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Monday 23 May 2011

"Knock knock, open wide, see what's on the other side

Knock knock, any more, come with me through the Magic Door"
Ah this reminds me of childhood. Sitting in the kitchen watching RTE.

For those who don't know of the adorable Bosco, here's an official telling of Bosco's story from the Official website:

"Bosco was born in Donnybrook, Dublin 4, in 1978.

Bosco actually started out as an educational programme involving the puppet and two teachers. This in the words of Bosco producer and director Michael Monaghan “did not work”. With a bit of help from puppeteer Paula Lambert, the format changed to Entertainment and Bosco set off on the path to fame and ehm, what probably should have been fortune!

There were 386 Bosco programmes made in total, all of which were broadcast on RTE2 (and Network2) many, many times (the “Faulty Towers effect” that’s why you always thought there were more!). In later years, Bosco was the programme before ‘Dempsey’s Den’ and Bosco and Ian struck up a firm friendship.

Of course, Bosco had many friends during the television hay-days. There was Marian, Frank, Mary, Grainne, Liam, Peter and Bosco’s best friend Philip, who sadly passed away in 1987 and is still very much missed. There were also the hangers on and groupies; Gregory Graineog, the Spuds, the Plonsters, the Tongue Twisters. Ah yes when you’re on the box, everyone wants to be your friend.

In 1983 Bosco recorded his first 12″ LP – Bosco Sings. It did really well and had Bono worried!

But in 1987 Bosco went the way of many RTE greats, Miley, Carrie Crowley, Derek Davis, and lost his show. Not to be defeated, he shacked up with 2FM jock Barry Lang and his sidekick Majella Nolan to present Action Station Saturday on Saturday mornings. That lasted 3 seasons and you might remember Bosco had the challenging job of trying to remember the name of every child in Ireland who had been sick that week.
After season 3, things went bad for Bosco again. This was a dark time and our hero ventured out ‘ar an tiles’ a little more then recommended at that time. Luckily, the Gaiety Theatre was one of his regular haunts and Bosco developed a keen interest in theatre, realising it had so much more to offer then the 2 dimensional existence on TV (its true, just ask Carrie Crowley!).

And so Bosco took to the stage – playing the length and breadth of the country. Initially Frank Toomey joined him on the road but he went back to RTE to work on Bull Island. Maria McDermottroe (Glenroe, Killinaskully currently Gaiety panto) stepped into Frank’s shoes and then Conor Lambert.

Bosco’s new found love of live performance lead him, unfortunately, to the UCD Fresher’s Ball. Bosco kindly agreed to make a special guest performance at a student’s union event, naïve to the fact that it was a trap. After his performance, Bosco was accosted and bundled into a waiting van.

His bumbling captors dragged him across the globe, in ruthless pursuit of 5 minutes of fame, sending photos to the press every so often; Bosco at the Sydney Opera House, Bosco at the Golden Gate Bridge…

Although Bosco was in fear of his life, he soon realised his captors were, well, as Winnie the Pooh would say, “bears of very little brain” and he made his escape. The perpetrators were never brought to justice, but still, all these years later, Bosco gets letters from girls, who say the boys hang around in nightclubs using “I kidnapped Bosco” as a pathetic chat-up line.

Anyway, after a period of recovery, Bosco decided to pick himself up, dust himself off and go back to showbiz. Though a lot of people seem to think he retired years ago, we know that’s totally unrealistic with a mortgage to pay…the box and the magic door, these things don’t pay for themselves."
As you may have gathered, Bosco is an Irish childrens' tv show that was shown on RTE, which both Northerners and Southerners can get.



A nice bit o' nostalgia there. Can't say I remember it overtly, but I've definately watched it on manys an occassion when I was about 4-ish. There was a recent petition to bring Bosco back, and there's a tv show on RTE soon that I guess will be documenting the life and times of the oul thing ^^

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