Classic TV

Classic shows that have almost been forgotten, as well as shows that should probably have been forgotten

The Weekly Play

The Wednesday Play: The Black Stuff (1980), The Muscle Market (1981) and Boys From The Blackstuff (1982)

13 March 2013 Rob Buckley Post a comment

The Black Stuff

There have been few TV plays as influential or as seminal as The Black Stuff, Alan Bleasdale’s 1980 Play for Today which led to possibly the most famous anti-Thatcher serial of them all, Boys From The Blackstuff, which ranked seventh in the BFI TV 100 of the 20th century. Yet ironically, the play concerning a group of Liverpudlian tarmac layers on a job near Middlesbrough (‘the black stuff’ being tarmac), was actually written in 1978, a year before Margaret Thatcher became prime minister.

This original play was a reaction to Britain’s declining economic fortunes under Labour, with 1.5 million people unemployed – a 40-year high – at the time of its writing. The play featured the now-famous characters of Yosser (Bernard Hill), Loggo (Alan Igbon), Chrissie (Michael Angelis), George (Peter Kerrigan) and Dixie (Tom Georgson) coming across a group of gypsies who offer them a ‘side job’ while they’re on their properly contracted job. The gang reluctantly agree and after that, it all goes downhill…

The acclaim for the play led to the commissioning in 1981 of a play about the gang’s boss, Danny, played by Peter Postlewaite, called The Muscle Market. That was swiftly followed by the 1982 Boys From The Black Stuff, by which point unemployment had reached 3 million. Each episode focused a different member of the gang, now unemployed or in a different job. Best remembered for Yosser’s catchphrases “Gizza’ job” and “I can do that”, the serial showed how unemployment was destroying lives and how little support there was for those without work. As well as Hill and others, it launched the career of Julie Walters, who played Chrissie’s wife.

Since BBC Worldwide sucks, they won’t let me embed the video below, but head straight on over to YouTube to watch the full thing; I can at least embed The Muscle Market and the episodes of the serial itself below. As always, if you enjoy it, buy it on DVD (unfortunately, The Meat Market isn’t available on DVD).

The Weekly Play

I’m off! Plus two Wednesday Plays: Vote Vote Vote For Nigel Barton and Stand Up, Nigel Barton (1965)

5 March 2013 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

The Venetian in Las Vegas

I’m off to Las Vegas. Yes, I am, for I was married there 10 years ago on Sunday and we’re going back there to celebrate. I doubt there’ll be any 1960s-style cowboys-cum-sherrifs to see while I’m there – although there should be some gondoliers – but I’ll be off until next Wednesday at least, when some attempt at normal service might resume.

Until then, have loads of fun without me, watch good tele, chat among yourselves (and if you’re just lurking, feel free to introduce yourself to the other commenters – they’re all very nice people) and guard the blog against interlopers.

If you can’t find any good tele, here are two of Dennis Potter’s classic The Wednesday Plays for you to enjoy: Vote Vote Vote For Nigel Barton and its sequel, Stand Up, Nigel Barton, which aired just a week later in 1965. As always, if you like them, buy them!

TTFN!

Classic TV

Nostalgia Corner: Only When I Laugh (1979-1982)

14 February 2013 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Only When I Laugh

Being severely ill usually isn’t a laughing matter so you’ve got to hand it to Eric Chappell, creator of Rising Damp, for somehow managing to get 29 episodes of laughter out of a bunch of patients on an NHS ward. Admittedly it helped that the working class Roy Figgis (James Bolam from The Likely Lads and New Tricks), the middle class Norman Binns (Christopher Strauli from Raffles) and the upper class Archie Glover (Peter Bowles from To The Manor Born) are hypochondriacs, and spent more of their time misbehaving and fighting a cold class war than they did actually being ill, but it’s still a pretty impressive feat.

Running for four series on ITV, Only When I Laugh sees Figgis check into the same ward as Archie and Norman, where they almost instantly start a love-hate bickering relationship with one another, initially over who gets the bed by the window but usually about more or less anything, ranging from attractive nurses to jealous Greeks. The only thing uniting them over the show’s four series? Their mutual nemeses, the ward doctor (Richard Wilson of One Foot In The Grave) and the somewhat stereotypical Gupte the orderly (Derrick Branche from just about any show that needed an Indian-, Asian- or Middle Eastern-looking character).

While occasionally depressing, particularly thanks to the baleful theme tune (‘I’m H.A.P.P.Y.’), the show managed to find laughs in the three’s hypochondria and just about every aspect of hospital life, including hospital radio, and life itself. The final episode sees the three patients dismissed from hospital, and forced to discover whether not only are they friends but can they be friends when they no longer have their situation in common.

Here are both the first episode and the last episode for you to enjoy, but it’s pretty much all on YouTube. If you like it, don’t forget to buy it!

The Weekly Play

The Wednesday Play – God On Trial (2008)

13 February 2013 Rob Buckley 3 Comments

God On Trial

It would be tempting to think that British and US television companies no longer produce plays. However, while that is largely true – and certainly, by the 1980s, most play strands on television became film strands such as Screen One and Film on 4 before disappearing altogether – there is occasionally room in the schedules for a one-off play. A case in point is God On Trial, a BBC/WGBH Boston co-production by Frank Cottrell Boyce and starring Antony Sher, Rupert Graves, Jack Shepherd, Dominic Cooper, Eddie Marsan, Stellan Skarsgård, Lorcan Cranitch and Stephen Dillane, among others. Set during the Holocaust, it sees a group of Auschwitz prisoners put God on trial for allegedly breaking His covenant with the Jewish people by allowing the Nazis to commit genocide.

Twenty years in the making, the play isn’t easy going but it’s powerful with a great cast, so something of a must-see. Let’s hope television continues to be able to find room in its schedules – and the budget – to be able to continue making its like. As always, if you like it, buy it so that producers do have the budgets!

Classic TV

Question of the week: are you looking forward to the Thunderbirds remake?

4 February 2013 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

News of the day is that Gerry Anderson puppet show Thunderbirds is going to be remade. For those not in the know (who are you?), this saw a team of brothers go into action as part of International Rescue to save people from usually very explosive danger, sometimes with the assistance of their London agent Lady Penelope.

Here’s the first episode for you to enjoy – as always, buy it if you like it:

This isn’t the first time the show will have been remade, of course, since there was a live-action movie version a few years ago (with none other than Sophia Myles playing Lady Penelope)…

…and there was an animated series, Thunderbirds 2086, more than a few years before that.

This time, not only does it have the blessing of Gerry Anderson, it’s going to combine models with CGI thanks to those nice people who did the effects work for Lord of the Rings.

So today’s quick question is:

Are you (or perhaps your children or even your children’s children) going to watch the new series when it comes out?

As always, leave your answers below or on your own blog.