Don't Panic

by Neil Gaiman

  Certainly, So Long and Thanks for All the Fish is a wildly different book to its predecessor. Gone are the big heroics and wild invention to be replaced by… “A love story! We had to somehow marry off Arthur—something that was pretty hard to imagine!” Indeed, as much as we all adore Simon Jones’s portrayal of the hapless Arthur Dent, he’s hardly the obvious romantic lead.

  “It does turn into a sort of rom-com for a bit,” says Dirk, “and thank god we got Jane Horrocks* for Fenchurch. I thought she was brilliant and played wonderfully off Simon Jones. She was someone who was as quirky as Arthur himself and therefore we can believe in the relationship.

  “Douglas’s lead female characters aren’t hugely well drawn, there’s a bit of Sue Sheridan in all of them, the lovely middle-class, well-spoken girl. So Fenchurch was great as she offered the opportunity to introduce a character with a bit of spark.”

  Certainly the Quandary Phase isn’t as slavish in its adherence to the book as the previous series, with plotlines dropped in long before they appeared in the novels. Not that Douglas was ever that interested in pre-empting his forthcoming direction in narrative with anything so obvious as a linear plot.

  “You get to a certain point in a Douglas Adams novel,” agrees Dirk, “it’s about 63,000 words in, where you see this sudden change of gear as Douglas sees the end of the tunnel approaching. He suddenly puts his foot down and all the loose ends start being tied up in a very hurried way. It’s very funny.

  “There would be times in the scripts when I pulled things back to make more of them. I never did anything that I didn’t think there was a hint towards but, for example, I wanted to build up to the idea of the Vogons coming back in the Quintessential Phase to finish off the job of destroying Earth, so in the Quandary Phase we have a scene in the Vogon Court of Enquiry where Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz is being had up for not doing his job properly. It just builds up the idea that while all this lovey-dovey stuff is going on, the whole universe is still ticking over, there are still plots fomenting and minds moving against us.”

  Other changes were more out of deference to the change in medium. “Getting the late Nick Clark, the World at One presenter, alongside Sir Patrick Moore, to commentate on the flying saucer that lands at the end of the novel was wonderful,” says Dirk. “It enabled us to provide a lot of explanatory text but also get some slightly more contemporary jokes in and a knowing wink at Radio 4’s style.

  “I also think the actors bring out the emotional strengths of the piece. My favourite scene is at the climax of the Quandary Phase with Marvin crawling across the desert at the end of his life. It’s a terribly poignant ending which was a lot of fun to do, with Stephen on great form, but also very moving because you had an iconic character coming to the end of his existence and being no less churlish for it.”

  When it comes to poignant endings you’d be hard pressed to beat Douglas’s final Hitchhiker’s book, Mostly Harmless. In his script notes, Dirk comments on Douglas’s admission that he was in a somewhat downbeat frame of mind when writing the novel and the conclusion to the book certainly reflects that. When faced with trying to replicate the ending as part of a half hour comedy show Dirk fell back on his previously mentioned desire to unify all five series, using the notion of a narrative fracture to add a more positive coda: “Once we’d got into the final series and the idea of the Guide Mark II, a machine that actually bends reality, that can change the probability arcs so they intersect in different places, there was a opportunity to go back and explain why things seemed so disjointed between the second and third series.”

  Playing with the possibility of multiple realities, the radio series ends with a string of Alternative Arthurs… one still on the Heart of Gold, one still fighting for the preservation of his cottage in the face of impending bulldozers (this time supported by an alternative Fenchurch who lives in the cottage with him) and, finally, one eating a meal in Milliways, the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, accompanied by Ford, Zaphod, Trillian, Marvin, even a waitress named Fenchurch who certainly usurps the usual Dish of the Day for a place in his affections.

  The series, now concluded, was released on CD and even DVD with a full 5.1 sound mix. All the episodes were also expanded to include material that was cut from the broadcasts for time reasons.

  The script book for the first two Hitchhiker’s series—originally published in 1985—had been reissued in 2003 with an updated introduction by producer Geoffrey Perkins as well as a selection of extra material. In 2005 it was joined by a sister volume collecting Dirk’s scripts for the Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phases alongside an introduction from Simon Jones and more notes and anecdotes than you could wave an electronic sub-ether device at.

  * Archie Andrews was the wooden star of BBC Light Programme Educating Archie (1950-1958). Nobody questioned the logic of ventriloquist Peter Brough attracting, on average, 15 million listeners. The show introduced such future stars as Benny Hill, Bruce Forsyth, Tony Hancock and Julie Andrews. Archie always appeared in the nude, just because he could.

  * Philip Jackson will be familiar to TV viewers (spit) as Inspector Jap in the long-running series of Poirot mysteries featuring David Suchet. He has a great radio voice.

  ** Independence Day UK scored above its inspiration in a number of ways, not least by not banging on about how wonderful America was every five minutes until the audience were forced to drown themselves in their popcorn rather than endure another word.

