Cosmos: A Personal Voyage

For the book based on the series, see Cosmos (book).

"Cosmos (TV series)" redirects here. For the 2014 sequel series, see Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.

Cosmos:

A Personal Voyage

CosmosTC.jpg

Cosmos title card

Genre Documentary

Created by Carl Sagan

Ann Druyan

Steven Soter

Directed by Adrian Malone

Presented by Carl Sagan

Composer(s) Vangelis; various artists

Country of origin United States

Original language(s) English

No. of episodes 13 (List of episodes)

Production

Producer(s) Gregory Andorfer

Rob McCain

Running time 60 minutes

Broadcast

Original channel PBS

Picture format 4:3 SDTV

Audio format Stereo

Original run September 28, 1980 – December 21, 1980

Chronology

Followed by Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey

External links

Website

Cosmos: A Personal Voyage is a thirteen-part television series written by Carl Sagan, Ann Druyan, and Steven Soter, with Sagan as presenter. It was executive-produced by Adrian Malone, produced by David Kennard, Geoffrey Haines-Stiles, and Gregory Andorfer, and directed by the producers, David Oyster, Richard Wells, Tom Weidlinger, and others. It covers a wide range of scientific subjects, including the origin of life and a perspective of our place in the universe.

The series was first broadcast by the Public Broadcasting Service in 1980, and was the most widely watched series in the history of American public television until The Civil War (1990). As of 2009, it was still the most widely watched PBS series in the world.[1] It won an Emmy and a Peabody Award, and has since been broadcast in more than 60 countries and seen by over 500 million people.[2][3] A book was also published to accompany the series.

Cosmos: A Personal Voyage has been considered highly significant since its broadcast; David Itzkoff of The New York Times described it as "a watershed moment for science-themed television programming".[4]

Contents [hide]

1 Overview

2 Episodes

2.1 Ted Turner Interviews Dr. Sagan

3 Special edition

4 Music of Cosmos

4.1 LP and cassette

4.2 CD

4.2.1 Collector's Edition

4.3 Singles

5 Sequel

6 References

7 External links

Overview[edit]

Sagan on the set of Cosmos

Cosmos was produced in 1978 and 1979 by former Los Angeles PBS affiliate KCET on a roughly $6.3 million budget, with over $2 million additionally allocated to promotion. The program's format is similar to earlier BBC documentaries such as Kenneth Clark's Civilisation, Jacob Bronowski's The Ascent of Man, and David Attenborough's Life on Earth. However, unlike those series, which were shot entirely on film, Cosmos used videotape for interior scenes and special effects, with film being used for exteriors. The BBC—a co-producer of Cosmos—later screened the series, but the episodes were cut to fit 50-minute slots.

Sagan in the series' final episode, "Who Speaks for Earth?"

The series is notable for its groundbreaking use of special effects, which allow Sagan to seemingly walk through environments that are actually models rather than full-sized sets. The soundtrack includes pieces of music provided by Greek composer Vangelis, such as Alpha, Pulstar, and Heaven and Hell Part 1 (the last movement serves as the signature theme music for the show, and is directly referenced by the title of the fourth episode). Throughout the 13 hours of the series, many tracks from several 1970s albums are used, such as Albedo 0.39, Spiral, Ignacio, Beaubourg, and China. The worldwide success of the documentary series put Vangelis' music in the homes of many, and brought it to the attention of a global audience.

Turner Home Entertainment purchased Cosmos from series producer KCET in 1989. In making the move to commercial television, the hour-long episodes were edited to shorter lengths, and Sagan shot new epilogues for several episodes, in which he discussed new discoveries—and alternate viewpoints—that had arisen since the original broadcast. A 14th episode, consisting of an interview between Sagan and Ted Turner, was also produced. This new version of the series was eventually released as a VHS box set. This same re-edited version was also released on 12" Laserdisc, a popular consumer format at the time (a precursor to the DVD and Blu-ray Disc formats). Two episodes were released per disc, one episode on each side. The laserdiscs for the various episodes were sold separately, not in a boxed set (as was done for VHS).

Cosmos was unavailable for many years after its initial release because of copyright issues with the soundtrack music, but when it was released in 2000 on worldwide NTSC DVD, subtitles in seven languages[5] and remastered 5.1 sound were included, as well as an alternate music and sound effects track. In 2005, The Science Channel rebroadcast the series for its 25th anniversary, with updated computer graphics and film footage, digital sound, and information about relevant scientific discoveries in the intervening 25 years. Despite being shown again on the Science Channel, the total amount of time for the original 13 episodes (780 minutes) was reduced 25% to 585 minutes (45 minutes per episode) in order to make room for commercials.[6][7][8]

In a 2009 UK release, Fremantle Media Enterprises digitally restored and remastered the original series as a five-disc DVD set which included bonus science updates.

Episodes[edit]

No. Title Original air date

1 "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean" September 28, 1980

Carl Sagan opens the program with a description of the cosmos

...