P-Q
3/3
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PACKET OF THREE to PICTURE BOX
PIE IN THE SKY to POSTMAN PAT
POT BLACK to QUIZ BALL
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WHISPERING TED LOWE and his "just behind the green" black and white accounting shenanigans were chief in this Matchroom-helmed flowering of snooker, wherein assorted postman types and Australians indulged in hours of safety play, introduced by ALAN WEEKS after another from the wide selection of classic BBC sporting theme tunes, Ivory Rag. And while people complain about the lack of characters in today's game, the early days were very much lacking in true star quality - Alex Higgins was fast and flamboyant, Ray Reardon had odd teeth, and that's about it. JUNIOR POT BLACK later arrived to field a number of gawky future stars in badly measured outfits.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...90S REVIVAL POT BLACK TIMEFRAME FOUND EAMONN HOLMES WIELDING THE LESS-THAN-BON MOTS
FIRST ARTHUR LOWE then ROBIN BAILEY was your eponymous curmudgeonly old curmudgeon with amiable mate insulting shopkeepers, landlords and numerous landed gentry. "Potter Mints - the hotter mints. I'm a respected face round here!"
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."I NEVER KNEW THINGS STUCK IN YOUR BRISKET!"
POTTER'S PICTURE PALACE
(1976-8)
BBC
PRE-NATIONWIDE CARRY-ON of a kids comedy series set in an old cinema, concening the titular Potter (EDEN PHILLIPS) and his attempts to inherit the titular picture palace which is rightfully his. Professor Phil Redmond "sagged off" from GRANGE HILL to pen a couple of episodes.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...CO-STARRING MELVYN HAYES AS, ER, "MELVYN"
MICHAEL BENTINE'S POTTY TIME
(1974-80)
THAMES
EX-GOON AND Square-worlder played avuncular host to the Potties: short, squat, neckless bickering puppets reconstructing mighty moments from world history (see MIGHTY MOMENTS FROM WORLD HISTORY) with little regard for facts or coherence. Featured durable double-act Big Potty and Little Potty. Thousands of episodes made, inevitably lapsing into glorious parody along the way: On The Pirate Buses, Pottdark etc.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."THANK YOU, PROFESSOR!"
CUTTHROAT CHICANERY and dastardly derring-do in the alluring, nefarious world of budget airline manufacture. Unlike the bulk of its supposedly internationally renowned fleet, somehow the series got off the ground and piloted a perfunctory course to the end of the 60s before nosing to standstill when its star, PATRICK WYMARK, copped it. Admittedly this longevity was helped by the fact a) its storylines quickly switched from boring discussions about wingspan to eye-bulging barneys in the boardroom and gap-toothed mutterings on the shopfloor, and b) its name quickly switched to The Power Game from the rather insufferable The Plane Makers. Meanwhile BARBARA MURRAY did a fine turn as the boss's missus, while JACK WATLING, REGINALD MARSH, PETER BARKWORTH and CLIFFORD EVANS tried to make monologues about petroleum distillate sound thrilling.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."IF ONLY THOSE BLASTED ARABS WOULD LET US HAVE SOME OF THEIR OIL; WE ALL LIVE ON THE SAME PLANET, Y'KNOW!"
THE POWER OF MEMORY
(1983)
BBC
YET MORE sleep-inducing sophistry for a Sunday morning: sub-de Bono lectures from a Canadian dullard purporting to give us the techniques to "achieve total memory." Can't remember anything else about it.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."NOW, I WOULD IMAGINE A HORSE, TO REPRESENT THE NUMBER SEVEN." WHY NOT JUST IMAGINE THE NUMBER SEVEN?
THE POWERS OF MATTHEW STAR
(1982)
NBC
TRIVIAL TALE OF an alien prince (as in BENJI) sent to Earth with guardian (LOU GOSSETT) to engage in plenty of sub-Superman schoolboy telekenisis junketry.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...SUPPOSED "HIGH SCHOOL" STAR SUFFERED FROM WHAT IS COMMONLY TERMED THE "PLEASE SIR! SYNDROME"
SUMMERTIME STAND-IN for SONGS OF PRAISE, hosted by THORA HIRD from an oversized armchair in her "home" surrounded by numerous religious trinkets, baubles, bangles and beads. Basically a clip show of ver Praise with the Dame cueing in "requests" from viewers. "A lot of you wrote in asking to see again that wonderfully inspiring performance of Sing Hosannah To The King from that delightfully kept church of St Peter-in-the-Midden in Wessexshire." Our host would drop in a few gossipy asides, pick her own faves from the archives, tearfully clutch real "letters" from fans, and introduce classic interviews between ROGER ROYLE and (usually) CLIFF RICHARD. Running order would be printed in Radio Times, thereby removing - for those who cared - all element of surprise ("Oh no, and I was hoping for Abide With Me this week!")
