How the spectacular Space: 1999 set the bar sky-high for TV sci-fi

Through the 1960s, the couple had scored hit after hit with their futuristic Supermarionation shows, from Supercar and Stingray to Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet and the Mysterons. So a £2.6 million production – shot at Pinewood Studios and fronted by husband-and-wife stars Martin Landau and Barbara Bain from Mission: Impossible – was a huge deal. “It was everything that Dad and Sylvia had dreamt of and probably simultaneously their worst nightmare because of the pressure involved,” Gerry’s son Jamie tells Radio Times.

“They wanted to escape the world of puppets for humans and they did it with UFO.” That 1970 show looked set for a second series after initially favourable US ratings. But production company ITC Entertainment pulled the plug, so the Andersons channelled the extensive preproduction work for "UFO2" into a brand-new project.

“It was looking like everything was going to fall over,” says Jamie, “then suddenly they managed to rescue it from the ashes and turn it into something of almost film level with these amazing American stars. But with that comes a lot of pressure – pressure on an already fractured marriage and producing partnership.”

What emerged from the turbulence was extraordinary: the design was eye-catching, the stories gripping and the special effects unbelievably good for 70s television. The hard-edged, high-contrast space shots reminiscent of 2001: a Space Odyssey were no accident. Brian Johnson, a model-maker on that film, was now in charge of the special effects on Space: 1999, a show that influenced George "Star Wars" Lucas.

So, what were Gerry’s aims for Space: 1999? “Spectacle, philosophy, exploration, all of those kinds of big, heavy, lofty aims and themes," says Jamie. And such ambition extended to the premise, which carried an environmental, forward-thinking message. It concerned the mass dumping of nuclear waste on the Moon, leading to a cataclysmic explosion that propels the satellite and the 300-plus scientists based there into deep space.

The thrills of each episode were teased in a signature "This episode" montage near the start of each story, backed by a grabby theme tune by stalwart Anderson composer Barry Gray. Ronald D Moore later employed the same taster technique on Battlestar Galactica and credited it to 1999.

The "exorbitant" premise – the result of an imposition from ITC high-ups when UFO2 was still being planned and they nixed any more Earth-based stories – was an astonishing one. And some scientifically minded viewers scoffed at it. But the set-up proved to be one of its greatest virtues.

"If you look at it in a kind of lunar way," says Jamie, "you’ve trapped characters on a barren, grey rock in a massive void. OK, well that feels somewhat limiting, but once you start looking out and go, 'Well anything might be out there, literally anything' then yes, it's enormously freeing. By escaping the Earth and its gravitational pull it definitely gave writers free rein to explore what it means to be human in an expanding, infinite universe. So yeah, what an amazing playground and lot of people played quite well and quite creatively in it."

The playing fast and loose with science – every sci-fi show does it – make perfect sense in the context of a show more concerned with firing the imagination. As writer and story consultant Christopher Penfold said in a 2002 interview: "Space fiction stories are mainly thought of as action adventure. What we were engaged in on Space 1999 was of course action adventure, but it was also 'ideas adventure'."

Penfold, one of the programme's architects, added, "We weren't afraid of big ideas in series one, it was what drove us on day to day, it gave us a huge sense of excitement."

Sylvia’s daughter Dee was 18 when filming began. “I loved visiting the set,” she says. “It was so different to the former series and I was older then so it was great fun with real actors.” She’s not sure her mum and Gerry agreed: “They were used to working with puppets who never had tantrums or answered back!”

She adds, however, “My mother was a people person. Many of the actors loved her and she was the main casting director alongside Michael Barnes. She was especially good at casting and this continued many years after with her role at HBO. She had a keen eye for talent.”

It's fascinating now to speculate on how different Space: 1999 might have been had ITC not insisted on American leads.

"She did take risks when casting," says Dee, "and sometimes got into trouble for her 'outside the box' ideas. But they mostly worked out. She had a keen eye for talent and liked actors like Albert Finney, who knew their craft and always brought depth and authenticity to the role. She would've easily cast an actor like Finney."

Over 24 episodes, an A-list guest cast lined up to appear, including Christopher Lee, Peter Cushing, Margaret Leighton, Ian McShane, Jeremy Kemp, Joan Collins, Julian Glover, Isla Blair, Richard Johnson and Leo McKern.

