It wasn't Bosco but... (part deux)

Charm Offensive · 30-03-2006 2:03am #1

Ok, so following on from the thread about Johnson and Friends (a deeply disturbing show) I wanna see if anyone can remember this thing that used to be on Irish TV from the early to mid nineties that none of my friends can remember.

It was an Irish-made kid's program that was pretty much like a soap opera, but with puppets - weird looking puppets, albeit ones that were supposed to be humans. No talking tractors or accordians flying out of people's arses to offer advice on moral dilemmas or anything. It was set mainly in a house by the seaside - if I recall correctly there was a maritime feel to the whole thing - and I think the main male protagonist had gingery puppet hair. I seem to remember it having sorta dark spooky plotlines and looking back, though my judgement is probably clouded by nostalgia, it was very edgy.

Oh, and my memory is really struggling here, but I think it might have been in both English and Irish, or maybe some of the characters in the show talked in Irish sometimes but it was mostly in English. I seem to remember Irish being involved in some shape or form, but not to a great extent, otherwise I wouldn't have watched it. I could be wrong about that though.

Any ideas?

besty · 30-03-2006 2:08am

Did the said male character crawl around in the sand at all?
I have a really really vague recollection of this too. All things retro forum perhaps?

Charm Offensive · 30-03-2006 2:17am

Crawling around in the sand? Quite possibly, though I can't remember anything like that.

nesf · 30-03-2006 2:20am

Moved to All Things Retro. Hopefully one of them might know.

Archeron · 30-03-2006 8:04am

Robin and Rosie of Cockleshell bay made me shudder, even as a nipper, but I dont remember that being in Irish. (unless good old RTE dubbed it) It definitely had that spooky maritime feel to it though, coz they lived by the sea and their neighbour was a sea captain who had what looked like the wreck of the titanic in his front garden. They used to play in his garden and he would give them advice on various moral dilemmas. Did no-one realize how creepy these shows were?

Chris P Duck · 30-03-2006 11:27am

Rosie and Jim????

Charm Offensive · 30-03-2006 1:22pm

Archeron - that sounds like the one. Very creepy stuff alright.

Larianne · 30-03-2006 1:46pm

http://www.toonhound.com/cockleshell.htm

There's a link to cockleshell bay. And I dont think thats what Charm Offensive is talking about.

I remember the programme and there was a brother and sister (I think) and a scary, mean Aunt or some relation and I do remember a boat and a mad captain. I also remember them talking smainly in English and then sometimes in Irish.

Think it used to be on a Sunday evening??

Ruadan · 30-03-2006 3:13pm

Hang on, did the kid have a friend that was some kind of creature, but different from others of his kind, and one day the kid find out about the background of him and theres a line s.omething like " thats what...s do, we eat children" and there was a hotpress full of weird sea creatures and a strange kind of softfocus/dry ice feel some of the time? that show scared me sumthing awfull. The kid was ginger?!

Charm Offensive · 30-03-2006 3:50pm

Ok, having looked at that link it's not Cockleshell Bay I'm thinking of. Larianne - that's almost definitely the one, that brother/sister/mean aunt thing ticks all the boxes.

tk123 · 30-03-2006 7:39pm

It sounds like the Rimini Riddle to me? Def not Robin and Rosie - they lived a carefree child-puppet life!

Charm Offensive · 30-03-2006 8:45pm

RIMINI RIDDLE! That's the one!

Archeron · 31-03-2006 8:14am

Ruadan wrote:

Hang on, did the kid have a friend that was some kind of creature, but different from others of his kind, and one day the kid find out about the background of him and theres a line s.omething like " thats what...s do, we eat children" and there was a hotpress full of weird sea creatures and a strange kind of softfocus/dry ice feel some of the time? that show scared me sumthing awfull. The kid was ginger?!

