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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Novels

   The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, a science fiction comedy series
   created by Douglas Adams, debuted as a radio comedy broadcast on BBC
   Radio 4 in 1978. Since then it has been adapted to other formats,
   slowly becoming an international multi-media phenomenon over a span of
   several years. Adaptations have included stage shows, a series of five
   books first published between 1979 and 1992 (the first of which was
   titled The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy), a 1981 TV series, a 1984
   computer game, and three series of three-part comic book adaptations of
   the first three novels published by DC Comics between 1993 and 1996.
   There were also two series of towels, produced by Beer-Davies, that are
   considered by some fans to be an "official version" of The Hitchhiker's
   Guide to the Galaxy, as they include text from the first novel. A
   Hollywood-funded film version, produced and filmed in the UK, was
   released in April 2005, and adaptations of the last three books to
   radio were broadcast from 2004 to 2005. Many of these adaptations,
   including the novels, the TV series, the computer game, and the
   earliest drafts of the Hollywood film's screenplay, were all done by
   Adams himself, and some of the stage shows debuted new material written
   by Adams.

   The title The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is often abbreviated as
   "HHG", "HHGG", "HHGTTG", or "H2G2". The series is also often referred
   to as "The Hitchhiker's Guide", "Hitchhiker's", or simply "[The]
   Guide." This title can refer to any of the various incarnations of the
   story, of which the books, having been translated into more than 30
   languages by 2005, are the most widely distributed. The title can also
   refer to the fictional guidebook The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,
   an eccentric electronic encyclopedia that features in the series. Last
   but not least, h2g2, launched as the "Earth Edition" of The Guide, is a
   website now hosted by the BBC featuring a range of user-submitted
   articles.

   Although the various versions follow the same basic plot, they are in
   many places mutually contradictory, as Adams rewrote the story
   substantially for each new adaptation. In all versions, the series
   follows the adventures of Arthur Dent, a hapless Englishman who escapes
   the demolition of Earth by a bureaucratic alien race called the Vogons
   with his friend Ford Prefect, an alien from a small planet somewhere in
   the vicinity of Betelgeuse and researcher for the eponymous guidebook.
   Zaphod Beeblebrox, Ford's semi-cousin and part-time Galactic President,
   unknowingly saves the pair from certain death. He brings them aboard
   his stolen spaceship, the Heart of Gold, whose crew rounds out the main
   cast of characters: Marvin the Paranoid Android: a manically depressed
   robot, and Trillian, formerly known as Tricia McMillan, a woman Arthur
   once met at a party who he soon realises is the only other survivor of
   Earth's destruction. After this, the characters embark on a quest to
   find the legendary planet of Magrathea and the Question to the Ultimate
   Answer.

Origin of The Guide

   The first radio series comes from a proposal called 'The Ends of the
   Earth': six self-contained episodes, all ending with the Earth being
   destroyed in a different way. While writing the first episode, Adams
   realised that he needed someone on the planet who was an alien to
   provide some context, and that this alien needed a reason to be there.
   Adams finally settled on making the alien a roving researcher for a
   "wholly remarkable book" named The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. As
   the first radio episode's writing progressed, the Guide became the
   centre of his story, and he decided to focus the series on it, with the
   destruction of Earth being the only hold-over.

   Adams claimed that the title came from a 1971 incident while he was
   hitch-hiking around Europe as a young man with a copy of the
   Hitch-hiker's Guide to Europe book, and while lying drunk in a field in
   Innsbruck with a copy of the book and looking up at the stars, thought
   it would be a good idea for someone to write a hitchhiker's guide to
   the galaxy as well. However, he later claimed that he had told this
   story so many times that he had forgotten the incident itself, and only
   remembered himself telling the story. His friends are quoted as saying
   that Adams mentioned the idea of "hitch-hiking around the galaxy" to
   them while on holiday in Greece, in 1973.

   Adams's fictional Guide is meant to be an electronic guidebook to the
   Milky Way galaxy, originally published by Megadodo Publications, one of
   the great publishing houses of Ursa Minor Beta. The narrative of the
   various versions of the story are frequently punctuated with excerpts
   from the Guide. The voice of the Guide ( Peter Jones in the first two
   radio series and TV versions, later William Franklyn in the third,
   fourth and fifth radio series, and Stephen Fry in the movie version),
   also provides general narration.