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...SAINTED AUNT
HER OFF of Absolutely Fabulous, him off of Hotel Babylon, the geeky one from Trevor's World of Sport, the affable one from EASTENDERS (and there is only one these days) and Gonch Gardner's sister get together with him who writes all the best episode of present day DR WHO and come up with the finest children's drama series ever made. The lives, loves and losses of a bunch of supremely everyday, yet also extraordinary, sixth formers schlepping their way through Norbridge High then manically moonlighting in an office with one phone ("Who's paying for it?" "Not us"), one front door (apart from Colin's secret exit) and a fountain of the finest dialogue this side of the watershed: "I'm thinking of habits I'm wanting to kick" "So I'm a habit already?" "You're something I'm wanting to kick"..."Has anyone ever told you you've got a wonderful vocabulary?" "I always knew that. I just could never put it into words"..."Graphic Department spending proposals. An HB pencil and a sunbed?" "Well, I can explain the pencil"..."Tell me, how do you justify being off work at her funeral on no less than eight separate occasions?" "She is my aunt!" "Kenny - this woman has died eight times!" "How do you think I feel?"..."Who hates me enough to want to get me battered senseless by Malcolm the shaving gorilla?" "I'll get the list"..."Why do I do so many major scenes in my life dressed in my pyjamas?"..."Thanks." "For what?" "I don't know. Everything." "I'm not responsible for everything. I just make it look that way." Lynda was the editor, Kenny her assistant and best friend, Spike her obsession and everybody else's punchline, Colin the money man, book-cooker and oil sheik-impersonator, Sarah the boring lead writer, Frazz the stooge, Tiddler the small one, Sam the mouth, Julie the replacement and Mr Kerr the man upstairs. Romance, death, pigeons, pizza, Czars, ping-pong balls, hiccups, plant pots, lampposts that light up by magic, crossed lines, bad cardigans, giant rabbit costumes, swear boxes, sieges, drugs, shootings, explosions, nightmares, comings, goings and lots and lots of endings: all from the pen of STEVEN "CHALK" MOFFAT. Never before, or since, have the funniest and the saddest storylines in the world come together to sing in such perfect harmony. The only programme to make staying behind after school look thunderously exciting. Tommy Boyd declared it the best thing he'd ever seen, and who are we to disagree?
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."WELL WHADDA Y'KNOW BOSS? WE'RE YESTERDAY'S NEWS"
MORE HOKUM from Harlech. English Civil War chase chicanery involving nosey kid Elam (CURTIS ARDEN) who thinks he's heir to the heir to the throne, hooking up with sister called, erm Perfect (ELIZABETH ROBILLARD) and nefarious ne'er-do-well Joachim (FREDERICK JAEGAR) to find his ostensible dad, the Duke Of Monmouth. JOHN THAW showed up as "Fast Jack".
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...EPISODE TITLES INCLUDED 'THE EYE OF THE DRUM' AND 'NOT A LIVE THING LEFT'
THE PRINCE OF DENMARK
(1974)
BBC
MID-PERIOD OUTING for the littlest Ronnie, halfway between NO, THAT'S ME OVER HERE! and SORRY! Except this one didn't have an exclamation mark in it. And was set in a pub, after which the title was named. BARRY CRYER and GRAHAM CHAPMAN wrote.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...AND IT'S LAST ORDERS FROM HIM
THE PRISONER
(1967-68)
ATV
THIS ENTRY will not be pushed, stamped, filed, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."BE SEEING YOU!"
