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The Bill

The Bill is a long-running British television police procedural, first broadcast on 16 October, 1984 and transmitted on ITV, at 20:00 on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Older episodes of The Bill are broadcast on UKTV Gold regularly.

Contents

History

Following the pilot on 16 August 1983 the first episode of The Bill was transmitted on 16 October 1984. Starting with one episode per week, featuring hour long separate storylines for the first three seasons, The Bill went on to be three half hour episodes per week between 1988 and 1998 due to a drop in ratings before going to two hour long episodes per week. From 1998 The Bill became more serialised, especially from 2002 when Paul Marquess took over as Executive Producer. Under Johnathan Young who took over as executive producer in 2005 the more sensational story lines have been dropped with more focus on crime story lines.

Cast

Senior Officers

Police Sergeants

Detective Sergeants

Police Constables

Detective Constables

Police Staff

Upcoming character changes

Setting

The Bill is set in and around Sun Hill police station in the fictional London borough of Canley in East London. Other police stations within the Canley Borough Operational Command Unit (BOCU), mentioned but (usually) unseen, are Barton Street, which is the location of Borough Headquarters, Stafford Row and Spicer Street. Canley is approximately contiguous with the real London Borough of Tower Hamlets, but filming takes place all over London, mainly in South London and particularly the London Borough of Merton, where the Sun Hill set is located (on Deer Park Road, SW19). The main locations used when the show is filmed on an estate are the Cambridge Estate, in Kingston, south west London and the High Path Estate, in South Wimbledon, south west London (approx 10 minutes walk from the main set). Other main estates used are Durand Close, in Carshalton, and Roundshaw estate opposite Mellows Park in Wallington, London. Sometimes scenes are filmed in East London and notably the London Docklands standing in for Canley. Canley is also the name of a real district within the city of Coventry, some 100 miles north of London.

The Bill is unusual among police shows: it takes a serial format and it does not focus on one particular area of police work. The show focuses on the work and lives of patrol and response officers on one relief in the uniform division, and the work of the CID. In its current serial format, some stories are cleared up in an episode or two, whereas others can stretch over months or even in some cases approaching a year.

It started as a one-off drama for ITV entitled Woodentop; this pilot show starred Mark Wingett as PC Jim Carver and Trudie Goodwin as WPC June Ackland on Carver's first day on the beat at Sun Hill police station. It was originally devised by Geoff McQueen, and it impressed ITV so much that they decided to make a series out of it. Wingett left the cast in early 2005, while Goodwin's last episode was broadcast on 8 March, 2007 (coincidentally the last episode since the serialised format was introduced by Paul Marquess to be broadcast without an episode title).

Trivia

  • The doors of Custody used to be made of plywood, with the resounding "bang" also being added in the dubbing suite. In May 2007, they were changed to metal doors, which lock fully.[1]
  • The fictional telephone number of the station located on the notice board at the front desk is 020 7511 1642. The police station's address is: Sun Hill Police Station, 2 Sun Hill Road, Canley, London, E1 4KM[2]
  • In the 2005 live episode, since the action was filmed live at the Sun Hill set, crowds of people watching the filming can be seen across the road from the station entrance. Also, in the scene where the car flips over, a boom mike operator can be seen running across the screen, apparently unaware that he is being filmed.
  • The first line spoken in Woodentop was Jim Carver (Mark Wingett), saying "Okay Carver, let's do it" as he got out of bed. They were also the final words spoken by the character when he left the series in 2005.
  • The CAD room (Computer Aided Dispatch) was the centre of all radio communications for Sun Hill police, until 2006. In 2007 the Met revamped their communications (with radios changing from analogue to digital). Now there is an external control centre adjoining Sun Hill station called IBO or Integrated Borough Operations which provides all the local knowledge to the officers on the beat.
  • In 1998, Kevin Lloyd who played DC Alfred "Tosh" Lines, died of alcohol abuse, and in January 2008, Jeff Stewart who played PC Reg Hollis attempted suicide in his dressing room on the set, both after being told by The Bill bosses that their contracts would not be renewed.
  • When filming on location, The Bill does not have permission to use sirens. These are added in the dubbing suite.[1]
  • The Bill is recorded at Bosun House which is the building portrayed as Sun Hill Police Station instead of a studio set. Bosun House is situated in South Wimbledon, London
  • In November 2006, thieves stole editing machines and master tapes from the shows studios in Merton, South West London. Posing as a worker and wearing a high-visibility jacket, one of the thieves followed a real worker into the studios and took the equipment, walked out with it and was driven off in a getaway van.[3] Two episodes (468 and 469) were dropped from the schedules in late December 2006, and it is rumoured that the stolen tapes contained scenes from these episodes. The scenes were re-filmed, with the episodes being re-edited to fit continuity with present story lines and were transmitted Wednesday 9 May (Episode 468, renamed Blood Money) and Thursday 10 May (Episode 469, renamed To Honour and Obey).