Woooo, I must make a point of watching this while under the influence. Sounds like somebodys nightmare!!

tk123 · 31-03-2006 9:28am

The kid - Leo had a bizarre stuffed otter called Otto and it used to talk to him when nobody was around. They all thoughtn Leo was nuts until the christmas episode when Otto was controlling a computer or something and they could all see he could talk.

Larianne · 31-03-2006 12:55pm

Yeah Rimini Riddle. Deadly! Was quite a weird programme. Can't find any info on it though.

Roar · 01-04-2006 11:25am

the rimini riddle scared the living p!ss out of me.. as did pajo and the salty frog...

Sizzler · 01-04-2006 8:40pm

I saw one of the ex presenters in town last week....was it Philip? Hes aged badly lol

Mikosyko · 15-02-2007 9:49pm

I also remember a middle aged woman in the show. She used to wear eye covers while she slept! (how do i remember this?:o ) Also there was a story line where she was almost murdered! :eek:

Does anyone have any images or sound clips from the show?:)

tk123 · 15-02-2007 10:00pm

Mikosyko wrote:

I also remember a middle aged woman in the show.

That would be Aunt Vera - they went to stay with her when their parents died!;) God I'd love to see an episode of it again!!:D

Mikosyko · 15-02-2007 10:07pm

tk123 wrote:

That would be Aunt Vera - they went to stay with her when their parents died!;) God I'd love to see an episode of it again!!:D

Ahh yeah your right!

Ohh even a simple picture would jog my memory!

Nephew · 15-02-2007 10:18pm

Rimini Riddle, that show really gave me the creeps back in the day. I was only thinking about it last week but couldn't recall the name. Afaik it was on a saturday morning, along with Joe 90 and some other muck on net2. I'd really appreciate a picture or video of the 2 puppety things just to refresh the sheer creepiness of the show.

I think you confused the Irish talking bit with The Morbegs.

I much preferred Live & Kicking on BBC 1, but I really hated those two stupid pricks, who worked as janitors on the show. Does anyone know their names? The were both balding, one was a bit chubby, they may or may not have been brothers.

tk123 · 15-02-2007 10:30pm

Mikosyko wrote:

Ahh yeah your right!

Ohh even a simple picture would jog my memory!

How about some quotes
Older brother who's name I forget "I'm going to Jimmy Dorans"
Leo "And will it never happen again?..NEVER??" :rolleyes:

EDIT oh and nephew you're talking abt Trevor and Simon - I must say my studying is going very well this evening!

:rolleyes:

Unpossible · 16-02-2007 1:09am

I think you confused the Irish talking bit with The Morbegs.

No I think Rimini Riddle also came in an Irish version, but it was after the series was shown in english.

Wasn't "Royal blue" the magic phrase from otto?

edit: also who was that main bad guy, otto used to be one of his henchmen or something

c - 13 · 16-02-2007 8:58am

There were two of those ferret puppet things - I think otto was the main guy and there was another one sent to get the children, because otto had a change of heart ... or something.

Can we try and piece back together what we collectively know about this show because it seems impossible to find any information about it ?

- One main female carachter "Leo"
- Owns stuffed toy called Otto
- Otto has the soul/is possessed by something/one that wants to take the children ?

tk123 · 16-02-2007 11:12am

Leo was a boy!!!

c - 13 · 16-02-2007 2:04pm

IT WAS ? :eek:

That was the main carachter yeah ? or am I confusing it with the brother.
Maybe it just had a very effeminate voice.

EDIT-
This has been really bugging me today so I just mailed RTE to try and find out the production company and any other details they care to tell me. Ill let you know if they get back to me.

dabbler2004 · 16-02-2007 9:01pm

I just googled Rimini Riddle and found the following site;

www.wolfhoundproductions.nl/Pages/cv.htm

I think it means she worked on the show if I'm reading it correctly;

Claire Finn
Address:
Ijsbaanpad 117,
1076 CW Amsterdam,
Netherlands.
Phone:+ 31 (0) 20 379 2102
Mobile: + 31 (0) 6 4622 8030
Email: claire@wolfhoundproductions.nl

