Or, since I was working with Americans, The Traveler. If you already read the Bluesky thread below and just want to see the script, skip what follows and hit the button on the right.
When the news broke of Sam Neill’s death there was an outpouring of online appreciation the like of which we rarely see. Great stories from those who knew him well, great fondness from anyone who knew his work. lnvariably positive, and always expressed with affection and respect.
I held back a bit. I’d met Sam and I’d written for him, but I couldn’t claim a close friendship and I didn’t want to be one of those people who always seek to elbow their way into the photo.
But for a while now I’ve been thinking of following the example of Javier Grillo-Marxuach and creating an online archive of past material, produced and unproduced, and this Crusoe episode is one of those that I had in mind. Call this a good excuse for a trial upload. It’ll be for education, entertainment, whatever.
First the context, as expressed in my Bluesky thread:
OK, some time has passed so here’s my non-anecdote. Though Sam featured heavily in the show our only real contact was a chat on the bank of the Ouse while he waited in costume for a scene on the river. Poor guy hired to row the boat struggled with the period-accurate oars, so it took forever.
Sam was our villain, a duplicitous godparent with a financial interest in Crusoe staying lost at sea. I know it’s not in the book. But the show was pitched and sold to NBC as Pirates of the Caribbean with a man yearning to get home to his wife and child, also not in the book. I came in late and it was my job to make that work, mainly by co-opting Defoe’s own colourful life story into the character. Time was tight so I wrote Sam’s UK scenes first, to be shot in a 2-week block in and around York. Then the crew relocated to South Africa for the island and Sam flew home.
The plan was for Sam to rejoin for the final weeks. Production warned that there had better be some dramatic weight in it for him, and I said I was planning a two-part finale around a three-hander on the island. And as we were a one-season limited, I asked could I please burn down the sets.
Word came back that Sam liked the redemption dilemma I’d given him. It would be far from the pinnacle of his career but that two-parter is up there with the work of which I’m most proud. Anyone who wrote for him would probably say the same.
A couple of things to say before you read, if you plan to; the scenes in italics are those written for shooting in a block ahead of the main phase of production. In the early episodes they served as flashbacks, detailing Robinson’s backstory up to the shipwreck and his arrival on the island. By these later episodes they’ve caught up with present time. The scene with the cleric was shot in the ruins of Whitby Abbey.
And Dundee… Dundee is Crusoe’s dog, supplied by an animal handler in South Africa who swore that he was a trained movie dog who could play scenes and follow commands. He turned out to be a rescue dog acquired in haste from some shelter, looking the part but lovable and dim; his use was therefore limited, or we’d have seen more of him.
But let me assure you; Crusoe and his dog are reunited in episode thirteen, the season finale.
Click on the button to open the PDF.