Character Deaths

  • PC Billy Rowan was the first officer to die in his first episode (Cop Killer Part 1, 05/07/07).
  • 2006 was the first year since 2001 that has not involved the death of a police officer in the series although the death of PC Honey Harman was filmed in 2006 but not aired until 2007.

Reappearing actors

Notable guests

  • Singer and actress Martine McCutcheon appeared in an episode of The Bill entitled "Skeletons", on 2 July 1991 as a paper girl, and again on 16 July 1992 as Amanda Jones, in an episode entitled "A Scandalous Act".
  • Spice Girl Emma Bunton appeared in an episode of The Bill entitled "Missionary Work", on 23 February 1993, as a troubled teenager named Janice.
  • Actress Keira Knightley appeared in an episode of The Bill entitled "Swan Song", on 13 April 1995, as a ten-year old tearaway named Sheena Rose.
  • Comedian/Presenter/Actor Russell Brand appeared on The Bill when he was 18, as seen on Brand's new show Ponderland which aired 24 October 2007.
  • Jesse Birdsall, the actor who played Gillian Taylforth's (Sgt Nikki Wright) character's husband in 'Footballer's Wives' once appeared as a criminal who blackmailed DS Phil Hunter.
  • Daniel Radcliffe, most notable for being the leading actor in the Harry Potter films, appeared in a single 2002 episode as a boy who helped his mother with voluntary work for a local charity, and had been tricked by his friends into believing that one of the Sun Hill officers was a "child snatcher".
  • Sarah Tansey, who played the recurring role of missing seven year old Amy Tennant's stepmother Ruth Barker, is married to Hywel Simons, who played Sergeant Craig Gilmore until 2003.
  • In a storyline where Gina Gold had a romantic fling with councillor Peter Harris, who turned out to be married, Roberta Taylor played opposite her real-life husband Peter Guinness.
  • In an episode on 15 February 2007, the actor playing a criminal involved in a car dealership scam was called Bob Cryer.
  • Letitia Dean played suspected arsonist Amanda Ronson in 'Playing with Fire'in 1997.
  • Footballer Emmanuel Petit played himself in the 1998 Christmas episode
  • Linda Lusardi played Don Beech's girlfriend Maggie Lyons in four 2000 episodes, and return for two more in 2004.
  • Craig Charles played Martin Bailey in the 1995 episode "Honey Pot".
  • Ron Moody has appeared several times, including once as husband to Mollie Sugden, where the two of them were elderly con artists.
  • Sylvester McCoy has made several appearances, both comic and dramatic.

DVD releases

Australia (Region 4)

The Bill is currently being released in Australia in a 12 disc wallet format, the first 5 series have been released with the 6th series to follow.

UK (Region 2)

In the UK, The Bill has, so far, been released in a volume per season, with seasons 1 to 3 also released in a collected edition. The series 4 DVD release is now being released in volumes.

  • Series 1 (Episodes 1-12) was released on 6 June 2005
  • Series 2 (Episodes 13-24) was released on 17 October 2005
  • Series 3 (Episodes 25-36) was released on 28 May 2007
  • Series 1-3 (Episodes 1-36) was released on 19 November 2007
  • Series 4 - Volume One (Episodes 37-50) was released on June 30 2008
  • Series 4 - Volume Two (Episodes 51-) TBA

U.S. (Region 1)

The Bill was also released in the US with the first series, sadly at the moment no further series are planned for release.

  • Series 1 (Episodes 1-12) was released on June 5 2007.

Theme Music

Rick Wakeman was offered the chance to write the theme tune either for this series or for "Lytton's Diary" (1985). He chose the latter, believing that it had the best potential of the two to be a long running series. It ran for two seasons. The job went to Andy Pask and Charlie Morgan who wrote "Overkill".

There are several versions of this theme. The first, used between 1984 - 1987, featured a guitar riff, with synthesizer, bass and drum accompaniment, with "middle-eight" sections performed on synthesisers. The second is a remix of the first, used between 1988 - 1998. Instead of the guitar riff, it was replaced with a more bouncy saxophone riff, and is better known than the original. Both versions were written in the irregular time of 7/8 with the exception of the "middle-eight" sections which were written in 4/4. The current arrangement is by Lawrence Oakley.