PRISONER: CELL BLOCK H
(1979-87)
REG GRUNDY
ROTTEN PANTOMIMESQUE female lag epic, beneficiary of a dreadful "cult" following amongst people who should know better. No prison cliché was left unexplored, no potential for sordid melodrama left unrealised. Boss Cocky of the incarcerated femmes of the fictional Wentworth Detention Centre was Bea Smith (VAL LEHMAN), a queasy cross between a ginger-hued Miss Piggy and an Antipodean Anna Magnani, gaoled for double murder and rightfully deserving the title of "top dog". Bea's teenage daughter had died from a heroin overdose, prompting much decidedly dodgy "Just Say No" moralising amongst the ensemble of killers, thieves, thugs etc. Many of the most popular characters came from the early years, such as drunken old hag Lizzie Burdsworth (SHEILA FLORANCE), inserted for proto-COCOON "you're as old as you feel" factor, yo-yo knickered cockarnee sparra Chrissie Latham (AMANDA MUGGLETON) and Judy Bryant (BETTY - ho ho - BOBBIT), token lesbian with a pacemaker powered heart of gold. The officers or "screws" were chiefly represented by genteel governor Erica Davidson (PATSY KING), hair piled into an elaborate Sybil Fawlty meringue and blissfully unaware she is administering a teeming mound of corruption; and sadistic warder Joan "The Freak" Ferguson (MAGGIE KIRKPATRICK), enforcing her will with her black-gloved fists and taking her cut on everything that happens. CROSSROADS, WITHIN THESE WALLS, St. Trinians and THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW all rolled into one and bunged out over here in the only slot it deserved: the back of fucking beyond.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...SOPPY, SENTIMENTAL THEME SONG TOTALLY AT ODDS WITH THE 50 MINUTES OF HIGH TACK CACK THAT PRECEDED IT: "ON THE INSIDE, THE SUN STILL SHINES AND THE RAIN FALL FALLS DOWN, BUT THE ROSES FEEL LIKE PRISONERS TOO, WHEN MORNIN' COMES AROUND"
THE SECOND World War, eh? That was a barrel of laughs! Especially the time when dopey Nazi private MICHAEL ELPHICK cocked up a plan to drop forged £5 notes on England! And IAN RICHARDSON turned up as, variously, fiendish plotter Major Neuheim, an incompetent British officer and a Glaswegian "old lag"! Ho hum! Happy days!
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...1940S POUND NOTES "SIZE OF A 1:10 000 MAP OF DARTMOOR", QUOTH EXPERTS
THE PROFESSIONALS
(1977-83)
LWT
PYRO PUDDLE-SPLASHING, cardboard box-barging, "cover me!"-shouting, gun-held-with-both-hands, barrel-up-nose-having adventures of crack MI5 (here changed cunningly to CI5) operatives Bodie and Doyle, aka MARTIN "BLEND AND ROAST" SHAW and LEWIS "WHO DARES WINS" COLLINS. Many a provincial car-park became noisy child haven for months afterwards thanks to the perfunctory stakeout antics, directed by GORDON "UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS" JACKSON. Depicted a London permanently under siege from a) shifty Arab potentates b) Oirish bomb-toting bastards c) Soviet shysters with tiny eyes d) jive-talking African mercaneries, all of which both our protagonists would alternately joyfully beat up or shamelessly imitate.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."GRENADE DOWN PAMELA STEPHENSON'S BRA" EPISODE TOPPED THE RATINGS - TWICE
PROFESSOR LOBSTER
(1987-88)
ITV
ODDBEAT ODDMENT of a kids' semi-educational series about building and architecture. Professor Ken Martin from The Royal Institute of British Architects was your bristling titular boffin, arriving in an battered red mini with crappy lobster claws stuck on the doors to teach a group of kids the rudiments of the building trade, then getting them to mix concrete in the studio. Latterday impact on redevelopment of 21st century brownfield sites unknown.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...OBLIGATORY SPRIGHTLY-THEME-SONG-UTTERLY-IN-CONTRAST-TO-SUBJECT-MATTER: "THERE'S A WISE OLD MAN FROM THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA/HE'S COME TO HELP BOTH YOU AND ME/PROFESSOR LOBSTER!!"