Original radio series

   The first radio series of six episodes (called "Fits" after the names
   of the sections of Lewis Carroll's nonsense poem The Hunting of the
   Snark) was broadcast in 1978 on BBC Radio 4. Despite a low-key launch
   of the series (the first episode was broadcast at 10:30 p.m. on
   Wednesday, 8 March 1978), it received generally good reviews and a
   tremendous audience reaction for radio. A one-off episode (a "Christmas
   special") was broadcast later in the year. The BBC was in the practice,
   at the time, of commissioning "Christmas Special" episodes for popular
   radio series, and while an early draft of this episode of The
   Hitchhiker's Guide had a Christmas-related plotline, it was decided to
   be "in slightly poor taste" and the episode as transmitted served as a
   bridge between the two series. This episode was released as part of the
   second radio series and, later, The Secondary Phase on cassettes and
   CDs. The Primary and Secondary Phases were aired, in a slightly edited
   version, in the United States on NPR Playhouse.

   The first series was repeated twice in 1978 alone and many more times
   in the next few years. This led to an LP re-recording, produced
   independently of the BBC for sale, and a further adaptation of the
   series as a book. A second radio series, which consisted of a further
   five episodes, and bringing the total number of episodes to 12, was
   broadcast in 1980.

   The radio series (and the LP and TV versions) greatly benefited from
   the narration of noted comedy actor Peter Jones as The Book. He was
   cast after it was decided that a " Peter-Jonesy" sort of voice was
   required. His sonorous, avuncular tones undoubtedly gave the series a
   tremendous boost and firmly established the tenor of the piece.

   The series was also notable for its use of sound, being the first
   comedy series to be produced in stereo. Adams said that he wanted the
   programme's production to be comparable to that of a modern rock album.
   Much of the programme's budget was spent on sound effects, which were
   largely the work of Paddy Kingsland (for the pilot episode and the
   complete second series) and Dick Mills and Harry Parker (for the
   remaining episodes (2-6) of the first series.) The fact that they were
   at the forefront of modern radio production in 1978 and 1980 was
   reflected when the three new series of Hitchhiker's became some of the
   first radio shows to be mixed into 5.1 surround sound. This mix was
   also featured on DVD releases of radio series 3-5.

   The theme tune used for the radio, television, LP and film versions is
   "Journey of the Sorcerer", an instrumental piece composed by Bernie
   Leadon and recorded by The Eagles on their album One of These Nights.
   Only the transmitted radio series used the original recording; a
   soundalike cover by Tim Souster was used for the LP and TV series,
   another arrangement by Joby Talbot was used for the 2005 film, and
   still another arrangement, this time by Philip Pope, was recorded to be
   released with the CDs of the last three radio series. Apparently, Adams
   chose this song for its futuristic sounding nature, but also for the
   fact that it had a banjo in it, which, as Geoffrey Perkins recalls,
   Adams said would give it an "on the road, hitch-hiking feel."

   The twelve episodes were released on CD and cassette in 1988, becoming
   the first CD release in the BBC Radio Collection. They were re-released
   in 1992, and at this time Adams suggested that they could retitle Fits
   the First through Sixth as "The Primary Phase" and Fits the Seventh
   through Twelfth as "The Secondary Phase" instead of just "the first
   series" and "the second series". It was about at this time that a
   "Tertiary Phase" was first discussed with Dirk Maggs, adapting Life,
   the Universe and Everything, but this series would not be recorded for
   another ten years.

   Main cast:
     * Simon Jones as Arthur Dent
     * Geoffrey McGivern as Ford Prefect
     * Susan Sheridan as Trillian
     * Mark Wing-Davey as Zaphod Beeblebrox
     * Stephen Moore as Marvin the Paranoid Android
     * Richard Vernon as Slartibartfast
     * Peter Jones as The Book

Books

   The books are described as "a trilogy in five parts", having been
   described as a trilogy on the release of the third book, and then a
   "trilogy in four parts" on the release of the fourth book. The US
   edition of the fifth book was originally released with the legend "The
   fifth book in the increasingly inaccurately named Hitchhiker's Trilogy"
   on the cover. Subsequent re-releases of the other novels bore the
   legend "The [first, second, third, fourth] in the increasingly
   inaccurately named Hitchhiker's trilogy."

   The plots of the television and radio series are more or less the same
   as that of the first two novels, though some of the events occur in a
   different order and many of the details are changed. Much of parts five
   and six of the radio series were written by John Lloyd, but his
   material did not make it into the other versions of the story and is
   not included here. Some consider the books' version of events to be
   definitive, because they are the most readily accessible and widely
   distributed version of the story. However, they are not the final
   version that Adams produced.

   It was not truly clear that the series was over (since it was already a
   trilogy with five books) until Adams died of a heart attack at age 49
   in 2001. Indeed, Adams said that the new novel he was working on, The
   Salmon of Doubt, was not working as a Dirk Gently story, and suggested
   it might instead become a sixth book in the Hitchhiker's series. He
   described Mostly Harmless in an interview as "a very bleak book" and
   said he "would love to finish Hitchhiker on a slightly more upbeat
   note". Adams also remarked that if he were to write a sixth
   installment, he would at least start with all the characters in the
   same place.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

   Spoiler warning: Plot and/or ending details follow.

