FOR ME Space Race very nearly began and ended in Ilford – when the police rang with an urgent message. It was just a few days before three months of filming was due to start in Romania. The cast was flying into Bucharest. This in itself was quite a feat. One of our Russian starlets had insisted that the entire schedule was changed so that she could travel to location from Moscow by train not plane – complete with bodyguard and boyfriend. Nonetheless, the idiosyncrasies of the cast had been accommodated, locations were booked, props and sets designed, and the directors, Christopher Spencer and Mark Everest, were already in Romania with a crew – when one quiet Sunday night, our production manager, Victoria Gregory, received a call: the lorry carrying all the props for filming had vanished in Ilford – presumed stolen.
At first I could not quite take in this bizarre information. The props lorry contained countless Nazi uniforms, period Soviet and NASA space suits, a replica of the first Russian satellite and oddest of all, a life-size V-2 rocket – in pieces but when assembled all of three storeys high. It was hard to see what any thief could possibly gain from this odd – and very distinctive – assortment of items. At the same time, as series producer, it was beginning to sink in just what a nightmare we faced.
No filming could start without the props and costumes. It had taken the design team the best part of three months to build the V-2. If they had to start again, we would have to stand down the cast and crew. Yet they had been scheduled and booked in a mammoth feat of organisation led by line producer Jules Hussey. Now they would have to be re-hired. However I wrestled with the circumstances, the BBC could not afford to pay for the filming twice. It began to look as though the whole enterprise would have to be shelved. And for me that would be a great loss because we had unearthed a remarkable story.
In over a year of research we had very good access to Russian archives and had been able to explore the Soviet side of the story in full for the first time. I had long been fascinated by the mastermind behind the Russian space programme, the shadowy ‘Chief Designer’ Sergei Korolev. Such was the fear Korolev would be assassinated by Western intelligence that his real name was a closely guarded secret during his lifetime. It was as though he did not exist. He was rarely seen in public, his name never appeared in official records and he could only publish occasionally under a pseudonym. Korolev’s life seemed to epitomise the extremes and random punishments of Soviet rule – a dramatic personal story largely unknown to the West.
‘I was mesmerized when the first man was launched into space, the first probes reached the moon and the first hazy images of its bleak surface reached the earth.’
Associate producer Svetlana Palmer and assistant producer John O’Mahony had gone to great lengths to track down Korolev’s former colleagues and friends to investigate his true story. John was literally knocking on doors in the outskirts of Moscow when he had a major breakthrough. Korolev had an official biographer, Yaroslav Golovanov, who had been permitted to publish in Russia after his death. Golovanov was survived by his son, who took John into his father’s study. There, piled high, was a roomful of files, letters, personal details of Korolev, much of which had never seen the light of day.
I invariably get very excited when we can track down original primary sources. I knew Korolev had been denounced by his own colleagues during Stalin’s purges and sentenced, without a trial, to ten years’ hard labour in the Gulag where he nearly lost his life. We were able to obtain letters he wrote to Stalin from the notorious Kolyma camp in Siberia protesting his innocence and begging for his release, heartbreaking letters to his wife and even the confession he was forced to make when arrested by the NKVD.
‘Such was the fear Korolev would be assassinated by Western intelligence that his real name was a closely guarded secret during his lifetime. It was as though he did not exist’
But there were strange anomalies in his story. Despite the extremes of suffering in his youth, Korolev rose to serve Stalin with a fervour and commitment that makes little sense to Western eyes. Broken from the Gulag, and physically weakened, he emerged more driven than ever to put all his energy into something he could believe in – and in the process he led Russia to a series of spectacular firsts. These were great moments that I could recall from my own childhood. Although too young for Sputnik, I was mesmerised when the first man was launched into space, the first probes reached the moon and the first hazy images of its bleak surface reached the earth. It seemed an era of infinite possibility and to find the truth about the man who, through almost superhuman determination, created the Russian space programme against a background of enormous difficulty was very moving.
Yet this is also an unusual tale of scientific rivalry. Piecing together von Braun’s character from the threads of evidence was endlessly fascinating; amongst the team we debated each new twist that came to light. There was no doubt that he had been well aware of the horrific conditions of the concentration camp slaves building his V-2; he even helped to recruit skilled labour. How did this fit with the charismatic leader who emerged later in America? As word spread of our production, some of his former colleagues rang us up to explain just how much he was liked and respected. All this was hard to square with his past.
As the characters began to take shape, we were able to explore the true story of the space race in very personal terms, arguably for the first time, mapping it against the bigger picture of superpower rivalry and the Cold War. Above all with new records, we could show how close run the race was – right up until that final mind-bending voyage to the moon.
‘Above all with new records, we could show how close run the race was – right up until that final mind-bending voyage to the moon.’
The weeks before the shoot are invariably the most frantic – and this production was no exception. I’ve learned never to be surprised by anything – but the theft of the V-2 rocket was a bolt from the blue. After several agonising days of sightings and subplots worthy of the actual story, the props lorry was found, its strange cargo barely disturbed. The only satisfaction I could gain was imagining the look on the thief’s face when – having thought he had stolen something really valuable – he prised open the door to find he had acquired a mock-up of a V-2 rocket. The police escorted it from an industrial estate in Ilford, then began our own personal race to complete the series.