The Main Characters
The four main characters appear in all the original series, as well as the later special episodes:
| Captain Andrew "Jet" Morgan |
Doc Matthews | Stephen "Mitch" Mitchell | Lemuel "Lemmy" Barnet |
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Journey to the Moon | Andrew Faulds | Guy Kingsley Poynter | Bruce Beeby (episodes 2 to 6) | David Kossoff |
| Don Sharp (episodes 7 to 18) | ||||
| The Red Planet | Bruce Beeby | |||
| The World in Peril | Don Sharp | Alfie Bass | ||
| Operation Luna | David Williams | |||
| The Return from Mars | John Pullen | Ed Bishop | Nigel Graham | Anthony Hall |
| Frozen in Time | David Jacobs | Alan Marriott | Michael Beckley | Chris Moran |
| The Host | Toby Stephens | Alan Marriott | Jot Davies | Chris Pavlo |
Guy Kingsley Poynter (who played Doc) had worked with Charles Chilton before Journey Into Space, and Chilton once commented that Poynter "was a very good poetry reader". Chilton also observed that Bruce Beeby was like his character Mitch, and was "always blowing his top".
David Kossoff asked Chilton if his character (the ship's radio operator) could be called Lemuel (a name he loved), and Chilton shortened the name to Lemmy. Chilton based Lemmy's character on himself, since he had been a radio operator in the RAF. Originally, Chilton had chosen John Glen to play Jet, but later decided to use Andrew Faulds instead, because Chilton's secretary fancied him.
David Jacobs' ability to play a wide variety of characters, each with his own distinctive voice, resulted in him playing 22 different characters during the course of Journey Into Space. He used to mark up his script using different colour pencils, to help him remember what each character was supposed to sound like. In episode 1 of The Red Planet, Jet is interviewed by a group of newspaper reporters, all of whom were played by Jacobs.
Light-hearted pranks were often played on David Jacobs just before a recording session was about to begin. On one occasion, Andrew Faulds poured a jug of water inside his trousers, totally soaking him, and he "did the rest of the programme in a raincoat!" On another occasion, some of the actors smeared mustard on his lip microphone, causing him some difficulties during the recording session.
Read more about this topic: Journey Into Space
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