The Brittas Empire is a British sitcom created and originally written by Andrew Norriss and Richard Fegen. Chris Barrie played titular character Gordon Brittas, the well-intended but hugely incompetent manager of the fictional Whitbury New Town Leisure Centre. The show ran for seven series and 52 episodes — including two Christmas specials — from 1991 to 1997 on BBC1. Creators Norriss and Fegen co-wrote the first five series. The creators Andrew Norriss and Richard Fegen often combined farce with either surreal or dramatic elements in episodes. For example, in the first series, the leisure centre prepares for a royal visit, only for the doors to seal, the boiler room to flood and a visitor to become electrocuted. Unlike many traditional sitcoms, deaths were quite common place in The Brittas Empire. Plot summary Gordon Brittas (played by Chris Barrie) is the well-meaning but incompetent manager of Whitbury New Town Leisure Centre. He trained at the fictional Aldershot Leisure Centre. Completely tactless, totally annoying and forever coming up with 'half-baked' ideas (and oblivious to all of his aforementioned faults), Brittas frequently upsets his staff, public, and his frazzled wife Helen, often bringing confusion and chaos into their lives. Helen Brittas (Pippa Haywood) finds it increasingly difficult to cope with Gordon, and often turns to medication and affairs with other men to maintain her sanity. Helen is often helped by her supportive friend Laura Lancing (Julia St John), Brittas's calm and efficient deputy manager. Laura (though she is fully aware of his incompetence and the annoyance he causes his colleagues and customers) has a grudging admiration for Brittas whom she regards as an honest and decent man. Brittas's other deputy manager is the dim-witted but kind Colin Weatherby (Mike Burns) (credited as Michael Burns in series 1, 2 and 3). Colin has several medical problems including skin allergies, a constantly bandaged infected hand and a sizeable boil on his face. Although he is technically a deputy manager, he works more efficiently as the centre's caretaker. The other core members of the team are Carole (Harriet Thorpe) the unfortunate and often tearful receptionist who keeps her three children in the drawers and cupboards of reception, the gentle-hearted Gavin (Tim Marriott) who becomes Deputy Manager in Series 5, his paranoid and at times manic partner Tim (Russell Porter), lively and principled Linda (Jill Greenacre) and Julie (Judy Flynn) Brittas’s sarcastic secretary who hates her boss and refuses to do any work for him. Outside the core staff is Councillor Jack Drugett (Stephen Churchett), who is unable to sack Brittas despite numerous attempts at doing so. Cast alterations in the series sees character 'Angie' (André ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvdiLNCkKMg

Terry and June is a BBC television sitcom, which was broadcast on BBC1 from 1979 to 1987. The show was largely a reworking of Happy Ever After, and starred Terry Scott and June Whitfield as a middle-aged, middle-class suburban couple, Terry and June Medford, who live in Purley. Most of the 65 episodes were written by John Kane, with seven other writers also contributing some episodes. Production Terry Scott and June Whitfield began their television partnership in Scott On in 1968. On 7 May 1974, a Comedy Playhouse pilot called "Happy Ever After" aired on BBC1 with Scott and Whitfield playing Terry and June Fletcher, a middle-class couple whose grown-up children have just left home.[1] This was commissioned into a series of the same name, and five series and two Christmas specials were broadcast, ending on 25 April 1979. John T. Chapman, one of the original writers, said that the programme had run out of ideas and had to come to an end. BBC Comedy, however, were unwilling to end a popular show, and so brought in fresh new writers. Legal complications meant that the name and setting had to change, and so on 24 October 1979, Terry and June was born. The characteristics of Terry and June remained largely similar. However, the character of Aunt Lucy and her mynah bird, a popular ingredient of Happy Ever After, were dropped.. Despite being seen as "cosy" and even somewhat "dated" even upon its original broadcast, and lampooned by contemporaneous alternative comedy programmes, the show nevertheless attracted large viewing figures. The series never came to an 'official' end, with Series Nine in 1987 not planned to be the last, but, according to main writer John Kane, the series "just sort of petered out in the end", after Series 8 (1985) already having been "buried in an early tea-time slot", with the BBC "slightly embarrassed of their 'safe and cosy' sitcom but one which still commanded strong audience figures". Several scripts for a proposed Series Ten were submitted, but in the end the series "simply wasn't renewed". During filming of Series Nine, Terry Scott commented that he felt the programme's format had started to become tired and that he was keen to do something new. In 2004, it came 73rd in Britain's Best Sitcom, jointly with Happy Ever After. In The Listener at the end of its run it was described, not unaffectionately, by Andy Medhurst as "a Macmillanite sitcom" to which Thatcherism was as alien as socialism.[2] Cast Main characters Terry Scott – Terence 'Terry' Medford June Whitfield – June Medford Reginald Marsh – Sir Dennis Hodge Terence Alexander – Malcolm Harris (series 1 and 2) Tim Barrett – Malcolm Harris (1980 Special to series 7) John Quayle – Malcolm Harris (series 8 and 9) Rosemary Frankau – Beattie Harris Joanna ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O1KtSeVNdA0

