Ringo Starr's 80th Birthday
Happy 80th Birthday to Sir Richard Starkey from the Beatles! As part of his birthday and the 75th anniversary of Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends, I have four different VHS tapes that include Ringo Starr’s original storytelling of some episodes. Two of them are in the UK format while the others are in US format. The first UK tape is titled Ghost Train, which features ten episodes (all from season 2) narrated by the same person. The second UK tape is Thomas' Christmas Party, which I already covered for the tribute to Ringo’s successor Michael Angelis. In this tape, Ringo narrated eleven episodes: two from season 1 and nine from season 2. These two UK tapes were distributed by The Video Collection International (VCI) in the early 1990's.
For American consumers, Ringo Starr also re-narrated many episodes from the first two series in the US format. So the first US tape shown is titled Thomas Gets Tricked, released by Strand Home Video in 1992. In this particular video, Ringo narrated the very first seven episodes of season 1. In 2001, Anchor Bay Entertainment released Best of Percy (shown in this post) as part of the Thomas & Friends Collector’s Edition, and it features nine episodes. Ironically, Ringo narrated only one episode, Percy Takes the Plunge (season 2), while the rest of them were narrated by George Carlin for this video. In my opinion, Best of Percy could have been better if there are more episodes told by this very special Beatle. Listed below are some of its episodes that originally had Ringo’s US narration:
- Percy Runs Away (season 1) - Percy Proves a Point (season 2) - Percy's Ghostly Trick (season 2)
Interestingly, a special American Thomas & Friends DVD set, titled The Early Years, was released in 2004 to completely include all 26 episodes of the first season. For this release, all of them were actually told by Ringo Starr in the original UK format. This marked the first time for Americans to hear Sir Topham Hatt’s nickname, The Fat Controller, instead of his real name mentioned in a regular episode. In the US format, Ringo did re-narrate almost all of the first season’s episodes except one, titled Whistles and Sneezes, which was told solely by George Carlin. For that reason, The Early Years set also marked the first time to hear Ringo’s UK narration of that episode in a US release. I don’t have that DVD set but I did borrow it once from a library several years ago.
One last thing I like about Ringo Starr is that he has been living in Monte Carlo, Monaco since the 1970’s. Between 2000 and 2004, my family and I used to live in a nearby area called Cap-d'Ail. However, my father used to work within the city of Monaco. The fact that this rich Beatle and storyteller lived in Monaco is one of things that make my life perfect. I’ll never forget the childhood days when I watched Thomas & Friends told by Ringo as well as Michael Angelis at our old home. I’m so grateful that the former storyteller was born five years before the creation of the Reverend W. Awdry’s Railway Series, and he is still feeling great today at age 80. Peace and love from Sir Ringo Starr!
