Background
The Clangers originated in a series of children's books developed from another ''Smallfilms'' production, ''Storyline
''The Clangers'' was described by Postgate as a family in space. They were small creatures living in peace and harmony on – and inside – a small, hollow planet, far, far away: nourished by Blue String Pudding, and by Green Soup harvested from the planet's volcanic soup wells by the Soup Dragon. The word "Clanger" is said to derive from the sound made by opening the metal cover of one of the creatures' crater-like burrows, each of which was covered with an old metal dustbin lid, to protect against meteorite impacts (and space debris). In each episode there would be some problem to solve, typically concerning something invented or discovered, or some new visitor to meet. Music Trees, with note-shaped fruit, grew on the planet's surface, and music would often be an integral feature in the simple but amusing plots. In the ''Fishing'' episode, one of the Cheese Trees provided a cylindrical five-line staff for notes taken from the Music Trees. Postgate provided the narration, for the most part in a soft, melodic voice, describing and accounting for the curious antics of the little blue planet's knitted pink inhabitants, and providing a "translation", as it were, for much of their whistled dialogue. Postgate claimed that in reality when the Clangers' were whistling, they were "swearing their little heads off".Production
Awards
Characters
The principal characters are the Clangers themselves, the females wearing waistcoats and the males brass armour: *Granny Clanger: an elderly Clanger, she is fond of knitting and often falls asleep. She wears a black tabard in the original show, but a lilac one in the new version, it is also confirmed that she is Major Clanger's mother. *Major Clanger: the father and head of the family, he is determined to get all things right on their planet, and can be grumpy. He wears brass armour. Narrator of the 2015 series, Michael Palin has said that Major Clanger is one of his favourite characters. *Mother Clanger: Mother to Tiny Clanger and Small Clanger, Mother Clanger is the matriarch of the family and is often seen preparing and dispensing the Clangers' soup or Blue String Pudding, though her favourite thing to do is gardening. She wears a red tabard. *Small Clanger: Small Clanger is the son of Mother and Major Clanger, and the older brother of Tiny Clanger. Small Clanger is very inquisitive and inventive, which - despite his best intentions - has sometimes led to some element of chaos amongst the Clangers, the soup pump being a classic example. Small Clanger is often the focus of the episodes, as he is the most adventurous of the family. He wears brass armour in the original show, but wears a blue tabard in the new version. *Tiny Clanger: Youngest of the family, daughter to Mother and Major Clanger, and younger sister to Small Clanger, Tiny Clanger often plays a key role in the episodes too. She has a kind and gentle nature, that is apparent in many episodes in which a new visitor arrives, as she usually tries to communicate peacefully with them. She wears a red tabard in the original show. This changed to a bright pink one in the first series of the new version before turning to a reddish pink in later series. *Three other Clangers, two males with different coloured hair and a female wearing blue, also appear in the original episodes, but they have been dropped for the 2015 revival.Other inhabitants
*The Soup Dragon: a benign, female creature with a penchant for Green Soup. The Soup Dragon dwells in the soup wells within the Clangers' planet. She is often summoned by tapping on the top of what look like small inactive volcanoes; she slides the lid back, and then takes a jug from (usually) Small Clanger, which she fills for them to eat. A green glow is visible beneath her when she emerges, suggesting the presence of a substantial lake of green soup. *Baby Soup Dragon: the Soup Dragon's son. Baby Soup Dragon was brought into the Clangers' world when the Soup Dragon became broody, which meant the Clangers could not get any soup. Tiny Clanger called the Iron Chicken by radio, for advice, and she told Tiny to get the egg which she had left on the surface of the planet and to fill it with ingredients. Then they made a nest with macaroni sticks, not far from the soup wells, and placed the egg in the middle. The Iron Chicken asked the Clangers to stand back while she shot the iron egg with a beam from her nest: this had an effect, and the Soup Dragon saw the egg and instinctively sat upon it, moments after the beam was shut off. Then the Soup Dragon was startled and leapt up to find that the egg was hatched and she had a Baby Soup Dragon. *Froglets: a trio of small orange aliens with black, stalk-like legs and large eyes, who travel around in aVisitors
Other characters appeared in only one or two episodes each: *Hoots: small horn-like creatures with three legs, speaking like trumpets. *A Spaceman: an astronaut who arrives to collect rock samples. Upon landing, the Clangers observe his movements and discover that he is digging up rocks. Small Clanger peeks out of a hole and takes the wicker basket he is (rather humorously) placing the collected rocks in. The astronaut turns to find his basket gone and begins to look for it, searching the surface until he lifts the lid off one of the holes only to find Tiny Clanger within. This clearly scares the astronaut, who proceeds to run away, and falls straight down one of the holes into the planet where he then falls into a soup well. After the Clangers retrieve him and clean him up, he appears to be still in shock, as he then begins to run around again in panic, at which point he