Auf Wiedersehen, Pet anniversary DVD released
A DVD commemorating the 30th anniversary of Auf Wiedersehen, Pet has been released, containing footage of September’s fan convention and the sketch which inspired the show’s revival.
“Back With The Boys Again – The Story of Auf Wiedersehen Pet” features footage from September’s fan convention to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the show, which was first broadcast on 11 November 1983.
Stars Tim Healy and Kevin Whately and writers Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais celebrated the show’s anniversary on Tyneside in September in a series of events, including an appearance in front of Newcastle F.C. fans at St James’ Park and an event at the Hilton Hotel in Gateshead.
Directed by legendary director Geoff Wonfor, the DVD includes footage of the “Brickies Banquet” event at the Hilton, alongside specially recorded interviews with Jimmy Nail, Timothy Spall and Christopher Fairbank, who were not in attendance.
The documentary also includes new interviews with Healy and Whately, with additional footage filmed around Newcastle, alongside a Q&A with Clement, La Frenais, director Roger Bamford, and series creator Frank Roddam at the Tyneside Cinema.
However, as an unexpected bonus, the DVD contains footage of the first Auf Wiedersehen, Pet sketch, penned by Clement and La Frenais and featuring Healy, Whately and Brendan Healy, for the Sunday for Sammy benefit concert in 2000, which inspired the writers and stars to revive the show.
The footage has never before been commercially available, since the biannual Sunday for Sammy concerts, the charity set up by Healy and Nail to aid emerging talent in the region, was only professionally filmed for a DVD release from 2004 onwards.
September’s convention featured Stan Hey, who wrote three episodes, and some supporting cast members, including Julie Tobin, Lesley St John, Melanie Hill, and Jimmy Nail’s real-life sister, Val McLane.
Some fans were disappointed that more of the surviving members of the “magnificent seven” could not attend, since event organisers had promised on Radio Northumberland in August that the event would include “as good as everybody in the room at one time.”
Fans who had paid £75, a ticket, plus booking fees, to attend the convention were also disgruntled when it was suddenly announced that the event would be recorded for DVD, and a stern email was distributed banning fans from moving around the room or approaching their idols during filming.
Proceeds from the DVD, which carries an RRP of £16.99, will go to Sunday for Sammy.
Back With The Boys Again – The Story of Auf Wiedersehen Pet is available online direct from publisher Mawson Wareham, and from JG Windows in Newcastle, the Metro Centre, and Darlington.