PROFESSOR POOPSNAGGLE'S STEAM ZEPPELIN
(1980s)
ITV
OZ IMPORT for kids screened in (sigh) two-hour segments. Old bloke and requisite Big Freckled Brats float around in a big bus with an airbag fastened at the top, collecting bits and bobs to improve their vehicle. "Dr Robotnik"-style baddie attempts to foil them with a series of hi-tech gizmos, but a hastily improvised soup-up of the zeppelin's "Mega Steam" and the like put paid to that. One memorable episode featured the old "snake bite" race-against-time-before-venom-takes-hold staple scenario.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."THERE'S A BIG RED BUS WAY UP IN THE SKY/WHICH EVERYONE SAID WOULD NEVER FLY/WITH A POOP POOP CHUGGA CHUGGA BING A BANG BING/THIS IS THE SONG THAT WE ALWAYS SING"
PROFESSOR POPPER'S PROBLEMS
(LATE 1970s)
CFF
ONLY ONE problem, to be fair. CHARLIE DRAKE notes a worrying hole in his pension plan and promptly accedes to star in this tatty affair as (naturally) a batty professor who, along with kidsistant, gets shrunk by own formula for desktop shrinking man adventures. Cue huge papier mache telephone handsets, pennies the size of hoops and a cat's paw as big as a Ford Transit.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...THEME SONG SUNG BY A BESTRANGLED DRAKE: "I MAY BE SMALL/BUT I'M BIG ENOUGH FOR ME/I'LL STAY JUST AS I AM/A HAPPY LITTLE MAN!"
PROGRAMMES FOR SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES
(FOREVER)
BBC/ITV
"GARY? ANDREW? Will you go and help Mrs Wilbrams fetch the television trolley?"
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...AN ACCOMPANYING BOOKLET AND TEACHERS NOTES ARE AVAILABLE
NOT UFO, mind; instead, a keep-watching-the-skies spookarama that always began with a UFO "visitation" on a hick redneck Southern town. Soon on the scene were the Project UFO guys from the military, who would investigate the scene of the close encounter and find something distinctly man-made like glitter, fairy lights or latex rubber. Then they'd piece together the mystery, and it'd turn out that the local dullards had in fact mistaken a Goodyear air-balloon that tore from its moorings for an interstellar craft. At this point the opening scene would be repeated, but from different angles, showing exactly how stupid we'd all been in the first place to fall for it. F'rinstance, one farmer-faked (to keep locals away, "Scooby Doo"-style) UFO, using crop-dusting chopper and fairy lights, was found out by the two investiblokes as a fake, via convoluted "boys in the lab" dissection of an audio tape made of the sound of the craft, e.g. one part ice-cream van played backwards, one part helicopeter noise, one part doorbell etc. Sometimes the FBI guys couldn't work it out and they'd show the scene in a mysterious way. Ostensibly based on the US Air Force's real 'Project Blue Book' UFO investigations; only at the end titles did you find out that the USAF wrapped up that department a decade before the show took place. Produced and narrated by JACK "DRAGNET" WEBB.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...EVERY EPISODE WAS CALLED "THE SOMETHING-OR-OTHER INCIDENT" IN THE STYLE OF MAN FROM UNCLE
PROSPECTS
(1985-86)
EUSTON FILMS/CHANNEL 4
EAST-END DESOLATION, Thatcher-style. The money-making schemes of two doleite friends, Pincy (GARY "2.4" OLSEN) and Billy (BRIAN BOVELL). Demolition ball opening titles set the scene for Isle Of Dogs Enterprise Zone shenanigans, with the duo establishing a variety of businesses (pest control, home-made booze, etc.) and getting into scrapes as a result. Typical "typical Channel 4" Channel 4.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."YTS? YOUR TOUGH SHIT, MORE LIKE"
NOT TO be confused with THE PERSUADERS, THE PURSUERS or, indeed, THE PROTECTORS, 1964 vintage (with ANDREW FAULDS and MICHAEL ATKINSON). Here lay NYREE DAWN PORTER, TONY ANHOLT and ROBERT VAUGHAN as jet-setting, i.e. back-projection-frequenting, private eyes. Produced by GERRY ANDERSON. Highlight was Tony "I Did What I Did For Maria" Christie-sung theme "Avenues And Alleyways."
