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With the General Collapse of Secondary Education

20th-26th November 2021

Hullo there!

And welcome to another Creamguide, where there’s only another three of these to go before the Christmas one, rather worryingly as it means we need to start thinking about writing it. As the nights draw in, do keep in touch via creamguide@tvcream.co.uk.

SATURDAY

20th NOVEMBER

BBC2

18.25 Dad’s Army
The big news this week was the announcement of the various programmes celebrating the Beeb’s centenary next year, including a documentary series with David Dimbleby and a Harry and Paul special which, if it’s anything like their previous jaunts through the archive, should be great fun. There’s also special editions promised of The Apprentice, Top Gear and MasterChef, whatever they’ll entail, plus also a special Strictly which must surely be the opportunity to get the Queen involved and bring us the Strictly Royal Dancing we’ve been banging on about for years. We know we sound like that bloke from the Telegraph endlessly droning on about the royal yacht, but this is how you’ll raise the nation’s spirits.

19.55 Paul McCartney at the BBC
We’re certainly celebrating the big guns on Saturday nights at the moment, this evening of Macca-related business presumably hung around the new Beatles series by Peter Jackson that’s appearing on Disney+ this week. That’s all based around archive footage from the Let It Be sessions, though we’re promised some perhaps equally rare clippage in this bumper ninety minute selection, hopefully not including the notoriously grumpy appearance on The Late Late Breakfast Show he did under duress so they’d show the video for Say Say Say. This is followed by a repeat outing for his concert from the Cavern Club from the other years and then his interview with Idris Elba first shown after the Strictly final last year.

ITV4

10.55 The Big Match Revisited
Fascinating to see Malcolm Allison touting for a job after the Palace match last week, given we now know that a few days later he got the manager’s job at Palace, and though Eagles fans may disagree one of the most interesting things about this series has been watching the Team of the Eighties gradually implode over the weeks. This week’s episode is only in an hour-long slot, but that’s not ITV4’s doing but because it was only an hour long in the first place, as we think is the case for most episodes for the rest of the season now. Fortunately, it’s not too much of a struggle to fit everything in as their main match between Chelsea and Swansea appears to have been absolutely diabolical, hence a brief-as-is-politely-possible edit.

BBC Radio 2

13.00 Pick of the Pops
We always remember when Simon Mayo used to do 1989 in the Golden Hour he’d quite frequently play Fight The Power by Public Enemy, seemingly forgetting that they mention the year in the very first line, thus rather undermining his attempts to get us to guess it. We’re not sure he ever did 1984 and played the Eurythmics song we’ll hear in the first hour, but it’s quite an intriguing chart. Then it’s 1999, which might be a bit of a slog and they’ve rather unnecessarily chosen a week when R Kelly is in the top five.

BBC Radio 4

20.00 Mercury
One thing we’re missing from the Pops repeats on BBC4 due to Rosegate is the announcement of the death of Freddie Mercury, which was thirty years ago this week. This should be quite an interesting take on the subject, as Sathnam Sanghera reflects on his position as a gay, mixed-race performer, especially in such a macho genre as hard rock, and wonders why his background never really seemed to be discussed much, and what difference it might have made had been famous a few decades later.

SUNDAY

21st NOVEMBER

BBC1

18.20 Doctor Who
Fair to say this series has been quite a ride so far, as after the success of the Sontarans episode we then had last week’s instalment which seemed to leave quite a lot of people baffled with its proudly Moffatt-esque non-linear storytelling. We can’t say we understood all, or indeed much of it, but there were some nice bits with Yaz and Dan getting to act out of character and some amusing moments, and we’re hopeful that it’ll all be tied up in due course. Should be on slightly safer ground this week, anyway, a sixties-set instalment with some Weeping Angels.

CHANNEL 5

21.00 Freddie Mercury: In His Own Words
22.55 Queen: A Night At The Odeon
Was a bit sad to see Pops proudly talking up its Queen exclusive the other week when the video was just a load of archive clips, for obvious reasons. More Fred here, first with a new doc which promises to raid the archive and hopefully not find too much that’s also going to be on the Beeb doc next weekend. After that it’s a bit of an oddity as it appears to be the concert from 1975 which was filmed for Whistle Test and has been shown on the Beeb several times since – and indeed, is going to be shown again next week – although we think this is a version that’s been suitably tarted up for DVD release.

