Colin Pasmore tests his strength against his family ties but finds them stronger than he ever imagined.
Guest Stars:
Philip Jackson, Alison Steadman, Jimmy Jewel, Roger Hammond, Richard Wilson
"In heaven there is no drama - drama depends on failure and conflict. My trade is a scrutiny of hell. For any proud dramatist his style is his prejudice."
Guest Stars:
Dinsdale Landen, Zena Walker, John Normington, Deborah Grant
Writer-director John McGrath deliberately shies away from naturalism in an experiment that mixes blue screen, songs, and characters realising they're acting within a play. This first of two parts sees Frank travel to a hostile London.
Guest Stars:
Mick Ford, Alan Ford
Guest Stars:
Mick Ford, Jim Broadbent, Susan Porrett, Alan Ford
Kay Gilbert goes into hospital for a minor operation which goes badly wrong. This play tells the story of her fight for compensation.
Guest Stars:
Paola Dionisotti, Paul Brooke, David Hargreaves, Charles Kay, Maggie Ollerenshaw
What could Steve Jackson's documentary film expose that must be concealed from the African leaders meeting in Brussels? Steve Jackson is on the run and the wrong decision could prove fatal.
Guest Stars:
Roy Boyd, Nick Tate, Derek Martin, John Challis, Harriet Philpin
Twelve-year-old Jude has never met Dick, his father. One Sunday afternoon Dick impulsively engineers a meeting, which has distressing consequences.
Guest Stars:
Dorian Ford, James Laurenson, Rachel Kempson, Gabrielle Lloyd
Dominick Hide, a time traveller from London in the year 2130, is studying the city's transport system of 1980. Breaking the rules, he lands his craft to seek out his great-grandfather. Compared to his anaesthetised home, 80s London is filthy and polluted...and yet...it exudes an excitement that soon draws him in.
Guest Stars:
Caroline Langrishe, Peter Firth, Pippa Guard, Patrick Magee, Trevor Ray
Clive admits himself to a psychiatric hospital after undergoing a breakdown. His wife wants him back home, but in order for Clive to be released, he has to want to be cured.
Guest Stars:
Philip Latham, Elisabeth Sladen, Richard O'Callaghan, Pauline Quirke
In Victorian times, a nanny cares for a mute boy, who becomes overly attached to her.
A vacation at a seaside hotel in Ireland changes the lives of four friends.
Guest Stars:
Stanley Lebor, Wolfe Morris
The problems of an owner of a building contractor company in Liverpool
Guest Stars:
Pete Postlethwaite, Terence Rigby, Alison Steadman, Ronald Forfar
"They're nice affable gobblers and we're in the nice affable gobbling business." Tom and Gwen soon find that their gastronomical retreat from the rat race is anything but an escape when the Porters come to dine.
Guest Stars:
Christopher Benjamin, Nigel Hawthorne, Shirley Stelfox, Gillian Martell
"They say that in the wood you get what nearly everybody here is longing for - a second chance." J. M. Barrie's fantasy play, depicting alternative realities for its characters and their eventual return to real life.
Guest Stars:
Frank Finlay, Sarah Badel, Nigel Stock, Peter Egan, Angharad Rees
A confused industrial dispute at a London hospital triggers off in trade unionist George Harley's mind memories of his days fighting in the Spanish Civil War, when the issues seemed so much clearer.
Guest Stars:
Jimmy Jewel, Andrew Fell, David Suchet, Elizabeth Spriggs
The head of a multinational corporation wants to do business with the Soviets
Guest Stars:
Steven Berkoff, Graham Crowden, George Pravda
A group of men hold a reunion dinner in Tokyo
Guest Stars:
Peter Sallis, Don Henderson
You know the nuts and bolts of our policy? To penetrate the unions. To use all sorts of stratagems, manoeuvres, illegal measures, evasions, subterfuges, to carry on Communist activities inside them at all cost.
Guest Stars:
Ian Hogg, Susan Kodicek, David Bradley
Two very different women share an office, a common enemy, and a sense of humour.
Guest Stars:
Meg Davies, Nicholas Ball, June Brown, Geoffrey Chater
When her 17-year-old son Roy falls in love with a Muslim girl, and a Bangladeshi butcher seeks help from her husband Raji, Leela realizes that the tears and romance of Indian cinema are closer to her own life than she has ever imagined.
Guest Stars:
Terry Molloy, Lyndam Gregory, Albert Moses, Tariq Yunus, Patricia Garwood
Six lifers living in an experimental self-rehabilitation unit attached to an ordinary prison participate in a group therapy session. All of them have spent many years in prison and have little chance of ever getting out.
Guest Stars:
Eric Porter, Kenneth Cranham
An evening with the Parent-Teacher Association gets out of hand.
Guest Stars:
Carmen Silvera, John Challis
When the dynamic young head-master of St Peter's Primary School decides to liven up a parents' fund-raising social by hiring a Bavarian band, he little suspects the hidden passions that are about to be unleashed.
Guest Stars:
Bob Peck, Malcolm Terris, Gary Olsen, Sarah Badel
Nancy and Ella are two bored housewives starved of affection when their husbands are away on the oil rigs. The rules are simple: have some fun, just make sure nobody finds out, and you don't get emotionally involved.
Guest Stars:
Phyllis Logan, Anne Kristen
It's such a simple, natural thing to have a baby, thinks Mary. But she and husband Paul are preoccupied with their careers. Can their young neighbour Tessa help - or are the emotions around a new baby more complex than anyone had expected?
Guest Stars:
Susan Littler, John Harding, Pauline Quirke
Soldiers are subjected to a brutal and sadistic kind of psychological training exercise
Guest Stars:
Christopher Ryan, John Challis, Bernard Hill, Margaret Mason

19 Episodes