Many reports have emerged over the years of delays in production – most episodes overran, the pilot by several weeks – but one hold-up was deliberately engineered. Roy Dotrice, who played the conniving Commissioner Simmonds in two episodes, was surprised by Eamonn Andrews, who invited him to appear on This Is Your Life.

Dotrice provided fans with an unforgettable episode of the show. Look away now if for any reason you've not see it yet – and you really need to! Its fans include journalist Samira Ahmed. "The episode Earthbound is burned into my memory," she tells Radio Times. "Commissioner Simmonds hammering on the glass walls of his space 'coffin' when he realises he hasn't gone into hibernation!"

Ahmed, who now hosts Front Row on Radio 4 and Newswatch on BBC1, adds, "I used to watch it on Saturday mornings on LWT on my own, and was utterly transfixed by its existential crisis mood... There was a great sense of spiritual mystery and horror about it – adventures in ESP and things like that."

Ahmed taps into another appeal of the show when she says, “I loved the aesthetics and tech of Moonbase Alpha.” Many loved the look: the gleaming white panels of Alpha itself, the colour-coded sleeves of its personnel's uniforms, the clever functionality of their stun guns and comlocks, the beautifully designed but credible workhorse that was the Eagle spacecraft and the vibrancy and weirdness of the worlds they visited.

The Alphans had encounters with time warps, a black hole, their future selves, and aliens benign and homicidal. There are many stand-out stories; among them are: Guardian of Piri, in which a weird planet ensnares Alpha and even its computer in a deadly trap (production designer Keith Wilson was the hero on this one); Force of Life, where a technician is absorbed by a ball of energy that sucks all the power from the moonbase; The Last Sunset, a demob-happy instalment where the Moon gains an atmosphere; and Death's Other Dominion, blending an ice planet, a Shakespearean fool and Brian Blessed as an immortal doctor.

One outing appears on the lips of nearly all fans, including Jamie Anderson's. "Dragon’s Domain! It’s so over the top in its horror, it's so scary and is the one that gets mentioned so often. It's a great creature and is just a very punchy episode."

But then, according to Dee Anderson, "I think 'scary' sells and adds to the drama of a storyline. Space 1999 is no exception." And what was her personal favourite? "The Testament of Arcadia – the link to life on earth, maybe the original human race? For my mum, she always said it was not only about discovering the universe but the place humanity had in the universe... Her stamp was on that show and I loved it."

Space: 1999 was just getting into its stride towards the end of season one, but the immense stress on the producers took its toll. Gerry and Sylvia split, Sylvia left the show and American Fred Freiberger took over as producer for a more action-driven, far less thought-provoking £3.7 million season two. Amid a raft of drastic changes, he replaced Barry Morse as science officer Victor Bergman with Maya, a shape-shifting alien played by Catherine Schell.

Freiberger was the producer of the final and least popular season of the original incarnation of Star Trek, and fan consensus has it that his overhaul of Space: 1999 was also largely to its detriment. One infamous story that he wrote himself, about a planet of talking trees, he named after the town he once drove past, calling it The Rules of Luton.

Season two is so different to the first run in character and composition. Might it not have been better to call the show something else? "Yes," nods Jamie. "Just call it Moonbase Alpha, do something, yes!"

Samira Ahmed agrees that "Season one is better in every way, but I did love Maya best – she was like a female Spock, who had the hot Italian boyfriend [Tony Verdeschi, played by Tony Anholt]. Role model! My favourite episode was the The AB Chrysalis because it combined growing destructive threat with exploring a new planet. I loved the bouncing communication balls. The transformations were, I now see, very silly, but at the time I loved the idea of Maya transforming into a chlorine-breathing creature. It had a kind of logic!"

As for the Andersons, the show itself was unlikely to have been top of their priority list. “It was a difficult time for both of them," says Dee, "but in those days the woman was easily cancelled. And in this case it was Sylvia who was excluded in spite of her years of amazing work. She was written off as if she hadn't existed and there was no mention of how she saved the company on many occasions. Most people I speak to admit that after she was no longer involved, the series lost its soul.”