   In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (published in 1979), the
   characters visit the legendary planet Magrathea, home to the
   now-collapsed planet building industry, and meet Slartibartfast, a
   planetary coastline designer who was responsible for the fjords of
   Norway. Through archival recordings, he relates the story of a race of
   hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings who built a computer named
   Deep Thought to calculate the answer to the Ultimate Question of Life,
   the Universe, and Everything. When the answer was revealed as 42, they
   were forced to build a more powerful computer to work out what the
   Ultimate Question actually was, but their plans never come to fruition.
   (Later on, referencing this, Adams would create a puzzle which could be
   approached in multiple ways, all yielding the answer 42.)

   The computer, often mistaken for a planet (because of its size and use
   of biological components), was the Earth, and was destroyed by Vogons
   five minutes before the conclusion of its 10-million-year program. Two
   of the race of hyper-intelligent pan-dimensional beings, who turn out
   to be Trillian's mice, want to dissect Arthur's brain to help
   reconstruct the question, since he is the last remaining survivor from
   Earth at the moment when it was destroyed. Trillian is also human but
   had left Earth six months previously with Zaphod Beeblebrox. Our
   protagonists escape, setting course for "The Restaurant at the End of
   the Universe". The mice, in Arthur's absence, create a phony question
   since it is too troublesome for them to wait 10 million years again
   just to cash in on a lucrative deal. Their new question was " How many
   roads must a man walk down?"

   The book was adapted from the first four radio episodes. It was first
   published in 1979, initially in paperback, by Pan Books, after BBC
   Publishing had turned down the offer of publishing a novelisation, an
   action they would later regret. The book reached number one on the book
   charts in only its second week, and sold over 250,000 copies within
   three months of its release. A hardback edition was published by
   Harmony Books, a division of Random House in the United States in
   October 1980, and the 1981 US paperback edition was promoted by the
   give-away of 3,000 free copies in the magazine Rolling Stone to build
   word of mouth. To this day, it has sold over 14 million copies.

   A photo-illustrated edition of the first novel appeared in 1994.

The Restaurant at the End of the Universe

   In The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (published in 1980),
   Zaphod is separated from the others and finds he is part of a
   conspiracy to uncover who really runs the Universe. Zaphod meets
   Zarniwoop, a co-conspirator and editor for The Guide, who knows where
   to find the secret ruler. Briefly reunited with the others for a trip
   to Milliways, the restaurant of the title, Zaphod and Trillian discover
   that the Universe is in the safe hands of a simple man living on a
   remote planet in a wooden shack with his cat.

   Ford and Arthur, meanwhile, fall backwards through time and end up on a
   spacecraft full of the outcasts of the Golgafrinchan civilisation. The
   ship crashes on prehistoric Earth; Ford and Arthur are stranded, and it
   becomes clear that the inept Golgafrinchans are the ancestors of modern
   humans, having displaced the Earth's indigenous hominids. This has
   disrupted the Earth's programming so that when Ford and Arthur manage
   to extract the final readout from Arthur's subconscious mind by pulling
   lettered tiles from a Scrabble set, it is "What do you get if you
   multiply six by nine?" Arthur then comments, "I've always said there
   was something fundamentally wrong with the universe."

   The book was adapted from the remaining material in the radio series —
   covering from the fifth episode to the twelfth episode, although the
   ordering was greatly changed (in particular, the events of Fit the
   Sixth, with Ford and Arthur being stranded on pre-historic earth, end
   the book, and their rescue in Fit the Seventh is deleted), and most of
   the Brontitall incident was omitted. Instead of the Haggunenon
   sequence, co-written by John Lloyd, the Disaster Area stuntship was
   substituted — this having first been introduced in the LP version.

Life, the Universe and Everything

   In Life, the Universe and Everything (published in 1982), Ford and
   Arthur travel through the space-time continuum from prehistoric Earth
   to Lord's Cricket Ground. There they run into Slartibartfast, who
   enlists their aid in preventing galactic war. Long ago, the people of
   Krikkit attempted to wipe out all life in the Universe, but they were
   stopped and imprisoned on their home planet; now they are poised to
   escape. With the help of Marvin, Zaphod and Trillian, our heroes
   prevent the destruction of life in the Universe and go their separate
   ways.

   This was the first Hitchhiker's book originally written as a book and
   not adapted from radio. Its story was based on a treatment Adams had
   written for a Doctor Who movie, with the Doctor role being split
   between Slartibartfast (to begin with), and later Trillian and Arthur.
   In 2004 it was adapted for radio as the Tertiary Phase of the radio
   series.

