Channel 4

Trial and Error

Channel 4's Trial and Error investigated real-life miscarriages of justice in the courts' system and aimed to set them right.

Lipstick on Your Collar

During the Suez Crisis of 1956, two young clerks at the stuffy Foreign Office in Whitehall display little interest in the decline of the British Empire. To their eyes, it can hardly compete with girls, rock music, and the intrigue of romantic entanglements.

The Big Battalions

The Big Battalions tells the story of three families, Christian, Muslim and Jewish, and moves between Britain, Ethiopia, Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

The Big Breakfast

The Big Breakfast was a British light entertainment television show shown on Channel 4 and S4C each weekday morning from 28 September 1992 until 29 March 2002 during which period 2,482 shows were produced. The Big Breakfast was produced by Planet 24, the production company co-owned by former Boomtown Rats singer and Live Aid organiser Bob Geldof. The programme was distinctive for broadcasting live from former lockkeepers' cottages commonly referred to as "The Big Breakfast House", or more simply, "The House", located on Fish Island, in Bow in east London. The show was a mix of news, weather, interviews, audience phone-ins and general features, with a light tone which was in competition with the more serious GMTV and even more serious BBC breakfast programmes.

Terry and Julian

Terry and Julian is a British sitcom that aired on Channel 4 in 1992. Starring Julian Clary, it was written by Clary, Paul Merton and John Henderson. The title is a spoof the title of the long-running BBC sitcom Terry and June, whose star June Whitfield made a guest appearance in one episode of Terry and Julian.

Rachel's Dream

Shown as part of Channel 4's Video Fantasies series, a selection of four innovative dramas deploying state-of-the-art visual and electronic effects. This was the only one of the four that had a futuristic basis. It was set perhaps a couple of decades ahead in a world being slowly drowned by technology, a world in which traffic jams are the norm instead of the exception, and where the people avoid getting caught in the rain for better reasons than simply not wanting to get wet. The Rachel of the title is the younger sister of an up-and-coming marketing executive who has just secured a contract with a wealthy but repulsive millionaire who is into toxic waste, which he stores in secret for large sums of money. Rachel finds that, through a large bank of video screens in her sister's apartment, her wishes can come true when she brings to life the image on an anti-pollution poster. This new friend helps her to make up her mind about her own future. The style of the production was fresh and colourful, the pace slow and moody for the most part, and it made for an interesting half-hour's viewing.

Blue Heaven

Frank Sandford has big hopes for his pop duo, Blue Heaven, but his home life is less than satisfactory. His father, Jim, is a local hard man whose favourite son is in prison, while his mother can only be described as the perfect match. Despite the lack of parental support he is determined that he should succeed as a pop star and that his favourite football team, West Bromwich Albion, will win the cup!

Sean's Show

Sean's Show was a United Kingdom television situation comedy broadcast on Channel 4. Stand-up comedian Sean Hughes co-wrote and starred as a fictionalised version of himself, aware of the fact he was living in a sitcom. It received a nomination for the 1992 British Comedy Award for Best Channel 4 Sitcom.

The Camomile Lawn

The Camomile Lawn is British adaptation of the Mary Wesley's classic novel that aired on Channel 4. As storm clouds gather over Europe in 1939, five cousins meet to pay tribute to a world that will never be the same again.

The Jack Dee Show

Stand-up comedy from Jack Dee, and music from Seamus Beaghen and The Apollos, from the fictional Bohemia Club.

GamesMaster

GamesMaster was a British television show, screened on Channel 4 from 1992 to 1998, and was the first ever UK television show dedicated to computer and video games.

The Wild Bunch

Secret History

Secret History was a long-running British television documentary series. Shown on Channel 4, the Secret History brandname was used as a banner title in the UK, but many of the individual documentaries can still be found on US cable channels without the branding. It can be seen as Channel 4's answer to the BBC's Timewatch.

The Gravy Train Goes East

A fictitious Balkan state adaps to life after Communism.

Paul Merton: The Series

Fresh from his appearances on Whose Line is it Anyway?, Paul starred in his own comedy series on Channel 4, featuring a mix of surreal sketches, links and stand-up routines

Time Signs

Time Signs is a British television series that aired on Channel 4 in 1991. Presented by Mick Aston, the series tells the story of a Devon valley throughout history. Phil Harding does some reconstruction archaeology. Time Signs was later developed into Time Team, the long-running archaeology series that has aired since 1994. Time Team has the same producer and also features Mick Aston and Phil Harding.

G.B.H.

GBH was a seven-part British television drama written by Alan Bleasdale shown in the summer of 1991 on Channel 4. The protagonists were Michael Murray, the Militant tendency-supporting Labour leader of a city council in the North of England and Jim Nelson, the headmaster of a school for disturbed children. The series was controversial partly because Murray appeared to be based on Derek Hatton, former Deputy Leader of Liverpool City Council — in an interview in the G.B.H. DVD Bleasdale recounts an accidental meeting with Hatton before the series, who indicates that he has caught wind of Bleasdale's intentions but does not mind as long as the actor playing him is "handsome". In normal parlance, the initials "GBH" refer to the criminal charge of grievous bodily harm - however, the actual intent of the letters is that it is supposed to stand for Great British Holiday.

Teenage Health Freak

Teenage Health Freak is a British teen comedy-drama about the life and travails of a socially awkward teenager as he goes through life. It is best known for featuring the actress Liza Walker and the actor Alex Langdon. It was based on the book Diary of a Teenage Health Freak, by Dr. Ann McPherson and Dr. Aidan Macfarlane.

Josie

The Orchid House

A white, plantation owning family in Dominica waits for the return of the patriarch from WWI, but things change when he does. Its focus on the declining power of the white plantocracy on the island of Dominica between the war years, handled through the prism of an intimate family drama, has great depth while remaining accessible. The series was shot in its entirety in Dominica.