Samuel Scott
Member
Taking my levels of anorakdom to new heights, having got fed up with current TV schedules full of pap which I end up watching anyway like The Only Way is Essex, Celebrity Big Bro and the like, I've bought up DVDs of some classic series and my God TV was so much better when I was a kid... so here's my list of spotted Rorty Renaults from times gone by - it's rather nice seeing cars when they were new against the backdrop and hairstyles of the correct era... perhaps some of you over the age of 30 remember a yummy mummy from Grange Hill in a 5 GT Turbo Raider or a brief glimpse of a Renault 18 Turbo in some dusty episode of Minder - if so feel free to comment. I'm not saying the following cars are stars of the show, but if you watch close enough they are all in there:
1982: Bergerac Season 2: Don't recall the exact episode but there's a stonking brand new bright red 5 Gordini Turbo showing off it's very shiny dished alloys in the high street of St. Helier -- (anyone know what happened to "A426UWP" my Gordini Turbo of over 6 years, I spent ages when I was 18 years old mirror polishing those gorgeous alloys?!)
1983: Never Say Never Again : Bond film where Sean Connery was tempted back with dodgy toupé and a $5million pay cheque - the Nicaraguan beauty Barbara Carrera, as the best Bond femme fatale Fatima Blush, zooms around in a red mid-engined Renault 5 Turbo 2.
1983: The Curse of the Pink Panther: Poor cobbled together Blake Edwards sequel with Roger Moore, this time the fabulous Joanna Lumley is blasting about in a red Renault 5 Turbo 2.
1984 Lace : It's a glossy TV mini series of a Shirley Conran novel starring the pretty lass from Gremlins, Phoebe Cates, anyway there's a brand new black Renault 25 GTS at some point, your missus and mother in law will love the story anyway and there's 6 hours of it... and Lace 2 if you're that way inclined.
1984: Bergerac Season 3 episode "Ice Maiden": Liza Goddard is great as diamond thief Phillipa Vale outwitting the police in a new red Fuego GTS along the winding Jersey roads.
1985: A View to a Kill: Another Bond film - An electric blue Renault 11 TXE or maybe it's an Electronique, it gets decapitated but I'd sooner go for the bright red Fuego Turbo driven by Alison Doody before Patrick Macnee gets throttled by Grace Jones in the car wash in a Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud.
1990: Final series of Howard's Way - OK I am not so sad to have bought DVD's of this, honest guv'nor! I saw it on some wierd channel when in Lanzarote - anyway Ken Masters drives on in a brand new Renault Alpine GTA V6 Turbo in rare electric blue I think. What caught my eye more was Kate O'Mara fresh from playing Carress, Joan Collins's sister in Dynasty, (can you believe she is 73 now!!!) - as Laura Wilde and she drives a newly launched Diamond White Fiesta RS Turbo.
1993: Taggart "Death Benefits" episode: One of the final episodes starring the late Mark McManus as Jim Taggart before the next, heavily subsidised, 20 years keeping Scottish Television in business with all the supporting cast. This features a brand new Sports Blue Renault 19 16V Cabriolet Phase II, always with the hood down and even in dark and dismal Glasgow this car looks like sex on wheels - and those Phase II soft 5-spoke alloys were something to behold back then... loved my 1994 Brooklands Green 16V 3-door! "L327HTF".
I don't think Renault UK have been much cop at product placement over the years, a gross oversight really. Famously the first series of Bodie and Doyle "The Professionals" was severely hampered by British Leyland's total indifference and unreliability, witness Doyle switching from a Dolomite Sprint to a TR7 and then back again and Cowley's yellow 3500 SD1 suddenly being replaced with a brown Austin Princess, so by the 2nd series Ford had won the contract and they played it to the hilt. A gold and silver Capri 3.0S for Bodie & Doyle, a plum Granada 2.8i Ghia for Cowley, latterly a white Escort RS2000 for Doyle... Then when Bergerac was mid-flight scarcely an episode went by without his annoying girlfriend Susan being seen in an Escort XR3i Cabriolet or his bit on the side, Philippa Vale, zipping about in an all white XR3i Cabrio.