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

   In So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish (published in 1984), Arthur
   returns home to Earth, rather surprisingly since it was destroyed when
   he left. He meets and falls in love with a girl named Fenchurch, and
   discovers this Earth is a replacement provided by the dolphins in their
   Save the Humans campaign. Eventually he rejoins Ford, who claims to
   have saved the Universe in the meantime, to hitch-hike one last time
   and see God's Final Message to His Creation.

   This was the first Hitchhiker's novel which was not an adaptation of
   any previously written story or script. In 2005 it was adapted for
   radio as the Quandary Phase of the radio series.

Mostly Harmless

   Finally, in Mostly Harmless (published in 1992), Vogons take over The
   Hitchhiker's Guide (under the name of InfiniDim Enterprises), to
   finish, once and for all, the task of obliterating the Earth. After
   abruptly losing Fenchurch and travelling around the galaxy
   despondently, Arthur's spaceship crashes on the planet Lamuella, where
   he settles in happily as the official sandwich-maker for a small
   village of simple, peaceful people. Meanwhile, Ford Prefect breaks into
   The Guide's offices, gets himself an infinite expense account from the
   computer system, and then meets The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy,
   Mark II, an artificially intelligent, multi-dimensional guide with vast
   power and a hidden purpose. After he declines this dangerously powerful
   machine's aid (which he receives anyway), he sends it to Arthur Dent
   for safety ("Oh yes, whose?" — Arthur).

   Trillian uses DNA that Arthur donated for travelling money to have a
   daughter, and when she goes to cover a war, she leaves her daughter
   Random Frequent Flyer Dent with Arthur. Random, a more-than-typically
   troubled teenager, steals The Guide Mark II and uses it to get to
   Earth. Arthur, Ford, Trillian, and Tricia McMillan (Trillian in this
   alternate universe) follow her to a crowded club, where an anguished
   Random tries to kill her father. The shot misses Arthur and kills a man
   (the ever-unfortunate Agrajag). Immediately afterwards, The Guide Mark
   II causes the removal of all possible Earths from probability. All of
   the main characters, save Zaphod, were on Earth at the time and are
   apparently killed, bringing a good deal of satisfaction to the Vogons.

   In 2005 it was adapted for radio as the Quintessential Phase of the
   radio series, with the final episode first transmitted on 21 June 2005.

Other books

   Douglas Adams and Geoffrey Perkins collaborated on The Hitchhiker's
   Guide to the Galaxy: The Original Radio Scripts, first published in the
   United Kingdom and United States in 1985. A tenth anniversary edition
   was printed in 1995, and a twenty-fifth anniversary edition was printed
   in 2003.

   A short story was also written, Young Zaphod Plays it Safe. This story
   first appeared in The Utterly Utterly Merry Comic Relief Christmas Book
   a special large print compilation of different stories and pictures
   which raised money for the new (at the time) Comic Relief charity in
   the UK. It now appears in some of the omnibus editions of the trilogy,
   and in The Salmon of Doubt. It is almost, but not quite, entirely
   unrelated to the rest of the trilogy. There are two versions of this
   story, one of which is slightly more explicit in its already
   heavy-handed political commentary.

   A novel, Douglas Adams's Starship Titanic written by Terry Jones, is
   based on Adams' computer game of the same name, which in turn is based
   on an idea from Life, the Universe and Everything.

   Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged, a character from Life, the Universe
   and Everything, also appears in a short story by Adams titled The
   Private Life of Genghis Khan which appears in some early editions of
   The Salmon of Doubt.

   For some information on understanding the philosophy of the Guide, or
   Douglas Adams's influence on technology, see The Anthology at the End
   of the Universe, a series of essays edited by Glenn Yeffeth, published
   in 2005.

   Michael Hanlon published The Science of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the
   Galaxy in 2005. Topics include space tourism, parallel universes,
   instant translation devices and sentient computers.

   Dirk Maggs, who adapted and dramatised the last three novels for radio,
   released a collection of their scripts in July 2005, with Maggs
   providing notes for each episode. This second radio script book is
   entitled The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Radio Scripts: The
   Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phases. Douglas Adams gets the
   primary writer's credit (as he wrote the original novels), and there is
   a foreword by Simon Jones, introductions by Bruce Hyman and Dirk Maggs,
   and other introductory notes from other members of the cast.

TV series

   The popularity of the radio series gave rise to a six-episode
   television series, directed and produced by Alan J W Bell, which first
   aired on BBC Two in January and February of 1981. It employed many of
   the actors from the radio series and was based mainly on the radio
   versions of Fits the First through Sixth. A second series was at one
   point planned, with a storyline, according to Alan Bell and Mark
   Wing-Davey, that would have come from Adams's abandoned Doctor Who and
   the Krikkitmen project (instead of simply making a TV version of the
   second radio series). However, Adams got into disputes with the BBC
   (accounts differ: problems with budget, scripts, and having Alan Bell
   and/or Geoffrey Perkins involved are all offered as causes), and the
   second series was never made. The elements of the Doctor Who and the
   Krikketmen project instead became the third novel, Life, the Universe
   and Everything.

