 26 of the 1988 Geordie Racer teacher's notes said "The series is 21 years old in the Spring of 1988, which is when Geordie Racer will be seen for the first time. It is full of good NE ingredients - the Great North Run, pigeon-fancying, stotty-munching and of course the city of Newcastle itself. So after Spring 1988 there’ll hardly be a child in the country who won’t know exactly where Newcastle is!" The text was revised in subsequent issues of the notes into the past and present tenses ("So now there'll hardly be a child in the country" and so on)
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