''Tomorrow, Today!'' was a radio

sitcom A sitcom (short for situation comedy or situational comedy) is a genre of comedy produced for radio and television, that centers on a recurring cast of character (arts), characters as they navigate humorous situations within a consistent settin ...

written by Christopher William Hill, broadcast on

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. The station replaced the BBC Home Service on 30 September 1967 and broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes from the BBC's headquarters at Broadcasti ...

between 2006 and 2008. It is itself a spoof of radio

science fiction Science fiction (often shortened to sci-fi or abbreviated SF) is a genre of speculative fiction that deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts. These concepts may include information technology and robotics, biological manipulations, space ...

dramas of the late 1950s and early 1960s. The writer is Christopher William Hill. The sitcom takes place in a BBC studio in 1961, where a group of "bright young things" and aging actors produce a futuristic drama set in the year 2006, containing space flight, ray guns, and contact with aliens. The lead roles are played by Nigel Lavery (

Peter Bowles Peter John Bowles (16 October 1936 – 17 March 2022) was an English screen and stage actor. He gained prominence for television dramas such as '' Callan: A Magnum for Schneider'' and '' I, Claudius''. He is best remembered for his roles in sit ...

) and Sylvia Hann (

Cheryl Campbell Cheryl Campbell (born 22 May 1949) is an English actress. She starred opposite Bob Hoskins in the 1978 BBC drama '' Pennies From Heaven'', before going on to win the 1980 BAFTA TV Award for Best Actress for '' Testament of Youth'' and ''Malice ...

) who hate their jobs only slightly more than they hate each other. Their off-mike conversations are laced with carping comments and innuendo about each other's long-lost youth and popularity. Sylvia was once the voice of "

Listen with Mother ''Listen with Mother'' was a BBC radio programme for children which ran between 16 January 1950 and 10 September 1982. It was originally produced by Freda Lingstrom although for the majority of its run it was produced by George Dixon, and was p ...

". The "comic relief" for the radio production is provided by a stereotypical Welshman, "Taffy" Jones, played by a non-Welsh actor, Douglas Bennings (

Jon Glover Jonathan Philip Glover (born 26 December 1952) is an English actor. He has appeared in various television programmes including '' Play School'', '' Survivors'', the Management consultant in ''The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'', ''Casualty' ...

). Both series are regularly rebroadcast on

Radio 4 Extra BBC Radio 4 Extra (formerly BBC Radio 7) is a British Digital radio in the United Kingdom, digital Radio broadcasting, radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It mostly broadcasts archived repeats of comedy, drama and documentary program ...

Plot

The show is about to be terminated, much to the relief of the contractually committed leads. However, the BBC decides that thanks to the Soviet Union's apparent lead in space travel, national morale requires it to continue with a new pro-British, anti-Soviet slant. Writer and producer Hugo Kellerman (

Joseph Kloska Joseph Anthony Kloska (born 1983) is an English actor. He began his career in radio, moving on to work in television, theatre, and film. Life Named after a Polish grandfather, Teofil Joseph Kloska, who had settled in England, Kloska was brought ...

) introduces new aliens with a Communist philosophy and has them do battle with his heroes. BBC executive Godfrey Winnard (

John Fortune John Courtney Fortune (born John Courtney Wood; 30 June 1939 – 31 December 2013) was an English actor, writer and satirist, best known for his work with John Bird and Rory Bremner on the television series '' Bremner, Bird and Fortune''. Ea ...

) watches over the new production and keeps adding new elements to the mix, such as a member of the

Royal Shakespeare Company The Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) is a major British theatre company, based in Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England. The company employs over 1,000 staff and opens around 20 productions a year. The RSC plays regularly in London, Stratf ...

(

Leslie Phillips Leslie Samuel Phillips (20 April 1924 – 7 November 2022) was an English actor. He achieved prominence in the 1950s, playing smooth, upper-class comic roles utilising his "Ding dong" and "Hello" catchphrases. He appeared in the '' Carry On'' ...

) brought in to play an

android Android most commonly refers to: *Android (robot), a humanoid robot or synthetic organism designed to imitate a human * Android (operating system), a mobile operating system primarily developed by Google * Android TV, a operating system developed ...

. In the second series, set in 1962, Hugo is commissioned to devise a science fiction series for children's television and, thanks to a series of mishaps on the way to the Television Centre, has the idea for "Professor Fabula and the Diloks," featuring a scientist who travels through time and space in a police call box, accompanied by a robotic dog. However, the idea is squelched due to salacious interpretations of the Professor's status as a single man wandering in time and space with a dog. In the final episode of the second series, the entire production relocates to Wales as the

Cuban Missile Crisis The Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as the October Crisis () in Cuba, or the Caribbean Crisis (), was a 13-day confrontation between the governments of the United States and the Soviet Union, when American deployments of Nuclear weapons d ...

threatens to cause a holocaust. There, they discover that Jones, killed off and replaced by an equally stereotypical Scot (also voiced by Douglas), was immensely popular among the locals. Faced with mobs of angry Welsh fans calling him "Taffy killer," Hugo writes in a resurrection for the character, but Douglas's "more authentic" reading of the part causes the disgusted locals to cut power to the studio, which the team interprets as the arrival of Armageddon.

External links

* *{{British Comedy Guide, radio, tomorrow_today BBC Radio comedy programmes BBC Radio 4 programmes 2006 radio programme debuts Fiction set in 2006