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...ABEL AND HIS BROTHER, FIGHTIN' ONE ANOTHER, IN AND OUT OF EVERY DIVE
PS, IT'S PAUL SQUIRE
(1983)
CENTRAL
ERSTWHILE SEARCH FOR A STAR starlet searches for star quality with less than star-studded sketch shambles. Eponymous LES DENNIS prototype, previously of THE PAUL SQUIRE SHOW, essays a hopelessly optimistic theme song: "PS, it's Paul Squire - and I'm trying to make yer happy", before employing Madhouse-style ensemble peopled by the likes of JOHN SHARP, ELI WOODS and other forgotten stooges in a smorgasbord of shit skits. Used prop doors to exit one sketch and enter the next. Career high point was being mocked by Rick on THE YOUNG ONES.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...PS, IT'S PONTINS
PUBLIC EYE
(1965-75)
ABC/THAMES
LONG-DISTANCE SHODDINESS from ALFRED BURKE as a ramshackle UK private eye. Kettle in filing cabinet, fag butts on floor, your whole down-at-heel deal. Began in London, before moving (obviously) to Birmingham and thence to Brighton. Spent a stretch inside for handling stolen jewellery. Later joined by PAULINE DELANEY as his landlady.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...EPISODE TITLES INCLUDED 'THEY GO OFF IN THE END, LIKE FRUIT' AND 'I WENT TO BORROW A PENCIL AND LOOK WHAT I FOUND'
A DASH of MOONLIGHTING and a soupcon of GARRY SHANDLING stirred together then strained with Auntie cost-cutting relish: hey presto, one TV show within a TV show, with drunken bad-boy actor playing a courageous, honest ex-priest turned detective and finding it difficult to distinguish between fact and fiction.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...CAROLINE LANGRISHE AND RAY WINSTONE SPOTTED IN SUPPORTING ROLES
PULL THE OTHER ONE
(1984)
CENTRAL
MICHAEL ELPHICK, fresh from botching up the German invasion of Britain (see above), decides instead to settle down for a quiet life with the missus in Birmingham only to - erk - have Gran come to stay and never leave. First episode established this "sit": family holiday with Gran, Gran dies on journey, Gran put roofrack, Mike goes to find help, car gets stolen, Gran not dead after all, Gran comes to live with them.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...FIRST EPISODE ALSO ESTABLISHED ABSENCE OF "COM"
LENNIE BENNETT (of LENNIE AND JERRY) helmed this flimsy half-arsed rip-off variation on Hollywood/Celebrity Squares. Nine celebs, perched in precarious-looking square vertical arrangement, e.g. NORMAN COLLIER, MIKE REID, MIKE READ, BARBARA WINDSOR etc., delivered punchlines to jokes instead of answers to questions. So it's a different show entirely! See?
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...REMEMBER WHAT YOU HEARD, AND WHERE YOU HEARD IT!
IS THERE room in your cold, mean old heart for an adorable lost little girl and her dog? No, of course not. SOLEIL MOON FRYE (oh, yeah?) was the titular "loveable" orphan in quite possibly the world's worst slushcom to date.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...EXPLETIVE FUCKING DELETED
THE PUPPY'S NEW ADVENTURES/FURTHER ADVENTURES
(1982-3)
HANNA-BARBERA
TREACLY STEW of canine comradeship, opening with annoying yakking bunch of muts washed overboard and failing to not survive, and which somehow boasted CASEY "TOP TEN" KASEM on chief pipes.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...DOGS WERE STOWAWAYS AND SHOULD NEVER HAVE BEEN ABOARD
AT LEAST we're finishing on a high. Another DOIG delight, and an interactive one to boot. First series had ANDY JOHNSON and DONNA REEVE fronting five fifteen-minuters dispensing clues and concocting adventures on a giant grid in order to help you, the viewer, identify the whereabouts of some treasure. Over 12,000 people wrote in, apparently. Second series had TOMMY BOYD and SALLY "WEEKENDING" GRACE doing the honours, "searching for something that Tommy had lost." Our hero "knew all 36 places he had been to and retraced his steps place by place until he found where it was". Once again, loads of viewers beat Tom - and a minature chromakeyed version of himself - to the solution. Next up were KIRSTY MILLER and HOWARD STABLEFORD in The Puzzleton Plans, a massive three-week affair involving 12 suspects to a burglary of top secret plans in the titular town, with Kirsty and Howard playing everyone as well as themselves. Proving that high crimes of state were no stranger to children's telly, the plans were "in the Government Office at 6pm on a Tuesday evening and the MP reported them missing at 10am on Wednesday morning." So what happened in the intervening 16 hours, eh? Finally came DAVY JONES and EILEEN FLETCHER with The Riddle of Skully Island, who "try to find the hidden treasure and keep meeting strange characters who look remarkably like themselves." All fantastic, harmless, clever fun and the kind of superlative stuff much missed today.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."THE TREASURE IS BURIED IN A SQUARE WITH WATER IN IT"