Watching is a British television sitcom, produced by Granada Television for the ITV network and broadcast for seven series and four Christmas specials between 1987 and 1993. The series was written by Jim Hitchmough and starred Paul Bown and Emma Wray as mismatched couple Malcolm Stoneway and Brenda Wilson. Plot Watching was set in Merseyside, with Brenda from Liverpool and Malcolm from Meols on the Wirral, the "posh" part of Merseyside on the other side of the River Mersey. The title refers to Brenda and her sister Pamela's hobby of "people watching", and to Malcolm's hobby of birdwatching, which initially Brenda endures rather than enjoys, but later comes to appreciate. Also, similarly to the series title, most of the episode titles are verbs that end in ‘-ing’. Quiet biker Malcolm, who lived with his domineering mother (played by Patsy Byrne), was accompanied on his birdwatching trips by loud scouser Brenda, who was forced to ride in the sidecar of his Norton motorbike and had a habit of rubbing his mother up the wrong way. Other key characters in the series were Brenda's sister Pamela (Liza Tarbuck), her husband David (John Bowler – Series 2 onwards) and Brenda and Pam's mother Joyce (played by Noreen Kershaw) in the last few series. The series followed Malcolm and Brenda's on/off relationship, during which Malcolm married another woman called Lucinda (played by Elizabeth Morton). However, Brenda and Malcolm finally married each other in the final episode, "Knotting", which was broadcast on 4 April 1993. The series ran for 56 30-minute episodes over 7 series, including the two 60-minute special extended episodes. Cast Emma Wray as Brenda Wilson Paul Bown as Malcolm Stoneway Liza Tarbuck as Pamela Wilson Patsy Byrne as Marjorie Stoneway, Malcolm's mother Perry Fenwick as Terry Milton Philip Fox as Sydney Clough (series 1 only) John Bowler as David Lynch (series 2 on) Elizabeth Spriggs as Aunt Peggy (series 2–5) Liz Crowther as Susan Roberts (series 2 and 3 only) Ken Jones as Uncle Bernard (series 5) Russell Boulter as Chris Cameron (series 4 only) Noreen Kershaw as Joyce Wilson, Brenda's Mum (series 5 on) Andrew Hilton as Gerald Wilson, Brenda's young brother (series 5 on) Elizabeth Morton as Lucinda Davis/Stoneway (series 5–7) Richard Good as Jonathan MacMillan (series 6) Ally Vuli as Roz, the Nanny (series 7) Al T. Kossy as Harold, landlord of the Grapes Dave Dutton as Oswald the cafe owner (series 1–5) Bill Moores as "Cedric", regular at the Grapes Anita Petrof - "Mary", regular at the Grapes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watching_(TV_series) ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKkIuq343zQ

Catweazle is a British children's fantasy television series, starring Geoffrey Bayldon in the title role, and created by Richard Carpenter for London Weekend Television. The first series, produced and directed by Quentin Lawrence, was screened in the UK on ITV in 1970. The second series, directed by David Reid and David Lane, was shown in 1971. Each series had thirteen episodes, most but not all written by Carpenter, who also published two books based on the scripts. Summary The premise in the first episode is that an 11th century bumbling wizard, named Catweazle (Geoffrey Bayldon) is pursued by soldiers through a wood, carrying only his magic charm and his toad familiar. He says a spell as he jumps into a pond. When he comes out he thinks he has made the wood and soldiers disappear, but in fact has jumped 900 years. He arrives in rural England the year 1969 on a farm and befriends the farmer's son, a red-headed teenager, Edward Bennet, nicknamed Carrot (Robin Davies), who spends most of the rest of the series attempting to hide Catweazle from his father (Bud Tingwell) and the farmhand Sam (Neil McCarthy). Catweazle searches for a way to return to his own time while hiding out in a disused water tower on abandoned MoD land, which he calls Castle Saburac, with his familiar, a toad called Touchwood (a pun on touchstone). Luckily, whenever he is spotted, he uses his magic amulet to hypnotise people into forgetting that they saw him. The second series featured a 12-part riddle that Catweazle, now in 1970, attempts to solve at the rate of one clue an episode, the solution (as he thinks) being revealed in the 13th. Catweazle mistakes all modern technology for powerful magic (an example of Clarke's third law), particularly "elec-trickery" (electricity) and the "telling bone" (telephone). Often he tried spells that failed and he would sigh "Nothing works". Feeling flushed with success in the final episode, his last words were "Everything works Touchwood, everything works!". Both series were shot on 16mm film. The first series was mostly shot on location at Home Farm, East Clandon, near Guildford in Surrey, England in 1969. The second was mostly filmed around the Bayford/Brickendon area of Hertfordshire in 1970 (S02E12 shows scenes of Brickendon and near Bayford station). Interior scenes were filmed at Halliford Studios in Shepperton. Both series centred on the relationship between Catweazle and the young lad from the present day who quickly accepts Catweazle as a friend. The second series had a more farcical character than the first. In the plaster fight scene in the episode 'The Enchanted King'. Cedric's parents were slightly unhinged gentry living in their family stately home. Almost all characters seemed out of touch with reality except Cedric. In t ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IpbyWACFps