   The main cast was the same as the original radio series, except for
   David Dixon as Ford Prefect instead of McGivern, and Sandra Dickinson
   as Trillian instead of Sheridan.

Other television appearances

   Segments of several of the books were adapted as part of the BBC's "Big
   Read" survey and programme, broadcast in late 2003. The segments
   starred Sanjeev Bhaskar as Arthur Dent, alongside Stephen Hawking as
   Deep Thought.

Radio series three to five

   On June 21, 2004, the BBC announced in a press release that a new
   series of Hitchhiker's based on the third novel would be broadcast as
   part of its autumn schedule, produced by Above the Title Productions
   Ltd. The episodes were recorded in late 2003, but actual transmission
   was delayed while an agreement was reached with The Walt Disney Company
   over Internet re-broadcasts, as Disney had begun pre-production on the
   film. This was followed by news that further series would be produced
   based on the fourth and fifth novels. These were broadcast in September
   and October 2004 and May and June 2005. CD releases accompanied the
   transmission of the final episode in each series.

   The adaptation of the third novel followed the book very closely, which
   caused major structural issues in branching with the preceding radio
   series in comparison to the second novel. Because events in the second
   novel were written in a different order from the second radio series
   and several events were omitted, the two series split in completely
   different directions. The last two adaptations vary somewhat — some
   events in Mostly Harmless are now foreshadowed in the adaptation of So
   Long and Thanks For All The Fish, while both include some additional
   material that builds on incidents in the third series to tie all five
   (and their divergent plotlines) together, most especially including the
   character Zaphod more prominently in the final chapters and addressing
   his altered reality to include the events of the Secondary Phase. While
   Mostly Harmless originally contained a rather bleak ending, Dirk Maggs
   created a different ending for the transmitted radio version, ending it
   on a much more upbeat note, reuniting the cast one last time.

   The core cast for the third through fifth radio series remained the
   same, except for the replacement of Peter Jones by William Franklyn as
   the Book, and Richard Vernon by Richard Griffiths as Slartibartfast,
   since both had died. Sandra Dickinson, who played Trillian in the TV
   series, here played Tricia McMillan, an English born, American accented
   alternate-universe version of Trillian, while David Dixon, the
   television series' Ford Prefect, made a cameo appearance as the
   "Ecological Man". Jane Horrocks appeared in the new semi-regular role
   of Fenchurch, and Samantha Béart joined in the final series as Arthur
   and Trillian's daughter, Random. Also reprising their roles from the
   original radio series were Jonathan Pryce as Zarniwoop (here blended
   with a character from the final novel to become Zarniwoop Vann Harl),
   Rula Lenska as Lintilla (and also as the Voice of the Bird), and Roy
   Hudd as Milliways compere Max Quordlepleen, as well as the original
   radio series' announcer, John Marsh.

   The series also featured guest appearances by such noted personalities
   as Joanna Lumley as the Sydney Opera House Woman, Jackie Mason as the
   East River Creature, Miriam Margolyes as the Smelly Photocopier Woman,
   BBC Radio cricket legends Henry Blofeld and Fred Trueman as themselves,
   June Whitfield as the Raffle Woman, Leslie Phillips as Hactar, Saeed
   Jaffrey as the Man on the Pole, Sir Patrick Moore as himself, and
   Christian Slater as Wonko the Sane. Finally, Adams himself played the
   role of Agrajag... a performance adapted from his book-on-tape reading
   of the third novel, and edited into the series he created some time
   after the author's death.

   Tertiary, Quandary and Quintessential Phase Main cast:
     * Simon Jones as Arthur Dent
     * Geoffrey McGivern as Ford Prefect
     * Susan Sheridan as Trillian
     * Mark Wing-Davey as Zaphod Beeblebrox
     * Stephen Moore as Marvin the Paranoid Android
     * Richard Griffiths as Slartibartfast
     * Sandra Dickinson as Tricia McMillan
     * Jane Horrocks as Fenchurch
     * Samantha Béart as Random
     * William Franklyn as The Book

Film

   After years of setbacks and renewed efforts to start production and a
   quarter of a century after the first book was published, the big-screen
   adaptation of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy was finally shot.
   Pre-production began in 2003, filming began on 19 April 2004 and
   post-production began in early September of 2004. After a London
   premiere on 20 April 2005, it was released on 28 April in the UK and
   Australia, 29 April in the United States and Canada, and 29 July in
   South Africa. (A full list of release dates is available at the IMDb.)
   The movie stars Martin Freeman as Arthur, Mos Def as Ford, Sam Rockwell
   as President of the Galaxy Zaphod Beeblebrox and Zooey Deschanel as
   Trillian, with Alan Rickman providing the voice of Marvin the Paranoid
   Android (and Warwick Davis acting in Marvin's costume), and Stephen Fry
   as the voice of the Guide/Narrator.