MUCH LOVED BBC popular science series that seemed best served when stuck out after the NINE O'CLOCK NEWS. Although the title was mystifying to many younger viewers ("Kwed?") ,Q.E.D. found the perfect route between the whisker stroking extremities of the OU and the too populist Doctor MIRIAM STOPPARD and that-bloke-with-the-nose helmed WHERE THERE'S LIFE. While "John's Not Mad" is undoubtedly the strand's best-remembered episode, Q.E.D. embraced a wide range of subjects, such as "Why things go wrong" metal bending, what it'd look like to fly all the way round the coast of Britain in a fighter jet, "Understanding Rape", snooker, and (helpfully) "A Guide to Armageddon". Q.E.D. also provided some of the first television exposure for Falklands Veteran SIMON WESTON. But best of all on 13 March 1985, that comic imp KENNY EVERETT was given thirty minutes of airtime in which to muck around with Quantel, CSO and other ace mid-Eighties video effects, all in the name of better acquainting Joe Public with how that "Goodnight goodnight goodnight" bit at the end of LES AND DUSTIN'S LAUGHTER SHOW was achieved. Not that all editions were great though; a 1991 episode in which Professor Ian Fells attempted to test "Murphy's Law" consisted of little more than slices of jam on toast hurtling to the floor and various people switching from one checkout queue to another. However, it was always easy to forgive Q.E.D. the odd whimsical item, especially when an intriguing episode about panic attacks was served up the very next week. Axed in 1998, we fear we shall never see its whimsical-but-serious like again.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...KNIGHTS OF THE SHINING PIDDOCK INDEED
Q5/Q6/Q7/Q8/Q9/THERE'S A LOT OF IT ABOUT
(1969-82)
BBC
MILLIGAN MULLARKEY which bemused most (including the Beeb) but delighted enough to keep it being recommissioned despite the same things showing up in the same order every bloody series, namely: Nazis; Nazis dressed as Jews; Nazis dressed as beautiful buxom women; Nazis and beautiful buxom women running an unlikely business such as a costermogers or grocery; everyone blacked up; everyone blacked up playing Nazis; everyone walking off set into the audience; everyone walking off set into another sketch on film; people with cotton wool in their ears; hole reinforcers and cutlery falling from people's sleeves; BBC costume department labels on the outside of clothes; and racist and sexist punchlines. Original trailer announced the death of Spike, aged 104.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."SO, WHERE DID THE ANCIENT BRITONS GET THE CLAY TO MAKE THE BRICKS TO BUILD STONEHENGE?"
SPACE NONSENSE about an intergalactic dustman. RICHARD BENJAMIN wore the flourescent jacket of infamy in this lazy STAR TREK parody, which, given Trek was 10 years old and just gone out of re-runs, meant the show lasted all of six weeks and died unlamented. Then a year or so later, something called "Star Wars" attracted a bit of attention and suddenly Quark returned with a new one-off "pilot" which contained tons of Star Wars gags...and then the network showed the same six episodes and it died again. Characters besides Dick Benjamin included a pair of Hill's-Angels-type twins (one was supposed to be a clone but neither would admit it), a "transmute" who constantly switched from male to female (in voice only; lots of laughs from burly guy doing limp-wristed routines), and Ficus, a "Vegeton" plant-based Spock-alike. They got their marching orders from a disembodied head (called, startlingly, "The Head"), who bore an alarming resemblance to Holly in Red Dwarf.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...BEAM THEM ALL UP. PERMANENTLY.
