THINK ABOUT A VERY BUSY MARKET-PLACE. What's the first thing that comes to mind? The bright awnings over the stalls and the kaleidoscope of colours on barrows selling flowers and fruit? Or is it, perhaps, the noise, with boxes and crates clattering on the pavement and stall-holders yelling the praises of their wares? Or maybe you think first of the dense crowds of people milling around, looking for a bargain?
But now, think about the same market at night, when everyone has gone home and the stalls are bare. The lightest footfall echoes through the empty market-place and strange shadows dance across the littered ground. It could be pretty spooky, alone there in the dark.
Watney
Street Market, off the Commercial Road in the London district of Wapping, is
the setting for Thames Television's new Ace Of Wands series, beginning next
Wednesday in all regions. For the purposes of the story, it's certainly a sinister
place, supposed to be haunted by the ghost of a long-dead miser, a restless,
evil spirit whose nightly wanderings turn fresh food rotten overnight and send
ornaments and crockery crashing to the floor.
As
before, 'Tarot' the master magician is played by Michael Mackenzie, whom you
may remember reading about in LOOK-IN, last July. But 'Lulli', and 'Sam', his
assistants in the previous series have left him. 'Lulli', we learn, is now married,
and 'Sam' has gone into road haulage.
There's danger in plenty, to both mind and body, in the sinister market, so Tarot soon enlists the aid of two young helpers, 'Mikki' (played by Petra Markham) and 'Chas' (played by Roy Holder), a brother and sister who live in the market and are anxious to save it from possible demolition.
"'Mikki'," says Petra Markham, whom you may remember as 'Lydia', the youngest daughter of a Victorian family in the comedy series ALBERT AND VICTORIA, " is a bit scatty. She's romantic and dreamy-a bit like me." 'Mikki' is also psychic: sometimes she gets a brief glimpse of the future.
"I don't really know whether I believe in the supernatural or not," says Petra. "I've had one or two dreams which seem to have foretold coming events -and last year I had my fortune told with Tarot cards (the ancient fortune-telling picture cards from which 'Tarot' takes his name), which turned up several correct prophecies."
Roy Holder, who plays 'Chas', is more definite."I think there must be something in the supernatural. After all, thousands of strange happenings are reported-and only one needs to be true to show that it's not all a load of rubbish. Like many actors, I'm very superstitious. When I was filming in Singapore and India, I had my palm read by Eastern fortune-tellers, but I'm afraid I only listened to the good things they told me."
But Roy has an even stronger reason for believing that there may be some truth in 'magic'. "One of my neighbours, an old lady, often visits a gypsy fortune-teller. Some time ago, she warned me that the fortune teller had told her that a local house would be burgled and that 'the dogs would not bark'.
"A few weeks later, I was invited to a party given by the landlord of a local pub. While we were all having a good time downstairs, thieves broke into the rooms above and stole £250. And the landlord's two ferocious alsatians, kept specially as guard dogs, didn't utter so much as a yelp!"
And that just goes to show, there might be more to the mystery and magic of 'Ace of Wands' than meets the eye.
This
was the cover-article of this particular edition. To see a larger version of
the cover, click on the image or go to the archives
section.
Thanks to John Chenery for the transcription and scans.