BBC4

19.30 This Cultural Life
This is the series that’s been running on Radio 4 for the last few months, and there’s a camera in the studio so they’re putting it on telly as well. That means it’s unlikely to be the most dynamic bit of broadcasting but for half an hour of thoughtful, fuss-free, no-frills chat it should make for a pleasing way to wind down the weekend. The concept, such as it is, is that John Wilson invites noted names from the arts to talk about their influences and inspirations, and first up it’s Kenneth Branagh who discusses his favourite telly show, Boys From The Blackstuff.

MONDAY

22nd NOVEMBER

BBC2

19.30 Mastermind
We also enjoyed in the Beeb’s centenary press release that they mentioned the various sporting events next year including the Commonwealth Games and the World Cup, as if they’d been specially arranged to mark it. It is going to be a huge year for sport in 2022, mind, with the Winter Olympics kicking it off in a few months, and someone’s being quizzed on Team GB’s performances tonight. Also included are rounds on Goodness Gracious Me and, of all things, High School Musical.

BBC4

22.00 The Treasure of Abbot Thomas
These repeats of the ghost stories should indeed take us up until Christmas (although the earlier ones will have fallen off iPlayer by then, alas) and they’ve pleasingly given us the opportunity to reminisce about festive seasons past. 1974 was, televisually, probably the worst Christmas of the seventies, as the Beeb schedules had to be, in their words, “greatly amended for economic reasons” as raging inflation meant a load more repeats and imports than usual, while Frank Spencer dominated Christmas Day and the Radio Times. But enough pennies were found for this, with Michael Bryant as the lead.

Here’s a show we’re amazed we haven’t featured in this slot yet, given it must be the most famous kids’ show of all time, and was a staple of the schedules for thirty years. They’re the only kids in Britain who don’t say fuck, it’s...

GRANGE HILL (1978-2008)

When kids TV legend Anna Home took charge of childrens’ drama at the Beeb in the mid-seventies, she was eager to launch a programme that reflected modern school life, far removed from the likes of Billy Bunter and Jennings which were the most common portrayals of education on screen. Nothing seemed to be happening, though, until one day a jobbing comedy writer called Phil Redmond, a young Scouser who had penned several episodes of Doctor in Charge, came in for a meeting about a new kids’ comedy show. Neither seemed particularly enthused about it, until Redmond said he was really interested in writing drama and had been pitching a series about a school to the ITV companies – and Home found her new series. The first episode of Grange Hill appeared on screen on 8th February 1978, heralded by an immediately arresting theme tune, which was famously also used (though in a greatly inferior arrangement) by Give Us A Clue.

Grange Hill wasn’t intended to be a long runner, but the first nine-part series caught on almost immediately. Certainly it was a real departure for kids’ drama in terms of its realism, filmed in a real school and, thanks to its initial director Colin Cant who did much to pioneer its visual style, often using particularly low-level camera angles to offer a kids’ eye view. It also helped that Redmond was only 28 when it began and was one of the first generation to go to comprehensive school himself. And the casting was spot on too with Todd Carty the perfect choice as lead character Todd Carty and a host of unaffected and realistically common kids (even though most of them were straight out of stage school). Redmond himself later said he was fond of the first series but it was pretty basic and juvenile fare, though the aim was to entertain first and foremost – or as Anna Home had it, offer “entertainment with a hard core”.

And that hard edge was emphasised in later years. After the success of the first series, a second was commissioned which doubled in length, and from 1979 a familiar schedule began which would continue for some twenty years – a new series in January, twice a week on Tuesdays and Fridays (apart from 1985 when it was on Mondays and Wednesdays) for ten weeks, and then repeated in the autumn. With additional hours on air, there was more time to explore the characters and to delve closer into all aspects of life at school – including the dark side. Mary Whitehouse started to take issue with the show encouraging bad behaviour (seemingly ignorant of the fact it was always shown to have consequences) and various WIs and teaching unions complained the teachers looked like idiots, while parents wrote to the Radio Times saying they’d banned it because of the potential to terrify their kids in showcasing the less welcoming aspects of big school. But it was consistently named by kids as their favourite show on TV. So much was it talked about that in 1980 the series was followed by a special debate on the issues raised, chaired by Toni Arthur, and John Craven did something similar in 1983.