   The plot of the film adaptation of Hitchhiker's Guide differs widely
   from that of the radio show, book and television series. A romantic
   triangle is introduced between Arthur, Zaphod, and Trillian; and visits
   to Vogsphere, the homeworld of the Vogons (in the books it was already
   abandoned), and Viltvodle VI are inserted. The film covers roughly
   events in the first four radio episodes, and ends with the characters
   en route to the Restaurant at the End of the Universe, leaving the
   opportunity for a sequel open.

   Reactions to the film were mixed, both within and outside fandom. Some
   fans felt essential elements of the humour and philosophy had been lost
   in the adaptation, and the introduction of a romantic subplot was an
   unnecessary Hollywoodism, whereas criticism from some reviewers held
   that the film had good intentions but the pacing was problematic. It is
   therefore considered by many that the humour and philosophy elements
   were purposefully slanted more towards the American market and to work
   within the confines of a roughly two hour film, and hence, the story
   was reworked by Adams as such. Commercially the film was a modest
   success, taking $21 million in its opening weekend in the United
   States, and nearly £3.3 million in its opening weekend in the United
   Kingdom.

   The film was released on DVD (Region 2, PAL) in the UK on 5 September
   2005. Both a standard double disc edition and a UK-exclusive numbered
   limited edition "Giftpack" were released on this date. The "Giftpack"
   edition includes a copy of the novel with a "movie tie-in" cover, and
   collectible prints from the film, packaged in a replica of the film's
   version of the Hitchhiker's Guide prop. A single disc widescreen or
   full-screen edition (Region 1, NTSC) were made available in the USA and
   Canada on 13 September 2005. Single disc releases in the UMD format for
   the PlayStation Portable were also released on the respective dates in
   these three countries.

Other adaptations

   Hitchhiker's has also appeared as a stage show, three LP albums with
   condensed (and slightly contradictory) versions of the first six radio
   episodes, a text-only adventure computer game, and three series of
   comic books (with a set of collectors' cards spun off containing art
   from and inspired by, the first set of comics).

Stage shows

   There have been multiple professional and amateur stage adaptations of
   The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. There were three early
   professional productions, which were staged in 1979 and 1980.

   The first of these was performed at the Institute for Contemporary Arts
   in London, between 1st- 9 May 1979, starring Chris Langham as Arthur
   Dent (Langham later returned to Hitchhiker's as Prak in the final
   episode of 2004's Tertiary Phase). This show was adapted from the first
   series' scripts and was directed by Ken Campbell, who went on to
   perform a character in the final episode of the second radio series.
   The show ran 90 minutes, but had an audience limited to eighty people
   per night. Actors performed on a variety of ledges and platforms, and
   the audience was pushed around in a hovercar, 1/2000th of an inch above
   the floor. This was the first time that Zaphod was represented by
   having two actors in one large costume. The narration of "The Book" was
   split between two usherettes, an adaptation that has appeared in no
   other version of H2G2. One of these usherettes, Cindy Oswin, went on to
   voice Trillian for the LP adaptation.

   The second stage show was performed throughout Wales between 15 January
   and 23 February 1980. This was a production of Clwyd Theatr Cymru, and
   was directed by Jonathan Petherbridge. The company performed
   adaptations of complete radio episodes, at times doing two episodes in
   a night, and at other times doing all six episodes of the first series
   in single three hour sessions. This adaptation was performed again at
   the Oxford Playhouse in December 1981 and also at the Belgrade Theatre,
   Coventry in July 1983.

   The third, and least successful stage show was held at the Rainbow
   Theatre in London, in July 1980. This was the second production
   directed by Ken Campbell. The Rainbow Theatre had been adapted for
   stagings of rock operas in the 1970s, and both reference books
   mentioned in footnotes indicate that this, coupled with incidental
   music throughout the performance, caused some reviewers to label it as
   a "musical". This was the first adaptation for which Adams wrote the
   "Dish of the Day" sequence. The production ran for over three hours,
   and was widely panned for this, as well as the music, laser effects,
   and the acting. Despite attempts to shorten the script, and make other
   changes, it closed three or four weeks early (accounts differ), and
   lost a lot of money. Despite the bad reviews, there were at least two
   stand out performances: Michael Cule and David Learner both went on
   from this production to appearances in the TV adaptation.

   Future stage production rights got tied up with the rights to make the
   film, though various amateur adaptations appeared worldwide at least up
   to 2004.

