Thunderbird 6

The film's dialogue was recorded in six days at the Anvil Films Recording Studio in Denham, Buckinghamshire.[4][10] With the exceptions of John Tracy and Black Phantom/The Hood, all returning characters were voiced by the actors who had voiced them on Thunderbirds Are Go. New voice actors for Thunderbird 6 were:

• Keith Alexander as John Tracy and the Narrator. Ray Barrett, the original voice of John, had returned to his native Australia after the production of Thunderbirds Are Go.[4] His replacement, Alexander, was also contracted to provide a brief opening narration explaining the secrecy of International Rescue. Alexander later voiced Sam Loover in Joe 90 and Agent Blake in The Secret Service before starring as Lieutenant Keith Ford in UFO.
• Gary Files as Black Phantom. According to Files, his voice roles in Thunderbird 6 were a trial run for Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons, to which he supplied numerous guest character voices.[10] More roles followed, including the regular voice of Matthew Harding in The Secret Service.
• John Carson as the impostor Captain Foster (codenamed "White Ghost"). Carson's guest appearances in the TV series The Troubleshooters brought him to the attention of the Andersons. His delivery of Foster's dialogue led to a mistaken assumption that the character was voiced by James Mason.[9]
• Geoffrey Keen as James Glenn, the president of the New World Aircraft Corporation. Keen was known to the Andersons for playing the leading role of Brian Stead in The Troubleshooters.[9]

Simon Archer and Marcus Hearn suggest that Thunderbird 6 develops the character of Lady Penelope, thanks in part to a more mature reading of her lines by Sylvia Anderson. They also praise David Graham's contributions, especially his performance as Parker, but note that some of the regular characters from the TV series, including John and Gordon, play only minor roles in the film.[11]

Examples of the Skyship One set design: the Gravity Compensation Room (left) and the Games Room (right).[9] On the left, Foster holds the International Rescue agents at gunpoint; on the right, Parker, Lady Penelope and Tin-Tin contact Tracy Island. The puppets of Thunderbird 6 were more realistically proportioned than those of Thunderbirds Are Go and the TV series.[9]

By the time Thunderbird 6 entered production, Century 21's next puppet series, Captain Scarlet, had already started filming. This series introduced a new puppet design that discontinued the caricatured look of the Thunderbirds marionettes in favour of realistic body proportions.[7] The puppets of Thunderbird 6 were modelled as a compromise between the old and new designs: the heads and hands remained disproportionately large but the overall caricature was toned down.[7][9] Most of the guest character puppets were recycled from Thunderbirds Are Go, although the Captain Foster puppet was a new creation.[7] Puppeteer Wanda Webb remembered that Thunderbird 6 maintained high standards of puppet workmanship, commenting on a scene that shows Penelope asleep: "I had placed the sleeping eyelids in Plasticine and made the eye shadow a little too blue. We ended up re-shooting the whole sequence."[12]

A number of one-off puppets with gaping mouths (showing filled-in teeth) were made for the opening sequence in which Brains' proposal to design a mere airship sends the incredulous NWAC executives into howling fits of laughter. Stephen La Rivière describes this as "a contender for the most horrific scene ever produced by Century 21".[13] The decision to place the title sequence after a cold open was one of several measures taken to distinguish Thunderbird 6 from the previous film.[11]

The Skyship One filming model was built by effects director Derek Meddings, who also oversaw the construction of scale replicas of the various locations seen in the film, such as the Great Sphinx of Giza and the Grand Canyon.[2][13] The Swiss Alps scenes called for FAB 1 to skate across the ice with miniatures of Alan and Tin-Tin following on skis.[14] To accommodate the amount of movement that this entailed, the effects team built a set 40 to 50 feet (12 to 15 m) wide; this was the largest set used for the film and was filled with salt to simulate snow.[14]

Bob Bell's art department designed each of the rooms on board Skyship One in a unique style; for example, the Ball Room contained spherical decor while the Games Room had a die and chessboards theme.[2][9] Penelope's quarters, designed by Keith Wilson, were made pink to match the colour of FAB 1.[9] Archer and Hearn describe them as resembling a "Barbara Cartland nightmare".[11] During filming, the heat of the studio lights caused the floor of the Bottle Room set to catch fire, forcing the crew to rebuild it from scratch.[2] The scene set inside the fictional Whistle Stop Inn – a railway-themed Swiss pub where customers are served meals on model trains – required careful planning and coordination.[9][15]