As Grange Hill continued, though, one problem arose – what happened when the familiar characters got too old and had to leave school? This required regular influxes of new blood, with a new school year arriving every series, but the audience were still very fond of the existing characters. Of course, the moment everyone was dreading was when Tucker Jenkins, the linchpin of the early days, had to graduate, so along came the first and only Grange Hill spin-off, as Tucker’s Luck followed him into the world of work (or lack of it) over three series from 1983. At six o’clock on BBC2 there was scope for some slightly more adult storylines than Grange Hill, but for the main part it was as cheerful and charming as the character himself.

Back in the school, a new generation of characters were now taking centre stage. While still contributing the odd episode, Phil Redmond was less hands-on than before and various writers were penning episodes, under the guidance of script editor Anthony Minghella, who would go on to have a very distinguished career indeed, from Grange Hill to Hollywood. The show didn’t shirk from the big issues and in 1984 came the first on-screen death of a character when Jeremy Irvine drowned. This might have been even more shocking had they killed off existing character Jonah as planned, but actor Lee Sparke left and so relative newcomer Irvine was bumped off instead. It’s still a pretty shocking moment, the direction wonderfully giving across the air of confusion and panic with its frantic cuts, and it remains a hugely memorable moment for a generation.

The mid-80s saw a big change in Grange Hill as it merged with rival schools Brookdale and Rodney Bennett – a plot which allowed the programme to change its production methods. No longer were the exteriors shot at real schools and the interiors in studios at TV Centre, as production moved to purpose-built, permanent sets at BBC Elstree with various buildings on the site now acting as the school. And after a bit of a lull earlier in the decade, the merger brought a load of fresh blood into the show with fondly remembered pupils like Gonch, Ziggy and Zammo and memorable teachers including the fearsome Mr Bronson. And we could see how it all happened in this period with a behind-the-scenes doc in 1987. This was a golden age for the show with viewing figures in this period a healthy six million or so.

Anthony Minghella was keen to point out that while Grange Hill was renowned for covering issues, it didn’t just do them for the sake of it and they only featured them when they could spring naturally out of the characters and their circumstances. Undoubtedly the most famous and contentious issue covered so far came in 1986 when Zammo got hooked on heroin, a plot so far removed from anything on kids’ TV it was followed by a special programme with John Craven and Nick Ross exploring the real stories behind the drama, with fact packs and helplines and everything. That also led to the unforgettable Just Say No single, which was a top ten hit, and a memorable trip to the White House, although the cast later suggested their behaviour was not altogether squeaky clean.

Another new generation of pupils arrived in 1988 as the show celebrated its tenth anniversary. Those who had been watching for many years might have found them all a bit familiar, as every new cohort featured numerous archetypes that were very much the modern equivalent of Tucker, Trisha, Gripper and the rest, though as the show’s audience changed every few years for most of the viewers they were all new. But there was one big change, though – a new arrangement of Chicken Man as the theme tune, and some garish new opening titles replacing the familiar sausage-on-a-fork sequence.

And then the theme was replaced altogether in 1990 with a brand new composition, to much dismay, although the new theme was pretty catchy and actually lasted longer than Chicken Man in the end. By now Grange Hill wasn’t the only drama on kids’ TV that dealt with the big issues, with Children’s Ward on ITV and then, alongside it on CBBC, Byker Grove also breaking boundaries. For a while the latter probably overshadowed Grange Hill, what with its youth club setting seeming that bit cooler and courting controversy with kids’ TV’s first gay kiss. But Grange Hill was still unique in being set somewhere all kids could recognise, and in 1992 it covered the ultimate taboo – teen pregnancy. This caused a right stink, but the programme could easily argue that by leaving it so long, it was becoming increasingly unrealistic with Grange Hill having the lowest teen pregnancy rate in the country.

