6.6 /10 1 Votes
First episode date 10 September 1989 | 6.6/10 IMDb Final episode date 16 October 1994 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Writers Alan Bennett, Les Blair, Geoffrey Case, William Humble, Paul Knight, Monty Haltrecht, Beverley Marcus Awards British Academy Television Award for Best Single Drama, International Emmy Award for Drama Executive producers Ruth Caleb, Innes Lloyd, Sarah Curtis Cast Julie Walters, Iain Glen, Lauren Bacall, Samantha Bond, Sebastian Knapp Similar Screen Two, Play for Today, Oliver Twist, The Wednesday Play, Ghostwatch | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Screen One is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 between 1989 and 1993.
Following the demise of the BBC's Play for Today which ran from 1970 to 1984, producer Kenneth Trodd was asked to formulate a new series of one-off television dramas. However, while Play for Today's style had often been a largely studio-based form of theatre on television, the new series was to follow the lead taken by Channel 4's television films many of which had been released in cinemas. The result was Screen Two which ran from 1985 to 1994 on BBC2.
In 1989 the Screen One strand began broadcasting on the more mainstream BBC1.
The third series' A Question of Attribution adapted from the Alan Bennett play won the 1992 BAFTA TV award for Best Single Drama and Prunella Scales was nominated for Best Actress.
From the fifth series A Foreign Field starring Alec Guinness, Lauren Bacall and Jeanne Moreau and Wide-Eyed and Legless saw a cinema release. Wide-Eyed and Legless starring Julie Walters and Jim Broadbent was renamed The Wedding Gift in America.
Screen One attracted many names familiar to television and film audiences including Alfred Molina, Sean Bean, David Thewlis, Ray Winstone, Alan Bates, Judi Dench, James Fox, Keith Allen, Bob Peck, Alun Armstrong, Marina Sirtis, David Jason, Brenda Blethyn, James Bolam, Adrian Edmondson, Alison Steadman, Timothy West, Clive Russell and Janet McTeer. The fifth series episode Royal Celebration saw the screen debut of Keira Knightley.
By 1993, the prevailing mood within the BBC was to move away from single dramas and concentrate production on series and serials.