The Phoenix and the Carpet | |
---|---|
Genre | Drama |
Created by | E. Nesbit |
Written by | Helen Cresswell |
Directed by | Michael Kerrigan |
Starring | David Suchet |
Music by | Paul Hart |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Original language | English |
No. of episodes | 6 |
Production | |
Producer | Giles Ridge |
Running time | 28 minutes |
Production companies | HIT Entertainment BBC |
Original release | |
Network | BBC One |
Release | 16 November – 21 December 1997 |
The Phoenix and the Carpet is a 1997 British serial miniseries based on the book of the same name by E. Nesbit co-produced by HIT Entertainment and the BBC which aired throughout November-December 1997. Starring David Suchet as the Phoenix, the serial focuses on four children in Edwardian England who acquire a phoenix and the adventures they have as a result.
An earlier 8-part serialisation of the same story was made by the BBC in 1976 starring Jane Forster, Max Harris, Tamzin Neville and Gary Russell as the four children.
In the first episode, a second-hand carpet is delivered to the Bastable household in London. Impatient for the arrival of Guy Fawkes Night, the four Bastable children had set off fireworks in the nursery, leading to a fire. Rolled up in the carpet, the children find a large egg. When they accidentally knock it into the fire, it hatches, and a talking Phoenix emerges. The new carpet is a magic carpet and can take the children anywhere, and with it they have some exotic adventures.
The Phoenix is a friend of the Psammead, whom the children already know, and his help is sometimes called upon.
In the sixth episode, the Phoenix decides it is time for him to begin his cycle again, going up in flames to arise from the ashes in two thousand years' time. He lays an egg, and immolates himself.
The series was a co-production between the BBC and HIT Entertainment and took the format of six 28-minute episodes, first broadcast on BBC One between November and December 1997. [1]
The Phoenix and the Carpet is part of a family of BBC productions about the adventures of the Bastable children, based on novels by E. Nesbit, launched in 1991 with Five Children and It in six episodes, followed in 1993 by The Return of the Psammead. All three were adapted by Helen Cresswell, and apart from the children the Psammead, created and voiced by Francis Wright, appears in all three.
A VHS and DVD release from Reader's Digest (under license from BBC Worldwide) was released in 2004, containing the 90-minute feature-length edit of the serial. [2] [3]
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Five Children and It is a fantasy children's novel by English author E. Nesbit. It was originally published in 1902 in the Strand Magazine under the general title The Psammead, or the Gifts, with a segment appearing each month from April to December. The stories were then expanded into a novel which was published the same year. It is the first volume of a trilogy that includes The Phoenix and the Carpet (1904) and The Story of the Amulet (1906). The book has never been out of print since its initial publication.
The Phoenix and the Carpet is a fantasy novel for children, written by E. Nesbit and first published in 1904. It is the second in a trilogy of novels that begins with Five Children and It (1902), and follows the adventures of the same five children: Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane and the Lamb. Their mother buys the children a new carpet to replace one from the nursery that they have destroyed in an accidental fire. The children find an egg in the carpet, which hatches into a talking Phoenix. The Phoenix explains that the carpet is a magic one that will grant them three wishes a day. The five children go on many adventures, which eventually wear out their magic carpet. The adventures are continued and concluded in the third book of the trilogy, The Story of the Amulet (1906).
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