Thames Television
London (Weekdays)

Thames Television House,
306-316 Euston Road, LONDON NW1 3BB
Telephone 01-387 9494
Teddington Studios, Teddington Lock,
TEDDINGTON, Middlesex TW11 9NT
Telephone 01-977 3252
Sales Office: Norfolk House, Smallbrook,
Queensway, BIRMINGHAM B5 4LJ
Telephone 021-643 9131

Directors

Thames Television Limited is the company which, under agreement with the Independent Broadcasting Authority, provides the television programmes in London on weekdays from Monday to 7 pm Friday.

Howard Thomas, CBE (Chairman); George A Cooper (Managing Director); Jeremy Isaacs (Director of Programmes); John T Davey, FCA; D R W Dicks; H S L Dundas, DSO, DFC; J Stuart Sansom, OBE, FIERE (Director of Studios and Engineering); John E Read; Ian M Scott, CA (Director of Finance); T H Tilling; Colin S Wills, MA, FCA (Assistant Managing Director).

Executives

Ben E Marr, CA (Company Secretary); James F Shaw (Sales Director); Max Lawson, FCA (Chief Accountant); Jack Andrews (Controller, Programme Department); John Edwards (Controller of Current Affairs and Documentary Programmes); Guthrie Moir (Controller of Education and Religious Programmes); Grahame Turner (Controller of Outside Broadcasts); Sue Turner (Controller of Children’s Programmes); J A Muir Sutherland (Controller, Programme Sales); Brian G Scott, CENG, MIEE (Head of Engineering); R J Hughes (Sales Controller); Geoffrey Lugg (Programme Co-ordinator); Donald Cullimore (Controller, Public Relations); John Hambley (Controller, Advertising and Publications); Douglas Thornes (Research Manager); Eric E Parry (Controller, Programme Services); C J Smeaton (Controller, Administration).

Visits to Studios

A limited number of tickets are available for audiences at certain shows. Applications enclosing stamped addressed envelopes, should be made to the Ticket Office at Thames Television House, 306-316 Euston Road, London NW1 3BB. The minimum age is 16, except for some programmes specially for children.

Enquiries

Enquiries about artists and programmes should be addressed to Viewers’ Correspondence, Thames Television House, 306-316 Euston Road, London NW1 3BB.

Submission of Scripts

While Thames will always welcome the submission of proposals for plays and series, drama plans are subject to change over the year. Writers are advised in the first place to contact the Story Supervisor at Teddington Studios.

Sales and Marketing

Thames operates a full marketing and merchandising service and offers special rates for local advertisers, holiday and travel advertisers, etc. Details are available from the Sales Controller.

New Technology

Work in progress on the extension of production facilities at Teddington Studios.

In order to support sophisticated VTR editing with an equivalent audio facility, Thames has developed and brought into service a comprehensive sound dubbing system. This synchronizes helical scan or quadruplex video-tape machines with multi-track audio recorders and provides a flexible off-line dubbing system with a track laying, mixing and composite track production capability. The system may also be used on outside broadcasts. Associated engineering development work on off-line vtr editing is also being carried out.

Programmes

Jennie — Lady Randolph Churchill. Lee Remick stars as Jennie in Thames Television’s series of one hour plays.

Monday to 7 pm Friday Thames provides ITV programmes to 14 million people living in and around the capital and a substantial number of these are also shown throughout the ITV network. This means a production schedule reaching well over a thousand programmes a year – and increasing in number since the relaxation of restrictions on broadcasting hours. The company’s aim is to educate, inform and entertain in depth and on the widest scale.

Most of the drama, light entertainment and children’s programmes are made in the riverside studios at Teddington, ten miles from Thames Television House. There are three studios at Teddington, the largest of 7,500 sq. ft and all are fully operational in colour. The company has recently started a major building programme to extend and improve to the highest possible level the support facilities for the studios.

The widely praised Thames documentary series The World At War was prepared mainly at Teddington. Each episode was watched by an average audience of more than 11½ million people throughout Britain. It has also been sold to many countries overseas including the USA.

Current affairs and documentary programmes are produced mainly at TTH with its presentation and audience studios and extensive VTR, telecine and editing facilities. Today, London’s daily live magazine programme, Good Afternoon, one of ITV’s most important consumer-orientated programme series, Something To Say and People and Politics are all produced at TTH.

Thames’s outside-broadcast units are based at Hanworth, near Teddington, where much of the production work for Drive-In, ITV’s motoring magazine programme, is carried out. The equipment includes one four-colour camera unit, two two-colour camera plus VTR units, a single-colour camera unit, a hand-held colour camera which may be used independently or in association with other units, three micro-wave link units and a full range of other auxiliaries such as hydraulic towers, and stand-by generators. In addition, a specialised sound-mixing vehicle has been added, equipped for large-scale musical programmes and including multi-track recording and reverberation facilities.

The programme output of these three centres has made Thames a leading contributor to the national Top Twenty programme ‘league table’. Overseas sales of programmes are increasing. Here is a list of some of the programmes Thames produces:

The World at War. The opening titles of Thames Television’s highly successful 26-part series have now been seen by millions of people all over the world. An average of just under 12 million saw each episode in Britain and the series has already been sold for viewing in almost 30 other countries.

DRAMA: Armchair Theatre; Armchair Cinema; Public Eye; Special Branch; Man at the Top; Callan; Six Days of Justice; The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes; Shades of Green; Napoleon and Love; Way of the World; Jennie – Lady Randolph Churchill; Moody and Pegg. CHILDREN’S  Magpie; The Sooty Show; Rainbow; Larry the Lamb; The Tomorrow People; Robert’s Robots; Funny Ha Ha; Issi Noho; Amazingly Enough It’s Rod Hull and Emu; Michael Bentine’s Potty Time; Paper Play; Magpie Specials: Like Ordinary Children; My Brother David; Kids in the Country/Kids About Town. LIGHT ENTERTAINMENT: This Is Your Life; Bless This House; Love Thy Neighbour; …And Mother Makes Five; Opportunity Knocks!; The David Nixon Show; Tony Bennett at the Talk of the Town; Harry Worth; Looks Familiar; Whodunnit?; Quick on the Draw; Spring and Autumn; Man About the House; Specials from Benny Hill and Tommy Cooper. There Goes That Song Again; Carry on Christmas. CURRENT AFFAIRS: This Week; Today; Tuesday Documentary; Something to Say; People and Politics; The World At War; Specials (eg, Elections). FEATURES: Good Afternoon; The History of London. OUTSIDE BROADCASTS: Wrestling; Racing; Football; Tennis; Ice Skating; Athletics; Drive-in (motoring magazine); Specials (fashion shows, beauty contests, Royal Command Performance, etc); SCHOOLS: Seeing and Doing; Finding Out; The World Around Us; King Lear; Reflections; Song and Story; Evidence; Writer’s Workshop; Let’s Go Out; Le Nouvel Arrivé (French); Images. ADULT EDUCATION: Treasures of the British Museum; The Art of the Craft; A Place in the Country; A Place in History; A Place in Europe; Cooking Without Tears; Yoga for Health; Looking At(Antiques); Planting for Pleasure; Water Wise. RELIGION: Late Night Religious Programmes throughout the year; Christmas Services; Kontakion; Who Is This Man?; Crisis of the Cross.

About the author

Eric Croston was editor of the ITA and IBA yearbooks from 1963 until 1985

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