Some of the sequences involving the Tiger Moth, such as Alan and Tin-Tin leaving Tracy Island and Brains landing on Skyship One, were filmed with scale models. For other scenes, the production organised a live-action location shoot using a full-size Tiger Moth.[1][13][17] Joan Hughes, a ferry pilot who had flown Supermarine Spitfires and Avro Lancasters during the Second World War, was hired to fly the plane and serve as Lady Penelope's human stunt double.[13][16][17] The other characters were represented by dummies tied to the wings and undercarriage.[13] Scenes featuring live-action shooting include Brains' take-off, Penelope's struggle to control the plane, the gun battle with Foster's henchmen, the near misses with the motorway bridge and the chimney, and the crash-landing in the field.[18]

The location shoot was based at Wycombe Air Park in Booker, Buckinghamshire.[1] By the end of summer, the grass around the park had turned brown, so the effects team corrected the colour by applying green paint. Some time later, the production was informed that a local farmer's prize ram had died and that when the animal had been cut open a large amount of green paint had been found inside. Concluding that no one else could have been responsible for the death, the production apologised and compensated the farmer, and production manager Norman Foster gave the farmer's wife a bunch of flowers.[19]

The Tiger Moth glides under the bridge. This flying code violation led to a failed prosecution of pilot Joan Hughes and production manager Norman Foster.

The fictional M104 motorway was represented by the then-unfinished M40.[1][13][17] The Tiger Moth's near-miss with the bridge was filmed between Junctions 4 and 5 at Lane End on the High Wycombe Bypass.[16] Before this sequence was filmed, the Ministry of Transport and local police had told the crew that for the stunt to be performed legally the plane's wheels had to remain in contact with the ground while it passed under the bridge.[1][17][20] During one of the takes, a crosswind sprang up and the drag from the dummies caused Hughes to fear that she would lose control if the plane connected with the motorway.[1][17][20] She therefore stayed airborne, clearing the bridge by nine feet (2.7 m) as originally intended.[1][17][20] During another take, the continuing crosswind necessitated another glide, angering the Ministry of Transport official who was supervising the shoot and leading to the arrests of Hughes and Foster.[16]

Hughes was charged with seven counts of dangerous flying and Foster with three of aiding and abetting.[1][16][17] However, their trial at Aylesbury Crown Court did not take place until March 1968, by which time production had ended.[16] After a two-day hearing, during which the jury viewed the finished film, the defendants were found not guilty.[2][16][17] Commenting on his acquittal, which was reported in the Daily Express with the headline "Under The Bridge Goes Lady Penelope", Foster said that the incident had "opened the way for much greater realism in filmmaking."[16] Hughes remarked that the stunt marked the first time in her career that she had been afraid.[16]

The Tiger Moth being flown in 2017

In the time it took for Hughes and Foster's case to reach court, the Ministry of Transport withdrew its permission for any more stunts to be filmed on the M40.[1][2][17] The remaining Tiger Moth sequences were therefore filmed with a series of radio-controlled planes on a 1⁄6-scale replica of a section of the motorway.[1][2][12][17] The planes, which proved unreliable and frequently crashed, included a version that was six feet (1.8 m) wide as well as a smaller 1⁄3-scale model for shots featuring the puppet characters.[12] The M40 model was erected outdoors to reduce lighting discrepancies, with the bridge erected against a backdrop of real trees and fields to simulate the intended setting as accurately as possible.[1][2][12][17] The outdoor filming took six weeks to complete due to poor weather.[12]

Built at Hatfield Aerodrome in 1940, the DH82A Tiger Moth that appears in the film (registration G-ANFM, serial number 83604) served in the RAF before being sold to the Association of British Aero Clubs in 1953. After Thunderbird 6, the plane appeared in other films including Agatha (1978). Damaged in a crash in 1992, the repaired Tiger Moth is now a part of the Diamond Nine aerobatics squadron based at White Waltham Airfield in Berkshire.[21]

The score was recorded between 1 and 5 February 1968 at Olympic Studios at Barnes, London with a 56-member orchestra.[22] The opening credits music, which Archer and Hearn describe as "jaunty", plays over shots of Skyship One as it sits on the tarmac at NWAC headquarters.[11] The aerial shots of Alan and Tin-Tin's flight to England aboard the Tiger Moth are accompanied by a rendition of the 19th-century song "The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze". For this sequence, Lane wanted the plane's movements to suggest a "dance" in mid-air, and during the location shoot played the song on loudspeakers to inspire the stunt pilot.[14]