ACTOR - Aug 92 - Jul 94
R.T.E. (Radio Television Ireland)
Rimini Riddle - A 52 episode (30 min each) TV puppet show mixing fantasy with reality

· Played one On-Screen and 4 Voice-over characters, recording voiceovers simultaneously with the puppeteers action
· Collaborated on storyline with writer
· Learnt knowledge of basic puppetry

c - 13 · 19-02-2007 2:12pm

I just got the following reply rom RTÉ

In answer to your query,

Rimini Riddle is summarised in the database as:

A Puppet series – Three children are living in a guest house with their Aunt Vera. There is an old picture in the guest house painted by the children’s grandmother of two little girls on a beach in Victorian costume. One day while dusting one of the children, Ellen, cracks the glass in the painting and finds herself in a fantasy world, on the beach in the picture, where she meets the two little girls from the picture and also a fisherman.

There were three series, which ran…

Series 1 Starts Sep 26 1992 Episode 1 - Apr 10 1993 Series 1 Episode 26

Series 2 Starts - Sep 25 1993 Episode 1 - Apr 09 1994 Series 2 Episode 26

Series 3 Starts - Sep 20 1994 Episode 1 - ? March 1995 ?

It is written by Mary Elizabeth Burke-Kennedy and Marie Hannagan and produced / directed by David McKenna.

I’m pretty sure it was an RTE production.

That description doesnt really sound farmiliar to me anyway.

Mikosyko · 19-02-2007 6:28pm

c - 13 wrote:

I just got the following reply rom RTÉ

That description doesnt really sound farmiliar to me anyway.

Nay i don't remember the painting piece either......

Unpossible · 19-02-2007 10:20pm

Nay i don't remember the painting piece either....

I remember it, it was a big part of the first bunch of episodes, but later on it wasnt involved so much

tk123 · 20-02-2007 10:39pm

1993?! omg i feel so old now!!

Mikosyko · 03-03-2007 11:02pm

Does anyone remember the puppet in Deep Fried Swamp? Ginger puppet along with an old man, Mossy Ferguson!

"Hungry for the ball lads, hungry for the ball!!!"

30txsbzmcu2k9w · 07-03-2007 12:14pm

I remember cakin my pance on a few occasions watchin this - really weird stuff!
Anybody remember the episode where otto flips out and starts flinging knifes around the kitchen at Rory and Leo?Then they try and kill otto by cuttin his head off and stickin him in the washing machine.:eek:

For some strange reason i remember Rorys favorite band were 'The Fat Catastrophies'
Then there was Aunt Veras love interest with the snake skin belts and greasy matted plastic hair.who also turned out to be evil.

itsbillythehick · 14-04-2008 1:26am

i don't remember the painting at all, but one thing i do remember id that Vera had a little man seh drew on a piece of paper, and she talked to him a lot as if he was her boyfriend. and i remember there was another stuffed toy along with otto called Flick.
and the last thing i remember about it was at the end of one episode where vera was trying to use her computer and all the words on the screen suddenly started to morph into a picture of her old boyfriend, the evil one.

that one image is just burned into my memory. scared the **** out of me.

Dun laoire · 14-04-2008 11:16am

I vaguely remember it but did she look a bit like Bo Selecta's Scary spice???

Susannahmia · 14-04-2008 12:52pm

Charm Offensive wrote: »

Ok, so following on from the thread about Johnson and Friends (a deeply disturbing show) I wanna see if anyone can remember this thing that used to be on Irish TV from the early to mid nineties that none of my friends can remember.

It was an Irish-made kid's program that was pretty much like a soap opera, but with puppets - weird looking puppets, albeit ones that were supposed to be humans. No talking tractors or accordians flying out of people's arses to offer advice on moral dilemmas or anything. It was set mainly in a house by the seaside - if I recall correctly there was a maritime feel to the whole thing - and I think the main male protagonist had gingery puppet hair. I seem to remember it having sorta dark spooky plotlines and looking back, though my judgement is probably clouded by nostalgia, it was very edgy.