Before anyone calls for the men in white coats, I'm actually refreshingly cool, normal and with a healthy-(ish) sex life. But I don't actually own any Renaults right now come to think of it, I've even got a Volvo 240 GLT in my collection, perhaps I do need help after all...
1982: Bergerac Season 2: Don't recall the exact episode but there's a stonking brand new bright red 5 Gordini Turbo showing off it's very shiny dished alloys in the high street of St. Helier -- (anyone know what happened to "A426UWP" my Gordini Turbo of over 6 years, I spent ages when I was 18 years old mirror polishing those gorgeous alloys?!)
1983: Never Say Never Again : Bond film where Sean Connery was tempted back with dodgy toupé and a $5million pay cheque - the Nicaraguan beauty Barbara Carrera, as the best Bond femme fatale Fatima Blush, zooms around in a red mid-engined Renault 5 Turbo 2.
1983: The Curse of the Pink Panther: Poor cobbled together Blake Edwards sequel with Roger Moore, this time the fabulous Joanna Lumley is blasting about in a red Renault 5 Turbo 2.
1984 Lace : It's a glossy TV mini series of a Shirley Conran novel starring the pretty lass from Gremlins, Phoebe Cates, anyway there's a brand new black Renault 25 GTS at some point, your missus and mother in law will love the story anyway and there's 6 hours of it... and Lace 2 if you're that way inclined.
1984: Bergerac Season 3 episode "Ice Maiden": Liza Goddard is great as diamond thief Phillipa Vale outwitting the police in a new red Fuego GTS along the winding Jersey roads.
1985: A View to a Kill: Another Bond film - An electric blue Renault 11 TXE or maybe it's an Electronique, it gets decapitated but I'd sooner go for the bright red Fuego Turbo driven by Alison Doody before Patrick Macnee gets throttled by Grace Jones in the car wash in a Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud.
1990: Final series of Howard's Way - OK I am not so sad to have bought DVD's of this, honest guv'nor! I saw it on some wierd channel when in Lanzarote - anyway Ken Masters drives on in a brand new Renault Alpine GTA V6 Turbo in rare electric blue I think. What caught my eye more was Kate O'Mara fresh from playing Carress, Joan Collins's sister in Dynasty, (can you believe she is 73 now!!!) - as Laura Wilde and she drives a newly launched Diamond White Fiesta RS Turbo.
1993: Taggart "Death Benefits" episode: One of the final episodes starring the late Mark McManus as Jim Taggart before the next, heavily subsidised, 20 years keeping Scottish Television in business with all the supporting cast. This features a brand new Sports Blue Renault 19 16V Cabriolet Phase II, always with the hood down and even in dark and dismal Glasgow this car looks like sex on wheels - and those Phase II soft 5-spoke alloys were something to behold back then... loved my 1994 Brooklands Green 16V 3-door! "L327HTF".
I don't think Renault UK have been much cop at product placement over the years, a gross oversight really. Famously the first series of Bodie and Doyle "The Professionals" was severely hampered by British Leyland's total indifference and unreliability, witness Doyle switching from a Dolomite Sprint to a TR7 and then back again and Cowley's yellow 3500 SD1 suddenly being replaced with a brown Austin Princess, so by the 2nd series Ford had won the contract and they played it to the hilt. A gold and silver Capri 3.0S for Bodie & Doyle, a plum Granada 2.8i Ghia for Cowley, latterly a white Escort RS2000 for Doyle... Then when Bergerac was mid-flight scarcely an episode went by without his annoying girlfriend Susan being seen in an Escort XR3i Cabriolet or his bit on the side, Philippa Vale, zipping about in an all white XR3i Cabrio.
Before anyone calls for the men in white coats, I'm actually refreshingly cool, normal and with a healthy-(ish) sex life. But I don't actually own any Renaults right now come to think of it, I've even got a Volvo 240 GLT in my collection, perhaps I do need help after all...