Composer Barry Gray preferred his score for Thunderbird 6 to that of Thunderbirds Are Go as the second film's premise of a circumnavigation gave him scope to devise a variety of themes.[23] The soundtrack was commercially released as a limited-edition CD in 2005.[24]

Thunderbird 6 was a box office failure and its poor reception put an end to plans for another sequel. In a contemporary review for the Daily Mail, critic Barry Norman described Thunderbird 6 as a showcase of "technical excellence" but also pointed out its "class-conscious" side, noting that the manservant Parker is the butt of several jokes over the course of the film.[26]

Stephen La Rivière ascribes the film's failure to a loss of public interest in Thunderbirds: by the time the film was released, the TV series had been cancelled and the final episode ("Give or Take a Million") had been broadcast over a year earlier.[6] He praises the film's visuals, writing that the Tiger Moth effects were "some of the best effects work Century 21 would ever create. It is a testament to their skill and ingenuity that, in the motorway sequence, the model shots are indistinguishable from the original."[2] However, he questions the lack of action sequences, suggesting that this was disappointing to younger viewers and makes the film "[feel] like an extended puppet version of holiday magazine programme Wish You Were Here...?"[2] He argues that this "unfamiliar air" to the film is compounded by its voice acting, which he believes sounds more mature than before (a development he attributes to the casting of new actors like Gary Files and Keith Alexander).[6]

La Rivière further argues that the use of a vintage biplane as the star vehicle, and Virgil's pun on Esso's slogan "Put a Tiger in Your Tank", would have been appreciated only by an adult audience.[2] The film's younger viewers, on the other hand, "had spent the entire 90 minutes eagerly waiting for the most fantastic piece of hardware to arrive. They got an old plane."[2] Commentator John Marriott also criticises the Tiger Moth, remarking that "the big screen was an unsuitable place for the gentle irony of steam-age technology scoring triumphantly over an array of fantasy machines."[28] Responding to claims that the tone is markedly different from that of Thunderbirds Are Go, Gerry Anderson said that as many months had passed since the last TV episode, Century 21 was "much more aware with ['Thunderbird 6] that it wasn't just a question of making a longer episode, but it was, indeed, to make something special for the cinema."[29]

John Peel is dismissive of the film, comparing it negatively to the "well-made fun" of Thunderbirds Are Go.[30] He calls it "a feeble last fling for a brilliant series" with an over-long and illogical plot, weak jokes and little action.[30] BBC Online gives the film three stars out of five, calling it a "weak and perhaps too padded adventure" whose plot has the "extended feel of a special TV episode" instead of a feature film.[31] Jim Schembri of The Age praises the story and describes the film as having a "snappier pace, with an action climax leaps ahead of anything in the latest Bond epic."[29] Writing for the same newspaper, Philippa Hawker notes an increased level of humour, stating that the film is "more self-consciously light-hearted but it's also more suspenseful."[32] The Film4 website awards three out of five, praising Century 21's decision to introduce more realistically proportioned puppets and comparing Thunderbird 6 favourably to the 2004 live-action adaptation. The review describes the film as "entertaining if antiquated" and a "a slice of kid-friendly cinema made for a far more innocent age."[27]

• Archer, Simon; Hearn, Marcus (2002). What Made Thunderbirds Go! The Authorised Biography of Gerry Anderson. London: BBC Books. ISBN 978-0-563-53481-5.
• Bentley, Chris (2005) [2000]. The Complete Book of Thunderbirds (2nd ed.). London: Carlton Books. ISBN 978-1-84442-454-2.
• Bentley, Chris (2008) [2001]. The Complete Gerry Anderson: The Authorised Episode Guide (4th ed.). London: Reynolds & Hearn. ISBN 978-1-905287-74-1.
• La Rivière, Stephen (2009). Filmed in Supermarionation: A History of the Future. Neshannock, Pennsylvania: Hermes Press. ISBN 978-1-932563-23-8.
• Marriott, John; Rogers, Dave; Drake, Chris; Bassett, Graeme (1993). Supermarionation Classics: Stingray, Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons. London: Boxtree. ISBN 978-1-85283-900-0.
• Peel, John (1993). Thunderbirds, Stingray, Captain Scarlet: The Authorised Programme Guide. London: Virgin Books. ISBN 978-0-86369-728-9.