LP album adaptations

   The first four radio episodes were adapted for a new double LP, also
   entitled The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, first by mail-order
   only, and later into stores. The double LP and its sequel were
   originally released by Original Records in the United Kingdom, in 1979
   and 1980 with the catalogue numbers ORA042 and ORA054 respectively.
   They were released by Simon & Schuster's Audioworks in the United
   States in the 1980s, and Hannibal Records in Canada (the US edition of
   the first cassette carries a 1982 Hannibal Records copyright, the
   second only has Adams' 1980 copyright).

   The script in the first double LP very closely follows the first four
   radio episodes, although further cuts had to be made for reasons of
   timing. Most of the original cast returned, except for Susan Sheridan,
   who was recording a voice for the character of Princess Eilonwy in The
   Black Cauldron for Walt Disney Pictures. Cindy Oswin voiced Trillian on
   all three LPs in her place. Other casting changes in the first double
   LP included Stephen Moore taking on the additional role of the barman,
   and Valentine Dyall as the voice of Deep Thought. Adams' voice can be
   heard making the Public Address announcements on Magrathea.

   The sequel LP was released, singly, as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the
   Galaxy Part Two: The Restaurant at the End of the Universe in the UK,
   and simply as The Restaurant at the End of the Universe in the USA. The
   script here mostly follows Fit the Fifth and Fit the Sixth, but
   includes a song by the backup band in the restaurant ("Reg Nullify and
   his Cataclysmic Combo"), and changes the Haggunenon sequence to
   "Disaster Area". Some of the lines of dialogue that were indicated as
   having been cut when the original scripts from the radio series were
   eventually published, (for reasons of time etc) are restored in the LP
   version.

   Due to a misunderstanding, the second record was released before being
   cut down in a "final edit" that Douglas Adams and Geoffrey Perkins both
   had intended to make. Perkins has said, "[I]t is far too long on each
   side. It's just a rough cut. [...] I felt it was flabby, and I wanted
   to speed it up."

   Sales for the first double-LP release were primarily through mail
   order. Total sales reached over 60,000 units, with half of those being
   mail order, and the other half through retail outlets. This is in spite
   of the facts that Original Records' warehouse ordered and stocked more
   copies than they were actually selling for quite some time, and that
   Paul Neil Milne Johnstone complained about his name and then-current
   address being included in the recording. This was corrected for a later
   pressing of the double-LP by "cut[ting] up that part of the master tape
   and reassembl[ing] it in the wrong order". The second LP release ("Part
   Two") also only sold a total of 60,000 units in the UK. Distribution
   deals for the USA and Canada with Hannibal Records and Simon and
   Schuster were later negotiated by Douglas Adams and his agent, Ed
   Victor, after gaining full rights to the recordings from Original
   Records, which went bankrupt.

Interactive fiction and video games

   Sometime between 1982 and 1984 (accounts differ) the British company
   Supersoft published a text-based adventure game based on the book,
   which was released in versions for the Commodore PET and Commodore 64.
   One account states that there was a dispute as to whether valid
   permission for publication had been granted, and following legal action
   the game was withdrawn and all remaining copies were destroyed. Another
   account states that the programmer, Bob Chappell, rewrote the game to
   remove all Hitchhiker's references, and republished it as "Cosmic
   Capers".

   Officially, the TV series was followed in 1984 by a best-selling "
   interactive fiction", or text-based adventure game, distributed by
   Infocom. It was designed by Adams and Infocom regular Steve Meretzky
   and was one of Infocom's most successful games. As with many Infocom
   games, the box contained a number of " feelies" including a "Don't
   panic" badge, some pocket fluff, a pair of peril-sensitive sunglasses,
   an order for the destruction of Earth, a small, clear plastic bag
   containing "a microscopic battle fleet" and an order for the
   destruction of Arthur Dent's house (signed by Adams and Meretzky).

   In September 2004 it was revived by the BBC on the Hitchhiker's section
   of the Radio 4 website for the initial broadcast of the Tertiary Phase,
   and is still available to play online. This new version uses an
   original Infocom datafile with a custom-written interpreter, by Sean
   Sollé, and Flash programming by Shimon Young, both of whom used to work
   at The Digital Village (TDV). The new version includes illustrations by
   Rod Lord, who was head of Pearce Animation Studios in 1980, which
   produced the guide graphics for the TV series. On 2 March 2005 it won
   the Interactive British Academy of Film and Television Arts in the
   "best online entertainment" category.

   A sequel to the original Infocom game was never made. An all new, fully
   graphical game, designed and developed by PAN Interactive (no
   connection to Pan Books/Pan Mcmillan) and which became Phase 3 Studios,
   was planned and developed between 1998 and 2002, but also never
   materialised. TDV had a press release about the game in 1999.