Oh, and my memory is really struggling here, but I think it might have been in both English and Irish, or maybe some of the characters in the show talked in Irish sometimes but it was mostly in English. I seem to remember Irish being involved in some shape or form, but not to a great extent, otherwise I wouldn't have watched it. I could be wrong about that though.

Any ideas?

Hmm the rimhni riddle?

Bondvillain · 14-04-2008 12:59pm

Yeah, sounds like the Rimini Riddle. Some of the Pajo's Junkbox people were involved in that, as far as I recall.

Eva Lambert · 10-07-2008 1:11am

Rimini Riddle Pictures on www.noellambertpuppettheatre.com
Click on Productions for some pictures of Rimini puppets Vera, Rory and some of the others or Click on Gallery, Find at the bottom of webpage "go to more pictures click here". Hope you enjoy

Eva Lambert · 10-07-2008 1:15am

No Irish in Rimini Riddle go to
www.noellambertpuppettheatre for pictures. Click on productions or gallery.
Hope you enjoy

c - 13 · 10-07-2008 5:49am

Thanks for those pictures ! I'd forgotten how oddly shaped their heads were

RPGGAMER · 28-09-2008 10:42am

any actual videos of rimini riddle itself?

steveone · 29-09-2008 9:02pm

rimini or padjo i'd say....

tk123 · 30-09-2008 9:04am

I never made the connection before but Aunt Vera looks like Morag from Home and Away!

The Don · 30-09-2008 10:45am

tk123 wrote: »

I never made the connection before but Aunt Vera looks like Morag from Home and Away!

I can remember thinking that when it was on. Those puppets freaked the hell out of me, never liked the show because of it and gave up watching it after a while.

yrrab30 · 08-12-2010 11:40pm

Hi guys who in RTE do i email bout this show?

the purple tin · 09-12-2010 1:44pm

Unpossible wrote: »

No I think Rimini Riddle also came in an Irish version, but it was after the series was shown in english.

Wasn't "Royal blue" the magic phrase from otto?

edit: also who was that main bad guy, otto used to be one of his henchmen or something

I remember he taught a magic spell to Leo, if he said "royal blue" to someone they would drop anything that they were holding at the time.
Those puppets still look freaky, I never forgot the really weird wispy hair.

Was it on this show or Pajo where one of the characters accidentally shot himself in the face and died. Either God or an angel(female) came and told him it wasn't his time to die yet and brought him back to life.

tk123 · 09-12-2010 2:47pm

the purple tin wrote: »

Was it on this show or Pajo where one of the characters accidentally shot himself in the face and died. Either God or an angel(female) came and told him it wasn't his time to die yet and brought him back to life.

Bloody hell - shot themself in the face on a kids show?! Only on RTE!! :pac:

misterdeeds · 09-12-2010 3:12pm

Charm Offensive wrote: »

Ok, so following on from the thread about Johnson and Friends (a deeply disturbing show) I wanna see if anyone can remember this thing that used to be on Irish TV from the early to mid nineties that none of my friends can remember.

It was an Irish-made kid's program that was pretty much like a soap opera, but with puppets - weird looking puppets, albeit ones that were supposed to be humans. No talking tractors or accordians flying out of people's arses to offer advice on moral dilemmas or anything. It was set mainly in a house by the seaside - if I recall correctly there was a maritime feel to the whole thing - and I think the main male protagonist had gingery puppet hair. I seem to remember it having sorta dark spooky plotlines and looking back, though my judgement is probably clouded by nostalgia, it was very edgy.

Oh, and my memory is really struggling here, but I think it might have been in both English and Irish, or maybe some of the characters in the show talked in Irish sometimes but it was mostly in English. I seem to remember Irish being involved in some shape or form, but not to a great extent, otherwise I wouldn't have watched it. I could be wrong about that though.

Any ideas?

mmm rings a bell for me too does the morbegs sound right?