accidentally runs himself into orbit around their planet. Small Clanger retrieves him with a fishing rod and a magnet. *Lunar Rover: The rover appeared when the Clangers were building a structure on the surface and one of them noticed an incoming object. They all dived below for safety, and on impact the rover destroyed the structure they were building, much to the Clangers' annoyance. They all observed the rover, staying just out of its sight. When it began to dig - and seemingly eat - some of the surface, Major Clanger intervened and stopped it. It then turned to face him and they attempted to shake hands, at which point the Rover's "nose" came off in Major Clanger's hand. He tries to return it, but the Rover drives off, finds a suitable bit of ground, then launches itself back into space. Major Clanger exclaims that it is "Marvellous". *Eggbots: A group of egg-shaped, nesting doll-like robots who make sounds based on theMusic and sound effects
One of the most noted aspects was the use of sound effects, with a score composed byEpisodes from the original series
Series 1 (1969–1970)
The first series was transmitted on BBC1 at 5:55pm, except for the episode "Chicken" which went out at 5:50pm because there was a ''Children in Need'' appeal at 6:00pm.Series 2 (1971–1972)
The second series episodes were also transmitted weekly on BBC1, but in a wide variety of differing timeslots. Episodes 1 and 2 were seen at 4:50pm; episodes 3, 5 and 6 at 5:05pm; episodes 4 and 8 at 5:00pm; episode 7 at 4:40pm; episode 9 at 5:30pm; and episodes 10, 11, 12 and 13 (which followed episode 9 after a gap of more than a year) at 4:00pm.Specials
The first of these was an election special, produced in 1974, entitled "Vote for Froglet". Inspired by what Postgate referred to as the "Winter of Discontent" (a phrase from Shakespeare's play ''Richard III'', usually employed to refer to the winter of 1978–79, but Postgate was referring to the miners' strike in the winter of 1973-74), and inspired partly by his recollections of post-war Germany, it was broadcast on the night of the October 1974 General Election. The narrator explains the democratic process, and demonstrates it by asking the Clangers to vote between the Soup Dragon and a Froglet. The Soup Dragon wins the election on a policy of "No Soup for Froglets", but the Clangers are dissatisfied with the result. This special was believed to be a lost episode for many years, but it was released in full for free by the British Film Institute to coincide with the 2017 UK General Election.Episodes from the revival series
Series 1 (2015–2016)
Episodes 1–26 were first broadcast at 5:30pm, Episodes 27–52 at 6:00pm on CBeebies. Following the March 2015 special, a full series was commissioned for the summer of that year. The series was narrated by Michael Palin, and co-produced by Smallfilms with the involvement of Peter Firmin and Oliver Postgate's son, Dan. The series was directed by Chris Tichborne and Mole Hill, with music composed by John Du Prez. 52 11-minute episodes were commissioned. The voices of the Iron Chicken, the Soup Dragon, and the Baby Soup Dragon were by Dan Postgate. The first episode of the new series aired on 15 June 2015. It turned out to be a massive hit for CBeebies. The BBC News Entertainment and Arts magazine revealed that 65% of the episode's viewing audience of 484,000 were adults, and that it was CBeebies' most watched programme of 2015 up to that date. The rating was more than double the previous record, set by an episode of ''Series 2 (2017-2018)
A second series of the revival, and the fourth series overall, released on 11 September 2017 with 26 more episodes.Series 3 (2019-2020)
A third series of the revival, and the fifth series overall was broadcast on CBeebies on 17 July 2019 with another 26 more episodes.Specials
Reception
Although not quite as popular as ''Legacy
Other countries
The series was not widely broadcast outside the UK in the 1970s, mainly because it did not require additional money from sales abroad to finance its production. However the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation showed the series in 1970 and 1982, entitled ''Romlingane''. It was narrated by Ingebrigt Davik, a popular author of children's books. It was shown on Swedish Television in the late 1960s and 1970s, entitled ''Rymdlarna''. The first 13 episodes were also shown onSoundtrack album
In 2001, a selection of the music and sound effects was compiled by Jonny Trunk from 128 musical cues held by Postgate, who contributed act one, "The Iron Chicken and the Music Trees", of ''A Clangers Opera'', with libretto that he had compiled.Track listing
#Intro Music and Dialogue from "Episode One" #The Start Of "Music" #From "Visiting Friends" #"Clangers running around the planet!" #From "Fishing" #From "Treasure" #"Some Musical Sequences" #From "Goods" (when the machine in the episode "Goods" went into continuous production of plastic objects) #"An End Title" #"Tiny Clangers Radio Hat" #"Some of Oliver's Special Clangers Effects including the Froglets" #From "The Rock Collector" #From "Glowhoney" #From "Teapot" #From "Cloud" #From "The Seed" #From "The Bags" #From "Blow Fruit" #From "The Pipe Organ" #From "The Music of the Spheres" #"A short, silent interval" #"A Clangers Opera, Act One" "The Iron Chicken and the Music Trees" (compiled by Oliver Postgate)Home media
In the early 1990s, three VHS cassettes of the Clangers were released by BBC Enterprises Ltd. Later, another six cassettes were released by Universal Pictures. A number of DVDs have also been released by Universal Pictures (original series) and Signature Entertainment (revived series).VHS
DVD
References
External links
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