Charlie Drake

Screen One

Lionel

Anthology drama series.

The Modern World: Ten Great Writers

Marmeladov

This documentary series uses drama and commentary to shed light on the lives and works of Joseph Conrad, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, T. S. Eliot, Henrik Ibsen, James Joyce, Franz Kafka, Thomas Mann, Luigi Pirandello, Marcel Proust and Virginia Woolf.

Bleak House

Smallweed

Bleak House is BBC television drama first broadcast in 1985. The serial was adapted by Arthur Hopcraft from Charles Dickens' novel Bleak House and it was the second adaptation by the BBC.

99-1

Freddie Windsor

Implicated in an enquiry, maverick undercover DI Mick Raynor goes deep undercover to infiltrate dangerous criminal networks, often bending the rules in order to get results.

The Plank

Delivery man with cake

Classic short British comedy, full of stars, about two workmen delivering planks to a building site. This is done with music and a sort of "wordless dialogue" which consists of a few mumbled sounds to convey the appropriate emotion. TV remake of the 1967 short.

Christmas Night with the Stars

A gala programme broadcast each Christmas night by the BBC from 1958 to 1972 and also revived in 1994. It was hosted by a leading star and featured specially made short, seasonal editions of the previous year's most popular sitcoms and light entertainment programmes.

Mr. H Is Late

A team of inept undertakers attempt to get a coffin to a funeral on time. An undertaker is in charge of moving a coffin from a home to the church. The home is on the 26th floor of a skyscraper; the stairs are narrow; the lift is small and prone to stop working. Chaos ensues.

The Cracksman

Ernest Wright

Ernest Wright's peerless prowess as a locksmith comes to the attention of a tough big-time crook, who feels that the little man would be a valuable asset to his crime kingdom. In order to inveigle him into a series of jobs, he sets up a beautiful hostess as a trap, into which the hapless Ernest inevitably falls..!

Sands of the Desert

Charlie Sands

In this British comedy set in Saudi Arabia, a gentle British travel-agency clerk decides that it would be a smashing idea to open up a desert resort in Arabia. He heads to the desert and immediately finds himself on the bad side of a local sheik as the fellow tries to build his resort atop oil-rich land. A war erupts between rival desert bands as they vie for the rights to the oil, but it is the travel agent who wins out in the end

Royal Variety Performance 1984

In the presence of HM Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother accompanied by Their Royal Highnesses The Prince and Princess of Wales. From the stage of the Victoria Palace Theatre stars from the world of entertainment bring you comedy and music.

To See Such Fun

Compilation of classic British comedy moments

Mister Ten Per Cent

Percy Pointer

Percy Pointer's passion in life is the theatre, and all his spare time is devoted to the play he is writing. When it's finished it arrives on the desk of a London impresario, when he wants to stage a flop.

Filipina Dreamgirls

Lionel

Several men from Wales travel to the Philippines on an arranged tour to meet Filipina women for romance and possible marriage. None of the women are the ideal Asiatic beauties the men imagined, but by the end of the tour, most of the Englishmen return with a new bride.

Sinderella Live

Baron Hardon

A bawdy pantomime filmed during the sellout 1995 nationwide tour.

Endgame

Nagg

A performance of Samuel Beckett's 'Endgame', a play in which nothing happens, once - unlike Beckett's first play 'Waiting for Godot' in which nothing happens twice. It is not a play about chess, in any explicit sense, but it does feature a lovable if curmudgeonly old man in a dustbin. Generally accepted to be Beckett's bleakest play - indeed after it's 1957 English debut at the Royal Court, the TLS's Olivier Todd quipped that it made Waiting for Godot look like "a cheerful operetta". However, Beckett himself described it as "the favourite of my plays." Although the programme was not broadcast until 1991 it was recorded in 1989 prior to Beckett's death and had his blessing. This production is particularly notable as it is first full-length television performance of the play.

Rhubarb Rhubarb

During a game of golf between a police inspector and a vicar the inspector cheats by having a constable move his ball into favourable positions and the vicar's into hazardous ones. when the vicar discovers this he prays for divine intervention which turns the tables.

Petticoat Pirates

Charlie

Undistinguished British farce (in Technicolor and CinemaScope). Stoker Charlie (the diminutive Drake) helps 150 Wrens under Superintendent Maxine Audley, who've hijacked a frigate, HMS 'Huntress', to prove they're the equal of their male counterparts. Hardly a feminist masterpiece, but fans will relish the nightmare court-martial in which Drake plays all the parts

Charlie Drake: Drake's Progress

Self

Documentary profile of actor and comedian Charlie Drake. Drake had much to overcome - marital, financial and career troubles dogged him -but after reinventing himself as a straight actor, he won acclaim for his roles. At his home in south London, he recalls his highs and lows.

Professor Popper's Problems

Professor Popper develops a shrinking formula which he and a group of school kids take by accident, ending up trapped in his laboratory. But that's not the only problem that faces the professor and his friends.