Blackadder – the lost pilot episode
I had heard about this over the years, but as with the rumor of there being a 13th, never-before-aired, episode of the great Fawlty Towers, I passed this off as an idea that hatched late one night at The Nags Head (a GREAT pub, by the way) and not really something that had merit. Well, count me in the “I was wrong” category as a pilot episode has recently surfaced for Blackadder lending credence to that latenight discussion.
At this point, you’re probably thinking “…duh” and that I should have known that this is probably a DVD extra somewhere on one of the many versions of the complete Blackadder. Well, if it is, I didn’t know. According to several sources, however, it’s not currently available anywhere on DVD. Hopefully, this is something many of you weren’t aware of and will find this a great way to spend a half hour.
Several noticeable differences between the unaired pilot and the subsequent series are casting with neither Tony Robinson nor Brian Blessed cast in the pilot. While there were several changes from a production personnel standpoint, the most-important one, Richard Curtis as co-writer, was there from the beginning.
For a little background on the pilot and a look at the full episode, click here.
