JAMIE (OSMONDS blow-wave and flared turn-ups) and his dog, Wordsworth (Norfolk accent and woolly hat) are tucked in one peaceful suburban night by their doting, silhouetted mother. The door closes. Silence. Then- thrusting aside the bedclothes, Jamie grabs his trusty torch and shines it onto the floor, whereupon the circle of light dissolves away to reveal a psychedelic helter-skelter which they jump down, and eventually emerge from via a hole in a tree. The theme song helpfully informs us that this is “Cuckooland”. Mayhem ensues with a variety of Yellow Submarine-style (only better) characters, like midget scientist Mr. Boo (in land-based submarine), one-wheeled police officer Gotcha, a Scottish rabbit with one enormous foot, and loads more from the menagerie-filled minds of Cosgrove-Hall.
Jamie and the Magic Torch
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Ste
April 27, 2010 at 8:45 pm
As kids we would recreate the opening titles by jumping off a fence (thus bypassing the need for an infinitely long helter skelter) onto a dartboard. The dartboard was a wound-cardboard-with-a-wooden-bull affair and didn’t last very long under the stress.
Joanne Gray
February 18, 2017 at 1:57 pm
I often wondered if he ever had difficulty getting up for school the next morning after spending all night every night in Cuckoo Land.
Tom Ronson
March 28, 2022 at 1:35 am
He was only in Cuckoo Land for about ten minutes before the helter-skelter-concealing tree turned up again and beckoned him home.