Writing
A quirky spy show of the adventures of eccentrically suave British Agent John Steed and his predominantly female partners. Jonathan Steed - an urbane, proper gentleman spy - teams with various assistants throughout the series' run, including Dr. David Keel, Cathy Gale, Emma Peel and Tara King, to repeatedly save the world from diabolical schemes plotted by equally diabolical evil-doers (among them robots and man-eating monsters).
Drama 61-67 is anthology drama series which took a different title, based on year of transmission, each year. It alternated with Armchair Theatre from ABC in the Sunday evening slot. The series was described at the time as epitomising ATV drama.
Anthology of 70-minute UK dramatic productions.
18 short plays written especially for TV, an opportunity for up-and-coming directors such as floor manager Alan Clarke, who ended up doing 10 of the episodes. Some top ranking performers were attracted to the series.
'The Verdict Is Yours' premiered on September 2, 1957, in the CBS Daytime lineup. Unscripted, the show featured real lawyers playing the lawyers and judge. The defendants and witnesses on the program were professional actors who ad-libbed their dialogue, although they were given a general outline of what they were supposed to say. Sportscaster Jim McKay was the original reporter, providing commentary on the trials. He was succeeded in 1960 by newsman Bill Stout.
The Informer is a British crime drama series broadcast on ITV from August 1966 to December 1967. Created by John Whitney and Geoffrey Bellman, it stars Ian Hendry as former barrister Alex Lambert, disgraced and disbarred, who has to rebuild his life. He utilises his former contacts on both sides of the law to become a paid informer. Living well from the rewards paid by insurance companies, Lambert still has to hide his activities from both his wife and others behind a new persona in the guise as a business consultant. Two seasons were produced, totalling 21 episodes. Only two episodes are known to exist, the remainder presumably wiped.
The Plane Makers is a British television series created by Wilfred Greatorex and produced by Rex Firken. ATV made three series for ITV between 1963 and 1965. It was succeeded by The Power Game, which ran for an additional three series from 1965 to 1969. Firkin continued as producer for the first two series, and David Reid took over for series 3.
Harpers West One is an ATV television drama series created by John Whitney and Geoffrey Bellman about a fictional department store, Harpers, in the West 1 district of London. The show ran in one-hour episodes from 1961 to 1963. It was introduced by ATV while Probation Officer, was being rested but became an immediate success. Press releases described it as "shopping with the lid off". A combination of drama and soap opera, it has also been described as presaging corporate dramas such as The Brothers for its depiction of power struggles at board level.
When John North, a budding author, pulls the communication cord of a late night train that is taking him away on a weekend with his publishers wife, he sets in motion a series of events that lead to a train crash, a murder and a police man hunt, but all is not what it seems.
During the early years of World War II, a bomb from a German airplane uncovers the corpse of a strangled woman.