QUATERMASS
(1953-59/1979)
BBC/THAMES
THE ESCAPDES of NIGEL "KINVIG" KNEALE'S phone-book-named uber-scientist. First series, THE QUATERMASS EXPERIMENT, found REGINALD TATE prodding and pacing about a Government Laboratory predicting the worst before having to clean up after a mutant space-plant ravaged the greater part of Westminster. Next came the boringly-named QUATERMASS II, with the lowsy JOHN ROBINSON reading his liens off cue cards inbetween fighting a deadly mind-monster infecting the brains of yokels near a power plant in Surrey. Then came the best ever effort: QUATERMASS AND THE PIT, with the superb ANDRE MORELL facing an invasion of the world that had taken root in people's minds millions of years earlier and was triggered by the excavation of a ship full of giant crickets. Finally, Thames coaxed Kneale to pen one final fling for JOHN MILLS, only to come up with a dreadful pseudo-hippy yarn involving flower children, white chalk clouds invading Wembley stadium, talking stones, old biddies living in cars, SIMON MACCORKINDALE and an atomic bomb. The latter of which blew everyone, including the Prof, to bits.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."QUATERMASS, I PRESUME?"
THE QUEEN STREET GANG
(1968)
THAMES
DOZEY BOFFIN with big head is nabbed. Lucky for him his kid runs titular mob staffed with brats called "Big Bill" (SEBASTIAN ABINERI), "Snigger" (LEN JONES), and "Speedy" (ANTHONY PEPLOW).
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...SPEEDY WAS FAT AND LAZY, HA HA
QUEENIE'S CASTLE
(1970-72)
YORKSHIRE
KEITH WATERHOUSE and WILLIS HALL-penned palaver for DIANA DORS as eponymous matriach mithering about the Buckingham flats - a Yarrrkkkshire housing development - with the likes of FREDDIE FLETCHER, LYNNE PERRIE and BRYAN MOSLEY popping in for a) a cup of sugar b) a cup of "something stronger" c) a couple of jam sponges.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...BRASSY
KURT RUSSELL dons statutory small screen Wild West outfit and steps out into the dust to look for his long lost sister. Helped, and hindered, by brother TIM MATHESON, a San Francisco doctor. Spoiler: they never found her.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
..."AND SO, MY FRIEND, THE QUEST CONTINUES" [CLICK]
A QUESTION OF SPORT
(1970-NOW)
BBC
"SPORTING WIT AND BADINAGE", as Ceefax often had it, which somewhat underplayed the whole quizzing element if you ask us. Avuncular, easily entertained DAVID COLEMAN presided at just the right pace, except when making sure to ask the guests "you had a good season last year, and you'll be hoping for more of the same with the world championships coming up?" in the middle of a round. BILL BEAUMONT seemingly spent decades at the helm of one team, except for a couple of weeks when Coleman was off with shingles and he took over as a snail's pace host. Opposite massed a phalanx of overexcitable captains, most notably WILLIE CARSON and EMLYN HUGHES of John Reid-related royal handbagging and ill-fated attempt to make "we think..." a national catchphrase. The Mystery Guest round added "can you recognise this sporting star going for a day's fishing?" intrigue and hope that it wasn't someone you were particularly proud of, a tyro RAY STUBBS directing many an example. You knew Christmas was coming when the annual Mystery Guest competition started, the winner picked out in the series finale by the captains from a mound of envelopes dropped from the studio ceiling. Supposedly annual surveys referred to once a series placed What Happened Next? as the show's most popular round year after year. The score is Emlyn seven, Bill five.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...CURRENT HOST SUE BARKER DOES THE SAME CRAP GAG - "ON TONIGHT'S TEAMS, AN EXCEPTIONAL RANGE OF SPORTING TALENT AND ABILITY - PLUS JOHN AND ALLY!" - EVERY FUCKING WEEK
UNCOUTH VERSION of Radio 4's Any Questions, only with pictures. Invented to stop ROBIN DAY moaning about how the BBC weren't giving him any work, and to fill a hole in the schedules when the BBC Governors nixed the idea of Parky going five nights a week (and thank fuck they did). Early editions had Sir Robin hunched over a beige desk flanked on either side by two captains of industry/trade union leaders. Well-spoken audience members in frocks and suits read "questions" off cards about collective bargaining. Nobody watched. Then some politicos started turning up, figuring it was a chance for a bit of after-hours ego-exercise, and more than a dozen people realised the show existed. Sir Robin ruled it like a personal fiefdom until 1989, when he quit (in a huff, naturally) to be replaced by multi-trillionaire signing PETER "Er..." SISSONS, who was useless and was soon replaced by DAVID DIMBLEBY. Latterday policy of having a) celebrities b) competition-winning students and c) Eddie Izzard on the panel likely to have Sir Robin spinning in his humble spear-carrier grave.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...ROBIN RAPPED FOR TELLING VIEWERS "SLEEP WELL" AT THE END OF EACH EDITION, THEREBY ENCOURAGING THEM TO NOT TO STAY TUNED FOR WHAT FOLLOWED
QUICK BEFORE THEY CATCH US
(1966)
BBC
RAMBLING SATURDAY ramble through laughably watered-down Swinging Sixties, seen through escapades of flat-dwelling twentysomething "cats" BARRY FANTONI, TEDDY GREEN and DAVID GRIFFIN. Based on far more explicit tomes by Mark Timlin. Ner-ner theme tune taunted befuddled elder generation's viewers: "Quick before they catch us, everybody run run run/we'll get away from the people who put us down; everybody run run run!"
