The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a comedy science fiction franchise created by Douglas Adams. Originally a radio sitcom broadcast over two series on BBC Radio 4 between 1978 and 1980, it was soon adapted to other formats, including both novels and comic books, a 1981 BBC television series, a 1984 text adventure game, stage shows and a 2005 feature film.
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is an international multimedia phenomenon; the novels are the most widely distributed, having been translated into more than 30 languages by 2005. The first novel, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, has been ranked fourth on the BBC's The Big Read poll. The sixth novel, And Another Thing..., was written by Eoin Colfer with additional unpublished material by Douglas Adams. In 2017, BBC Radio 4 announced a 40th-anniversary celebration with Dirk Maggs, one of the original producers, in charge. The first of six new episodes was broadcast on 8 March 2018.
The broad narrative of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy follows the misadventures of the last surviving Earth man, Arthur Dent, following the demolition of the Earth to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Dent is rescued from Earth's destruction by Ford Prefect—a human-like alien writer for the electronic travel guide The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy—by hitchhiking onto a passing Vogon spacecraft. Following his rescue, Dent explores the galaxy with Prefect and encounters Trillian, another human who was taken from Earth by the President of the Galaxy, Zaphod Beeblebrox, and Marvin the Paranoid Android. Certain narrative details were changed among the various adaptations.
Spelling
The different versions of the series spell the title differently—thus Hitch-Hiker's Guide, Hitch Hiker's Guide, and Hitchhiker's Guide are used in different editions, formats, and compilations of the book, with some omitting the apostrophe. Some editions use different spellings on the spine and title page. The h2g2's English Usage in Approved Entries claims that Hitchhiker's Guide is the spelling that Adams preferred. At least two reference works make note of the inconsistency in the titles. Both, however, repeat the statement that Adams decided in 2000 that "everyone should spell it the same way from then on."Synopsis
The various versions follow the same basic plot but they are in many places mutually contradictory, as Adams rewrote the story substantially for each new adaptation. Throughout all versions, the series follows the adventures of Arthur Dent, a hapless Englishman, following the destruction of the Earth by the Vogons to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Dent's adventures intersect with several other characters: Ford Prefect, Zaphod Beeblebrox, the depressed robot Marvin the Paranoid Android, and Trillian who is a woman Arthur once met at a party in Islington and who—thanks to Beeblebrox's intervention—is the only other human survivor of Earth's destruction.In their travels, Arthur comes to learn that the Earth was actually a giant supercomputer, created by another supercomputer, Deep Thought. Deep Thought had been built by its creators to give the answer to the "Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything", which, after eons of calculations, was given simply as "42". Deep Thought was then instructed to design the Earth supercomputer to determine what the Question actually is. The Earth was subsequently destroyed by the Vogons moments after its calculations were completed but before they could be communicated, and Arthur becomes the target of the descendants of the Deep Thought creators, believing his mind must hold the Question. With his friends' help, Arthur escapes and they decide to have lunch at The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, before embarking on further adventures.
Background
The original, first radio series comes from a proposal called "The Ends of the Earth": six self-contained episodes, all ending with Earth being destroyed in a different way. While writing the first episode, Adams realised that he needed someone on the planet who was an alien to provide some context, and that this alien needed a reason to be there. Adams finally settled on making the alien a roving researcher for a "wholly remarkable book" named The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. As the first radio episode's writing progressed, the Guide became the centre of his story, and he decided to focus the series on it, with the destruction of Earth being the only hold-over.Adams claimed that the title came from a 1971 incident while he was hitchhiking around Europe as a young man with a copy of the Hitch-hiker's Guide to Europe book: while lying drunk in a field near Innsbruck with a copy of the book and looking up at the stars, he thought it would be a good idea for someone to write a hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy as well. However, he later claimed that he reassembled the memory from telling so many times and lost the original impression to old age. His friends are quoted as saying that Adams mentioned the idea of "hitch-hiking around the galaxy" to them while on holiday in Greece in 1973.
Adams's fictional Guide is an electronic guidebook to the entire universe, originally published by Megadodo Publications, one of the great publishing houses of Ursa Minor Beta. The narrative of the various versions of the story is frequently punctuated with excerpts from the Guide. The voice of the Guide, also provides general narration.
Radio
Overview
Original radio series
The first radio series of six episodes was broadcast in 1978 on BBC Radio 4. Despite a low-key launch of the series, it received generally good reviews and a tremendous audience reaction for radio. A one-off episode was broadcast later in the year. The BBC had a practice at the time of commissioning "Christmas Special" episodes for popular radio series, and while an early draft of this episode of The Hitchhiker's Guide had a Christmas-related plotline, it was decided to be "in slightly poor taste" and the episode as transmitted served as a bridge between the two series. This episode was released as part of the second radio series and, later, The Secondary Phase on cassettes and CDs. The Primary and Secondary Phases were aired, in a slightly edited version, in the United States on NPR Playhouse.The first series was repeated twice in 1978 alone and many more times in the next few years. This led to an [|LP re-recording], produced independently of the BBC for sale, and a further adaptation of the series as a book. A second radio series, which consisted of a further five episodes, and bringing the total number of episodes to 12, was broadcast in 1980.