Jamie adds, "Because of the time, it was going be much more likely that of the two, the male producer would be the one to come back, if we’re honest about gender attitudes in the 1970s.

"I wonder to what degree [the breakdown in relations] brought a certain kind of cosmic chilliness, if you know what I mean... But in many ways it’s a testament to their professionalism that they managed to keep it going and actually produce this incredibly expensive, high-profile, high-pressure show."

For all their differences, it's clear that both seasons of the show attracted a galaxy of admirers. Celebrity fandom reached new peaks in 2019 when Samira Ahmed appeared on Celebrity Mastermind's Champion of Champions dressed in a yellow-sleeved Alpha costume and won outright after hitting full marks on her specialist subject (Space: 1999, naturally): “If the questions hadn’t been so wordy, I’d have answered more,” she says.

The look and feel of the future – even if the year the show was set in is now 26 years ago – have appealed to many in space-adjacent industries. Jamie Anderson has been to Nasa and the European Space Agency and met “people whose lives were changed completely by it...

"They had guys who had been sending stuff to actual Mars and they sent this mission round the Moon and they’re going, “Oh, I love the Eagle so much” and “My favourite episode was this”... Meeting them means the most to me because it means so much to so many other people.”

So who is the person he’s been most surprised to learn is a fan of the show? “Brian Cox!” The professor and documentary-maker, and his fellow Infinite Monkey Cage co-presenter on Radio 4, Robin Ince, were both guests on the Gerry Anderson Podcast in 2020. It was here that Cox said, "When I go to parties, I’m dressed as Martin Landau from season one… I had to have it made.”

Cox also summed up the intellectual appeal of Space: 1999 by adding, “One of the things that I always come back to, particularly in our live shows but also in the documentaries that I make, is this central question about what it means to be a fragile, finite human in a vast and potentially eternal and infinite universe. That is the only interesting question actually worth asking... And that’s what Space: 1999 is about, self-evidently, and it’s not an accident, I suspect. I think it is that: a serious attempt to explore some serious philosophical questions."

After her Mastermind triumph, Samira Ahmed says, "I discovered how many high-profile fans there are – Frank Skinner, Duncan Jones and I think Edgar Wright..."

Award-winning screenwriter John Logan (Gladiator, Skyfall) also turned out to be a fan, and will appear in an ITVX documentary about Space: 1999. “Dad would have loved that,” says Jamie. “From the sciences to creative stuff, there can’t be many shows that have had that level and breadth of influence."

Last September, fans flocked to the "London: 1999" celebration, where original members of cast described the appeal of the show. "We had some of the best writers of space series, with ideas that had never been seen before. That's what I liked most about it: the futuristic way these guys fulfilled a lot of dreams." That proved to be a poignant summation by Clifton Jones, aka David Kano, who died this June, aged 87.

As Space: 1999 was a co-production with Italian broadcaster RAI, it was sprinkled with Italian stars throughout the first season. Carla Romanelli, who played Melita in Space Brain, engaged fans with her enthusiasm at London: 1999 when she said, "Sylvia and the writers and all of them, they made people dream. Everybody was working to give intelligence, to give visions... What is beautiful to see is that you’re here. We are honoured that you are here with us. Thank you!"

It's clear the show ignited a passion that has never gone away. Nick Williams, chairman of appreciation society Fanderson, calls it "one of Gerry and Sylvia Anderson’s greatest creations". He adds, "To me as a 12-year-old boy it was the gateway to ‘serious’ science-fiction.

"Space welcomed me into a scientific community, as the Alphans worked out how to make the best of a perilous situation not of their making. More than in anything I’d seen before, Moonbase Alpha, the Eagles and other equipment were ‘real’, and the characters flawed and vulnerable."

Full disclosure now: Space: 1999 was also the writer of this article's favourite show. To me the programme embodied escapism in its purest form, and season one was like an anthology where every episode had a different mood, and something else to say. It opened up my world and led to friendships and fan clubs, meeting my heroes and so much more. As Victor Bergman once so memorably said while raising a glass of 60-year-old brandy, "To everything that was."

A documentary on Space: 1999 will be available on ITVX (where all episodes can be found) in late September. A 4K steelbook of pilot story Breakaway is due for release later in the year.

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