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...BLURB OPTIMISITCALLY PROMISED "CARS, GIRLS, GUNS, STRUNG OUT ALONG THE HIGH SIERRAS OF BRIXTON AND BATTERSEA"
QUICK ON THE DRAW
(1974-79)
THAMES
WEEKDAY AFTERNOON siestathon hosted by LORD BOB MONKHOUSE (aided by JAN RENNISON) based around the modest talents of "UK's fastest cartoonist" BILL TIDY, who along with the similarly pen-wielding likes of WILLIE RUSHTON, ROLF HARRIS and MICHAEL BENTINE, would draw whimsical illustrations on a big pad in response to Bob's Pictionary-esque questions. Then, to prove the format was as flexible as a wobbleboard, Rolf took over hosting duties and Bob (an ex-cartoonist himself, of course) cropped up among the contestants. Later still, Bentine took over. The big flip chart thing remained, thankfully, largely unaltered. Possibly the only programme apart from THAT'S LIFE! to have the end credits cartooned in-studio. Devised by DENNIS GIFFORD.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...ROLFAROOS NOT INCLUDED
SO SO thriller filler based on famed torture-proof creation of US writer Elleston Trevor, previously subject of big budget mid-60s United Artists effort The Quiller Memorandum. MICHAEL "GUILLAM" JAYSTON did the honours for the Beeb, including being drugged up and afflicted by numerous voodoo curses.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...OUTRO MUSIC WAS "ODE TO A G" BY DEEP PURPLE
QUINCY, M.E.
(1977-85)
GLEN A LARSON, CAN IT REALLY BE YOU?
"GENTLEMAN, YOU are about to enter the most fascinating sphere of police work." What, going undercover? Chasing people through busy streets? Manning a space station-sized walkie-talkie control panel? "The world..." Yes? "...of forensic medicine". More Larsonry, with JACK KLUGMAN as "I'm Quincy, me" going about his cadaverous business with oriental lab assistant Sam boiling up some coffee on a tripod and gauze. Lived on a boat. Kept poking his nose into unsolved cases, before poking his beak into another jar at Danny's Place. Still a staple of BBC1 schedules in 2007. "Mr. Klugman's wardrobe furnished by Botany 500."
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...GREEN-CIRCLED TITLE SEQUENCE ALSO BOASTED OUR HERO EXAMINING A COUPLE OF OTHER "FASCINATING SPHERES"...ON A NUBILE WENCH ON HIS SPEEDBOAT
INSANELY COMPLICATED parlour game panel joust, ostensibly resembling a knock-out tournament but forever sagging under the weight of one too many rules and too too many outbursts from host STUART HALL. Each week two professional football teams, composed of players, management and "celebrity supporters", answered questions in order to move across an electronic scoreboard designed like a pitch, but not in a sensible way from end to end but in any manner of means involving "long ball" questions, passes, penalties, goal kicks and whatever else dreamt up on the spot by Hall, DAVID "THE GUV'NOR" VINE or BARRY DAVIES. "Internationals" were also staged, but only involving the home nations. Ultimately became too incomprehensible, or Hall's head burst, or nobody bothered turning up, and got axed.
TV CREAM immortality rating -
...A GAME OF FIVE HALVES
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