The following year came great excitement as, in an inspired move, CBBC began repeating the whole series again from the very beginning, expertly timed on Sunday mornings to catch those who grew up with the series but were now too busy working to follow it. This was a huge nostalgia trip for teens and twentysomethings and a bit of a novelty for younger viewers, and it was popular enough for the repeats to continue for several years, going right up to the late eighties. It was a treat to catch up with some old favourites again, and while some of the cast drifted away from the business, many were still familiar faces on TV, and for a while it became a bit of an unwritten rule that when you graduated from Grange Hill you crossed the car park at Elstree and ended up in Albert Square in the cast of EastEnders, as this doc in 1997 reflected.

And away from the repeats, the series continued to be a staple of the CBBC schedules. There was another change in production in the late nineties as it followed its grown-up soap stablemates and moved towards single-camera filming, making for a more sophisticated end product. The main approach remained the same, but with the rise of multichannel it could never be the national institution it once was, not just among the nation’s kids but also among the army of adults who would regularly tune in.

It was time for a bit of a shake-up, and in 2003 came the return of Phil Redmond. The show was farmed out to Redmond’s Mersey TV, which also meant the school relocating to Liverpool. Unlike Waterloo Road, this wasn’t written into the plot, with Redmond saying that Grange Hill didn’t have any specific location but could be anywhere in the UK – although the numerous Scouse accents rather belied that. Under the new regime, Redmond promised “a bit more fun and a bit more comedy”, going back to its roots and aiming at the under-11s, with Redmond looking to “the Tucker and Benny generation”. And to that end, star of the new look show was “Togger” Johnson, nephew of Tucker, allowing for a headline-grabbing cameo from Todd Carty.

The new Scouse Grange Hill continued for a few years, but the mid-noughties were tough times for kids TV, with budgets slashed across the board in the shape of increased competition and the Beeb aiming its kids’ output at the under-11s rather than trying to serve everyone up to the late teens. This meant changes for Grange Hill, although Redmond seemed to have forgotten what he’d said just a few years previously about it being a lighter show when he blamed the Beeb for not letting them do the hard-hitting issues they used to and said it should probably end if they couldn’t, seemingly to absolve himself from the blame when the show was axed in 2008, just shy of its thirtieth birthday. CBBC promised they were “actively seeking out new and exciting ways of bringing social realism to the CBBC audience through drama and other genres”, but the school gates finally closed. Though Tucker and Chicken Man came back to see it off.

Like most kids’ shows, you could never replicate the huge success of Grange Hill these days when there are a million and one other things for kids to watch, and even more so for the thousands of adults who used to tune in when it was the most interesting thing on telly at teatime. But for generations it was the ultimate in kids’ TV drama, breaking boundaries in children’s television at a rate no show has done before or since.

TUESDAY

23rd NOVEMBER

BBC4

21.30 The Many Faces of Les Dawson
Funny this repeat should turn up on the same night as the One Foot repeats, because David Renwick was at one point considering Les to take the role of Victor Meldrew, although seemingly not very seriously because he always had his heart set on Richard Wilson. Although it wouldn’t have been the same, Les probably would have done a decent job of it, Renwick no doubt aware of his talents after writing sketches for him for many years, and he was no slouch as an actor and happy to challenge himself, the early days of One Foot coinciding with his memorable turn in the serious play Nona. As we’ve said before, it’s a bit of a shame that he died when he was seemingly undergoing something of a renaissance and we’re sure he would have enjoyed successful appearances on the likes of Have I Got News For You and Room 101 like Bob Monkhouse. Hence it’s always worth watching this tribute to one of the few comedians who might have done his best work on ITV rather than the Beeb.

WEDNESDAY

24th NOVEMBER

E4

22.00 GamesMaster
Here’s a blast from the past, as almost thirty years after it began, this famous old show is back. It’s quite fondly remembered, we think, certainly the first show to ever really manage to reflect the fun and excitement of gaming on TV, while for viewers of a certain age Dominik Diamond’s endless innuendos gave it a real cache, certainly compared to the eager-to-please Andy Crane on Bad Influence, and you only had to see how badly it listed when Dexter Fletcher took over to see what he brought to proceedings. Certainly, for a time at least, we enjoyed both the series and the spin-off magazine which rather remarkably continued for another twenty years after the show was axed. This new version looks pretty promising, with Trevor McDonald taking over from Patrick Moore, while on hosting duties is Rob Florence, former presenter of the much-missed gaming show VideoGaiden, alongside Frankie Ward who is, and we must flag up a bit of a conflict of interest here, an actual real friend of Creamguide and is really great. So all should be well, and we understand that some Golden Joystick winners from the past will be returning to defend their titles for a bit of added nostalgia.