  * In 1993, thoughts of new adaptations had driven the BBC to issue the first two radio series on CD. It was Douglas who made the decision at this point to name them the ‘Primary’ and ‘Secondary’ Phase—the final three adaptations would therefore be known as the Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phases. There is a very good reason for the last two: ‘Quaternary’ and ‘Quintennial’ being silly words that nobody uses and are impossible to spell.

  * This is just the sort of coincidence that gets people worried enough to burn copies of Oolon Coluphid’s That Just About Wraps it Up for God, so we’ll say no more about it.

  ** The trade union representing performers and artists in the UK.

  * Oh well.

  * Not only Jane Horrocks but also Stephen Fry and—adding a bit of Hollywood glamour—Christian Slater as Wonko the Sane. It’s nothing if not a cast to stroll into The Ivy with.

  34

  POSTCARDS FROM DAVELAND

  It seems to me that we can either slip into the traditional stereotypes—you’re the studio executive who has a million real-world problems to worry about, and I’m the writer who only cares about seeing his vision realized and hang the consequences—or we can recognize that we both share the same goal, which is to make the most successful movie we possibly can.

  You have a great deal of experience nursing major motion pictures into existence. I have a great deal of experience of nursing The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy into existence in every medium other than motion pictures… Why don’t we actually meet and have a chat?

  — Excerpt from a letter written by Douglas Adams to David Vogel at Walt Disney Pictures, as reprinted in The Salmon of Doubt.

  On 28th April 2005 a rather startling thing happened. A big budget* movie of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy appeared in cinemas. Unfortunately, to quote that most remarkable of source material, “this has made a lot of people very angry and been widely regarded as a bad move.”

  Douglas had spent many years trying to make such a thing happen. In fact, many years, many phone calls, many draft scripts, many contracts, many lawyers arguing about those contracts, many directors signed up, many directors signed off again, and much moving to LA then moving back to Islington because LA just wasn’t very nice then moving back to LA again anyway because, well, you live in hope and at least the sun shines there…

  It is forgivable to assume a project stranded so long in Development Hell (that peculiar creative graveyard where movie ideas go to have the spirit beaten out of them by film producers
) will never see the light of day. Jay Roach, director of the first two Austin Powers movies as well as Meet the Parents and its ‘Focking’ sequel, was attached to the project for many years, ultimately stepping down from the director’s chair (due to other commitments) but retaining a role as producer. Roach passed Douglas’s last script draft on to Spike Jonze, director of Being John Malkovich, Adaptation and Where the Wild Things Are. He declined the offer to shoot it, but suggested Hammer & Tongs, a British production company comprised of director Garth Jennings and producer Nick Goldsmith, known for their innovative pop promo work. And there the film finally took root.

  The script was passed to screenwriter Karey Kirkpatrick, writer of the stop-motion animation movies Chicken Run and James and the Giant Peach, to produce a final version to put in front of the cameras.

  The casting seemed rock solid, with Stephen Fry as the Voice of the Book, Martin Freeman as Arthur Dent, Sam Rockwell as Zaphod* and Zooey Deschanel as Trillian. The only slightly controversial choice—and it must be clear here that when we say ‘controversial’ we mean ‘likely to get people who know a little about movie-making saying belligerent things online’—was actor turned rap artist turned actor again Mos Def as Ford Prefect.

  Much was made in the movie’s press releases about how closely the film was based on Douglas’s own most recent draft, though caveats were given with regard to the film’s divergence from established Hitchhiker’s narrative (like we needed to be told. Since when has one form of Hitchhiker’s shown the least concern for how similar it is to the last? We really don’t care…). Robbie Stamp, Douglas’s friend and CEO of The Digital Village, was an executive producer on the picture* and, in an interview on the Slashdot website, said, “All the substantive new ideas in the movie… are brand new Douglas ideas written especially for the movie by him… Douglas was always up for reinventing Hitchhiker’s in each of its different incarnations and he knew that working harder on some character development and some of the key relationships was an integral part of turning Hitchhiker’s into a movie.”

  Which is no doubt true, but doesn’t change the fact that the film doesn’t really work.

  One can level a number of criticisms at Douglas’s writing. Yes, the comment about character development is valid, as would have been an accusation of flimsy plotting. But to mention these flaws is rather to miss the point of Douglas’s writing. When he does it, it works. Douglas is one of those inspired creators who is impervious to such overarching technical issues—his genius lay in the detail. And it is precisely in the film’s adherence to the broad, sweeping generalities of Douglas’s work, rather than paying attention to what it was in the minutiae that made it so effective, that it fails.

  In the same Slashdot interview, Robbie Stamp commented that, “I know how easy it is to see every decision to cut a scene as ‘studio’ pressure, but it was always much more to do with pacing and rhythm in the film itelf.” And here we see perhaps the most telling issue with converting Douglas’s work to the big screen. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy never much concerned itself with the need to be fast-paced. The gems found in both the books and the radio series are often in the asides, the guide entries, the small moments of absurdity. The rhythm of Douglas’s writing is that of a comedy writer hitting his punchlines; an obsessive ear for comic dialogue and the best way to sell his unconventional ideas.

  It is this rhythm and pacing that the film loses, sticking instead to telling the story in a dynamic fashion. Jokes were cut, dialogue was trimmed and, arguably, this is where the spirit of Douglas’s writing fell by the wayside.