The radio series were narrated by comedy actor Peter Jones as The Book. Jones was cast after a three-month-long casting search and after at least three actors turning down the role.
The series was also notable for its use of sound, being the first comedy series to be produced in stereo. Adams said that he wanted the programme's production to be comparable to that of a modern rock album. Much of the programme's budget was spent on sound effects, which were largely the work of Paddy Kingsland at the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and Dick Mills and Harry Parker. The fact that they were at the forefront of modern radio production in 1978 and 1980 was reflected when the three new series of Hitchhiker's became some of the first radio shows to be mixed into four-channel Dolby Surround. This mix was also featured on DVD releases of the third radio series.
The theme tune used for the radio, television, LP, and film versions is "Journey of the Sorcerer", an instrumental piece composed by Bernie Leadon and recorded by the Eagles on their 1975 album One of These Nights. Only the transmitted radio series used the original recording; a sound-alike cover by Tim Souster was used for the LP and TV series, another arrangement by Joby Talbot was used for the 2005 film, and still another arrangement, this time by Philip Pope, was recorded to be released with the CDs of the last three radio series. Apparently, Adams chose this song for its futuristic-sounding nature, but also for the fact that it had a banjo in it, which, as Geoffrey Perkins recalls, Adams said would give an "on the road, hitch-hiking feel" to it.
The twelve episodes were released on CD and cassette in 1988, becoming the first CD release in the BBC Radio Collection. They were re-released in 1992, and at this time Adams suggested that they could retitle Fits the First to Sixth as "The Primary Phase" and Fits the Seventh to Twelfth as "The Secondary Phase" instead of just "the first series" and "the second series". It was at about this time that a "Tertiary Phase" was first discussed with Dirk Maggs, adapting Life, the Universe and Everything, but this series would not be recorded for another ten years.
Radio series 3–5
On 21 June 2004, the BBC announced in a press release that a new series of Hitchhiker's based on the third novel would be broadcast as part of its autumn schedule, produced by Above the Title Productions Ltd. The episodes were recorded in late 2003, but actual transmission was delayed while an agreement was reached with The Walt Disney Company over Internet re-broadcasts, as Disney had begun pre-production on the film. This was followed by news that further series would be produced based on the fourth and fifth novels.The third series was broadcast in September and October 2004. The fourth and fifth were broadcast in May and June 2005, with the fifth series following immediately after the fourth. CD releases accompanied the transmission of the final episode in each series.
The adaptation of the third novel followed the book very closely, which caused major structural issues in meshing with the preceding radio series in comparison to the second novel. Because many events from the radio series were omitted from the second novel, and those that did occur happened in a different order, the two series split in completely different directions. The last two adaptations vary somewhat—some events in Mostly Harmless are now foreshadowed in the adaptation of So Long and Thanks For All The Fish, while both include some additional material that builds on incidents in the third series to tie all five together, most especially including the character Zaphod more prominently in the final chapters and addressing his altered reality to include the events of the Secondary Phase. While Mostly Harmless originally contained a rather bleak ending, Dirk Maggs created a different ending for the transmitted radio version, ending it on a much more upbeat note, reuniting the cast one last time.
The core cast for the third to fifth radio series remained the same, except for the replacement of Peter Jones by William Franklyn as the Book, and Richard Vernon by Richard Griffiths as Slartibartfast, since both had died. Sandra Dickinson, who played Trillian in the TV series, here played Tricia McMillan, an English-born, American-accented alternate-universe version of Trillian, while David Dixon, the television series' Ford Prefect, made a cameo appearance as the "Ecological Man". Jane Horrocks appeared in the new semi-regular role of Fenchurch, Arthur's girlfriend, and Samantha Béart joined in the final series as Arthur and Trillian's daughter, Random Dent. Also reprising their roles from the original radio series were Jonathan Pryce as Zarniwoop, Rula Lenska as Lintilla and her clones, and Roy Hudd as Milliways compere Max Quordlepleen, as well as the original radio series' announcer, John Marsh.
The series also featured guest appearances by such noted personalities as Joanna Lumley as the Sydney Opera House Woman, Jackie Mason as the East River Creature, Miriam Margolyes as the Smelly Photocopier Woman, BBC Radio cricket legends Henry Blofeld and Fred Trueman as themselves, June Whitfield as the Raffle Woman, Leslie Phillips as Hactar, Saeed Jaffrey as the Man on the Pole, Sir Patrick Moore as himself, and Christian Slater as Wonko the Sane. Finally, Adams himself played the role of Agrajag, a performance adapted from his book-on-tape reading of the third novel, and edited into the series created some time after the author's death.