Developed from a sketch in the TV series French and Saunders in which Saunders played a baseball capped parent berated by her prim and proper daughter (French), the pilot episode was greeted by one TV executive with the comment, "I don't think women being drunk is funny."
Gerry Anderson's new production company was ailing and in desperate need of a cash boost when, in 1957, they were approached by children's writer Roberta Leigh and her colleague Suzanne Warner to make a series of 52 thirteen-minute episodes of a children's puppet series.
The publicity for this ITC show read "travel the world with The Adventurer, in a series of vital, new and dynamic situations in which every turn brings the zing of danger, drama and originality". Most viewers ended up wishing the hero of this particular television outing had stayed at home.
Spanning eighteen years and forty-two episodes, A Touch of Frost became one of Britain's best loved Television Detective shows, and starred actor David Jason in the title role.
The final starring vehicle for the masterful comedic talents of the incomparable, Arthur Lowe.
A shining example of a near flawlessly faithful adaptation of a canon of classic literary genius, Granada television's stylishly lavish series redefined the established film and TV image of the world renowned inhabitants of 221B Baker Street.
Although slammed by the critics The Abbott and Costello Show became a firm favourite with the viewing audience as the comic twosome brought to the small screen the same brand of slapstick humour that had pulled in theatre patrons for years.
When teenager Abigail throws a party for her friends, her next-door neighbour, Beverly Moss, does likewise for the adults. But Beverly is the hostess from hell.
'ABC Armchair Thriller', although sometimes listed alongside the later 'Armchair Thriller' series (1978 & 1980), is a separate series from the later Thames productions, which it preceded by 11 years.
TV series based on one of Hollywood's biggest stars of the 1920s, Rin Tin Tin was one of two survivor of an Apache assault on a wagon train, a scenario that wasn't a million miles from the dog's true origins.