   In April 2005 Starwave Mobile released two mobile games to accompany
   the release of the film adaptation. The first, developed by Atatio, was
   called "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Vogon Planet Destructor".
   It was a typical top-down shooter and except for the title had little
   to do with the actual story. The second game, developed by TKO
   Software, was a graphical adventure game named "The Hitchhiker's Guide
   to the Galaxy: Adventure Game". Despite its name the puzzles were new
   and different from the Infocom ones and the game followed the movie's
   script closely and included the new characters and places. The
   "Adventure Game" won the IGN's "Editors' Choice Award" on May 2005.

Comic books

   In 1993, DC Comics, in conjunction with Byron Preiss Visual Media,
   published a three part comic book adaptation of the novelisation of The
   Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. This was followed up with three part
   adaptations of The Restaurant at the End of the Universe in 1994, and
   Life, the Universe and Everything in 1996. There was also a series of
   collectors' cards with art from and inspired by the comic adaptations
   of the first book, and a graphic novelisation (or "collected edition")
   combining the three individual comic books from 1993, itself released
   in May 1997.

"Hitch-Hikeriana"

   Many merchandising and spin-off items (or "Hitch-Hikeriana") were
   produced in the early 1980s, including towels in different colours, all
   bearing the Guide entry for towels. Later runs of towels include those
   made for promotions by Pan Books, Touchstone Pictures/Disney for the
   2005 movie, and different towels made for ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha, the
   official Hitchhiker's Appreciation society. Another item that first
   appeared in the mid-1980s were t-shirts made for Infocom (such as one
   bearing the legend "I got the Babel Fish" for successfully completing
   one of that game's most difficult puzzles). Other official items have
   included "Beeblebears" (teddy bears with an extra head and arm, named
   after Hitchhiker's character Zaphod Beeblebrox, sold by the official
   Appreciation Society), an assortment of pin-on buttons and a number of
   novelty singles. Many of the above items are displayed throughout the
   2004 "25th Anniversary Illustrated Edition" of the novel, which used
   items from the personal collections of fans of the series.

   Stephen Moore recorded two of the novelty singles in character as
   Marvin the Paranoid Android: "Marvin"/"Metal Man" and "Reasons To Be
   Miserable"/"Marvin, I Love You". The last song has appeared on a Dr.
   Demento compilation. There was also another single featuring the
   re-recorded "Journey of the Sorcerer" (arranged by Tim Souster) on side
   A with "Reg Nullify In Concert" by Reg Nullify, and "Only the End of
   the World Again" by Disaster Area (including Douglas Adams on bass
   guitar). These discs have since become collector's items.

   The 2005 movie also added quite a bit of collectibles, mostly through
   the National Entertainment Collectibles Association. These included
   three prop replicas of objects seen on the Vogon ship and homeworld (a
   mug, a pen and a stapler), sets of " action figures" with a height of
   either 3 or 6 inches, a gun, based on a prop used by Marvin the
   Paranoid Android that shoots foam darts, a crystal cube, shot glasses,
   a ten inch high version of Marvin with eyes that light up green, and
   "yarn doll" versions of Arthur Dent, Ford Prefect, Trillian, Marvin and
   Zaphod Beeblebrox. Also, various audio tracks were released to coincide
   with the movie, notably re-recordings of "Marvin" and "Reasons to be
   Miserable", sung by Stephen Fry, along with some of the " Guide
   Entries", newly written material read in-character by Fry.

The origin of the towel joke

   The full version of this story was first found in The Hitchhiker's
   Guide to the Galaxy: The Original Radio Scripts and reprised in The
   Salmon of Doubt, but the short version is as follows: Adams had gone on
   holiday in Greece, but every time he had decided to go to the beach
   with his fellows, he discovered that his towel would disappear, and
   could only be found after hours of searching.

   After the holiday had ended, he decided that anyone who really had
   their life in order would "know where his towel is". He had no idea
   that this towel joke, which first appeared in the seventh radio
   episode, and subsequently in the first book, would catch on so
   brilliantly.

   He assumed, after learning that so many people liked and understood the
   joke, that he was not the only one with such an experience. After his
   death, Towel Day was established on May 25 as a tribute.

International phenomenon

   Many science fiction fans and radio listeners outside the United
   Kingdom were first exposed to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in
   one of two ways: shortwave radio broadcasts of the original radio
   series, or by Douglas Adams being "Guest of Honour" at the 1979 World
   Science Fiction Convention, Seacon, held in Brighton, England, UK. It
   was there that the radio series was nominated for a Hugo Award (the
   first radio series to receive a nomination) but lost to Superman: The
   Movie. A convention exclusively for H2G2, Hitchercon I, was held in
   Glasgow, Scotland, UK, in September 1980, the year that the official
   fan club, ZZ9 Plural Z Alpha, was organised. In the early 1980s,
   versions of H2G2 became available in the United States, Canada,
   Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Finland. The books have been translated
   into more than thirty languages.
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   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
   of authors and sources) and is available under the GNU Free
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