  Perhaps it is a sad fact that Hitchhiker’s just doesn’t work well in a visual medium. Certainly the BBC TV series was Douglas’s least favourite incarnation of the work. Film places different demands on its source material and in doing so it played to Hitchhiker’s weaknesses rather than its strengths.

  The film performed adequately at the box office and was released later the same year on both a single disc DVD and a double disc gift set (which included a copy of the original novel). It is unlikely that we shall ever see a sequel.

  * Well, relatively big budget anyway, the word ‘big’ when relating to cinema budgets enters a whole new sense of scope which the human mind cannot truly encompass. Certainly it cost the sort of money that if found on one’s doorstep one morning, say in several large skips guarded by men with machine guns, would force you to delicately lose your mind for a month or two, just while you decided what country to buy.

  * Who claimed, somewhat jovially, in the DVD extras that the only reason he got the part was that they couldn’t afford Jim Carrey.

  * As was Douglas himself, the film also being dedicated to him.

  35

  STARMAN

  2005 saw Douglas achieve an altogether more celestial accolade: having a small asteroid named after him. In August 2003, MSNBC.com* covered the story of seven asteroids being named after the astronauts who died in the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster. As part of that article the reporter asked readers who they thought deserved to have an asteroid named after them. Douglas’s name was submitted and the list of asteroids awaiting final designation was consulted. 224 million miles from the sun, part of the main asteroid belt that lies between Mars and Jupiter, there lay a lump of space rock with the preliminary designation 2001 DA42. The fact that the classification—no more than a catalogue number—referenced the year of Douglas’s death, his initials and the answer to the Ultimate Question of life, the universe and everything was duly noted and heartily “wowed” about. MSNBC.com issued a proposal to Brian Marsden, director of the International Astronomical Union’s Minor Planet Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Brian was secretary to the IAU’s Committee on Small Body Nomenclature** and he received the suggestion of naming 2001 DA42 after Douglas with a good deal of enthusiasm: “This was sort of made for him,” he commented to MSNBC.com. Nearly eighteen months later*, on 25th January 2005, the name was officially announced.

  This was not the first asteroid with a Hitchhiker’s connection. In 2001, on the very week that Douglas died, the IAU announced the naming of asteroid 18610—discovered in 1998 by Felix Hormuth of the Starkenburg Observatory in Germany—as ‘Arthurdent’. There were those that tried to claim that the naming of asteroid 18610 so close to Douglas’s death had some form of universal meaning. But then people will see universal meanings everywhere. There is no doubt that Douglas—were he not somewhat distracted—would have dismissed the significance of the two events, though one imagines the coincidence would have amused him.

  * America’s “most visited” news website, joint owned by Microsoft and the NBC TV network.

  ** It is ironic that a committee dedicated to naming things has such an unfortunate name of its own. Hardly trips off the tongue, does it?

  * Nothing appears to move quickly in astronomy, most especially not committees.

  36

  THE INTERCONNECTEDNESS OF ALL THINGS

  After the success of the new Hitchhiker’s radio series it was no great surprise to hear that Above the Title Productions and Dirk Maggs had more Douglas in their sights. In January 2007 the BBC announced that it had commissioned the independent company to produce three series of Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency, each series to be based on one of the novels in which the character appeared.*

  Dirk had already experienced a taste of life outside the framework of Douglas’s novels, treading the boards several times in Dirk, a theatrical adaptation originally written by James Goss** and Arvind Ethan David*** when they were still at school. They later expanded the one-hour production—which even they described as “amusing but utterly incomprehensible”—to a full-length show, which they presented in 1995 at the Old Fire Station, a theatre venue in Oxford. Douglas attended the production and was suitably impressed.

  In 1997 the play was restaged at the Oxford Playhouse by the Oxford Union Dramatic Society (with an even bigger budget thanks to a Lottery grant). People said even more nice t
hings about it, such as this trimmed review from The Word: “Dirk has success written all over it from the moment the lights came down… masterful… pure physical comedy so enthrallingly effortless that it merits no other adjective but ‘poetic’… hilariously funny… engrossing… this was a production which would not be unwelcome in the West End…” Which is just about as good as it gets, really.

  1999 saw the play produced in London—though not in the West End, unfortunately—and in 2001 a smaller-scale production was mounted in Abingdon as a tribute to Douglas. Since then it has crossed oceans to be performed in Australia and Los Angeles (where it scooped three of the 2007 LA Weekly Theater Awards, including Best Adaptation). As James comments, “It’s now on in Penn State. Which I had to have pointed out to me is in America, and not a prison. So, Dirk continues, blissfully. Although I think of all the business about ‘answering machines’ with ‘tapes’ in them and I feel a little giddy and worried.”

  In order to make the novel work for the stage the writers had to make a number of changes. As James noted on the original website, “The biggest casualty has been the Electric Monk. Since he spent the book riding around on a horse with a shotgun, he was not immediately suited to the stage. So, for technical reasons, there is no Electric Monk. Since he also committed the murder of Gordon Way, this may cause come problems for purists.