THURSDAY

25th NOVEMBER

BBC4

21.00 Walt Disney
Second part of this doc looks at the original golden age of Disney in the fifties, when they were genuinely pushing the boundaries and making films that were absolutely light years ahead of what the other studios were making at the time. It’s also the era when the Disney empire started to expand away from animation, not just in live action films like Mary Poppins – which funnily enough is getting an outing on BBC1 on Saturday teatime – but also with Disneyland the opportunity to cultivate a whole world in his own image.

CBBC

17.00 Blue Peter
Damon Rose writes, regarding our Breakfast Time feature last week, “Hey, do you remember that before Breakfast Time started there were loads of TV promos in manner of ET with the fingers touching across the universe idea and BT, Breakfast Time, compelling us to get up early for the new breakfast television? Answer: course you do. You’re Creamguide. I hope Creamguide is continuing - there seems to be a smidgen of gallows humour and hints in this edition. Do not go!” Well, don’t worry, Damon, we didn’t intentionally aim to come across as particularly glum last week, and if you noticed anything different it was just because we were a bit ill and there was a day or two when we thought we might have had to send a sicknote in lieu of a proper edition. But we’re fighting fit now, and now we’ve been doing this for over two decades we’ve long passed the window of opportunity for us to jack it in gracefully while people still want more, so we have no plans to call it a day, promise.

FRIDAY

26th NOVEMBER

CHANNEL 5

23.25 1975: Britain’s Biggest 70s Hits
We mentioned 1975 last week when it was on Pick of the Pops, surely one of the oddest years in terms of the singles chart with all kinds of oddities and novelty records abounding. As we say, we wonder if a lot of that is because, due to financial difficulties, Radio 1 and Radio 2 were simulcasting for large parts of the day and so some more radical records didn’t get much airplay and some ostensible Radio 2-only records got a wider audience than before. We doubt anyone will offer up that theory here, but there might be some fun clips.

BBC4

20.00 Top of the Pops
A bit earlier than we expected, due to the episodes we’re skipping, we’ve reached Christmas Day, and despite all the changes on Pops this year the Christmas show keeps its familiar format, with no boring exclusives and album tracks but just the hits of the year – and indeed it actually features every single top five hit of 1991 with over sixty tracks in the hour, though inevitably that means quite a few get a rather subliminal outing. Plenty of studio performances too, though that means that we now get to hear all our favourite songs from January to September ruined with live vocals as well. But for all that it should be pretty entertaining and a decent summary of what we think has not been a bad year for pop, especially as 1992 is much worse.

21.00 Lindisfarne’s Geordie Genius: The Alan Hull Story
This should make for a fascinating programme, a tribute to one of the North East’s most famous musicians. Lindisfarne’s brand of folk rock enjoyed some success on a national basis, with Run For Home a fabulous bit of Ken Bruce Pop, but their songs are absolutely treasured on Tyneside, such was Hull’s wonderful ability to reflect the people and the passions of his beloved Newcastle, and the likes of Fog On The Tyne and Lady Eleanor live on, long after his sad death aged just fifty in 1995. If you want proof of that, Sam Fender, a proper current pop star who’s had number one albums and won Brit awards and everything, is only 27 and he grew up on Hull’s work and still loves it, and he presents this show and speaks to a who’s who of the North East’s most famous musicians, including Sting, Mark Knopfler and Dave Stewart.

23.30 The Old Grey Whistle Test
And to round off the week, a burst of the blues, with John Martyn in concert in the suitably upmarket surroundings of University College London in 1978. And, er, that’s your lot for this week.

And that's that...

But there’ll be another Creamguide next week, with December in it!

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