Robert Powell in classic TV from the eighties as Hannay lives again

We’re enjoying watching our friend and frequent collaborator, actor Robert Powell in the current re-0run of the 1988-89 TV series Hannay.
It finds Powell reprising the role of Edwardian mining engineer turned crime-battling adventurer Richard Hannay - the character that he first played a decade earlier in the 1978 film version of John Buchan’s The Thirty Nine Steps.
That movie was of course itself a reboot of the Alfred Hitchcock classic from the 1935 with Robert Donat in the Hannay role and the 1959 film version starring Kenneth More.
The late eighties TV series ran for 13 episodes which you can currently see on Monday evening’s on the Talking Pictures channel. This evening (Monday 31st August) at 9.00pm the episode is The Rough Music and finds Powell’s Hannay setting out on a journey of intrigue after a friend dies and he inherits a walking-stick, field glasses and a lighthouse on a Fenland marsh.Great stuff!
Hopefully, Covid restrictions permitting, Robert will be back in action with CCP in October and November when alongside fellow actor Liz he will be presenting a centennial celebration of The Roaring Twenties.
With accompaniment from  Christine Crowshaw on piano and Clive Conway on flute, it examines the era that saw the rise of the Flapper girl, jazz and the cocktail party. When the young threw off the conventions of the previous generation, freedom was in the air, and the winds of change were blowing.
Noel Coward epitomised the spirit of the age with his sophisticated elegance and sardonic wit.
The songs said it all! Cole Porter was to be seen in the Ritz Bar, playing his unforgettable songs, while Fred Astaire danced on the London stage with the great George Gershwin himself at the piano. Audiences flocked to the cinema to see Charlie Chaplin, the great Hollywood star of the silent movies.The Bright Young Things partied the nights away, dancing the latest craze, the Charleston, while the Prince of Wales shimmied his way across Europe. It seemed as if the party would never end.
At the moment  Anything Goes is scheduled to play Tamworth Assembly Rooms on Oct 4th www.tamworthartsandevents.com The Kings Theatre, Southsea, on Oct 11th www.kingsportsmouth.co.uk and The Festival Drayton Centre in market Drayton on Nov 1st. www.festivaldraytoncentre.com
Make sure to check all show dates on this website and those of the venues concerned.