  • Despite new opening titles and a new version of the previous theme tune being introduced in very early 2007, the previous music can still be heard on certain episodes of the show a year or so on. Sometimes the opening and closing titles feature the modernised version and the break bumpers the old version, or vica versa.

Controversies and reception

  • The police uniforms used in the series are genuine and are locked away for security reasons every night with no complete uniform being locked in any one cupboard.
  • Real police officers took such a dim view of previews they were shown from the first series of The Bill that they refused to attend the launch party. The Police Federation later attacked the programme for implying that racial prejudice existed within the Force.
  • In the early days of The Bill a local resident registered her protest at what she deemed to be a stereotypical portrayal of council estates as hotbeds of crime. She held up filming by stationing herself in the background with an ironing board, iron and basket full of laundry.

Overseas broadcast

The Bill has been broadcast in over 55 different countries

  • It is very popular in Australia, where it is shown on the ABC1.
    • Currently two new episodes are shown on Saturdays from 20:30 and repeated on the digital-only channel ABC2 on Tuesday. Until late 2007 new episodes were shown on ABC1 two episodes were shown per week, one at 20.30 on Tuesday and the other at the same time on Saturday, when the episodes were half an hour one was shown on tuesday and two on Saturday.
    • Older repeats sometimes shown on ABC1 at 14:00 Monday-Thursday, usually when parliament is not in session. While initially years behind the new episodes, this repeats are currently about a month behind.
    • Additionally, older episodes can be seen on UK.TV. As of January 2008, episodes from the 1990s can be seen on weekdays, whilst episodes from 2005 can be seen on weekends.
  • In New Zealand, the series is shown on UKTV twice a week
  • In Sweden the show was retitled "Sunhillspolisstation" (Sun Hill Police Station) by broadcaster TV4. Now it is broadcast on Kanal 9 using The Bill, daily at approx. 15:00 with a repeat the following morning approx 04:00.
  • It screens in Ireland on RTÉ One, which is currently showing episodes from 2004. However, RTÉ does not show it in its proper hour long duration, but instead splits one hour long episode into two half hour shows five days a week thus only showing two and a half episodes each week. Fans of the show and TV critics in Ireland have nicknamed it as the "Old Bill", as viewers in Ireland can watch the same episodes as the UK, on UTV.
  • In Belgium the series is broadcast on één.

Novels

A series of six novelisations of The Bill were published between 1985 and 1992, by Thames/Methuan Publishing (under the Mandarin imprint). Each book was written by John Burke, and adapted from television scripts by Geoff McQueen, Barry Appleton, Ginnie Hole, Christopher Russell, Lionel Goldstein, Al Hunter, Nicholas McInnery, JC Wilsher, Jonathan Rich and Robin Muckherjee.

The format of the books differed from the original scripts in minor details: the episodes are presented in a more serialised style, with the narrative events of separate episodes moving into and out of each other, not unlike the format used on the television series itself at present. An example of this in Book 1 is the events of the episode "The Drug's Raid", where the first part of that episode is shown to take place midway through the book, while the last part takes place several chapters later (ostensibly after DI Galloway has received new evidence several weeks later). As such, what were separate episodes on television are woven into a single narrative in the books, with completely new linking material between events in one episode and events in another.

Also, an early taboo of the series itself (whose format firmly established that we never went home with the officers to see their private lives) was broken by, for example, showing DI Galloway at home with his wife and his daughter during the first two books.

When the novels began to adapt the half-hour episodes (Book Three onwards) there is a noticeable jump in continuity, as the sudden influx of a larger cast of characters meant that not every "first episode" of each character could be adapted, so several characters can be seen suddenly appearing half way through with little or no introduction as to who they are or where they came from.

All the novelisations were published in paperback editions. The first two books were also published in rarer to find hardcover editions. The stories from Series Three of the tv series never received a novelisation because of various unavoidable production problems with that series.

  • The Bill 1 (published 1985) - Adapted select episodes of Series One (1984). Cover photo of PC Jim Carver chasing a suspect.
  • The Bill 2 (published 1987) - Adapted select episodes of Series Two (1985). Cover photo of Sergeant Bob Cryer in civilian clothing.
  • The Bill 3 (published 1989) - Adapted select episodes of Series Four (1988). Cover photo of Sergeant Bob Cryer and Inspector Christine Fraser in Sun Hill station carpark.
  • The Bill 4 (published 1990) - Adapted select episodes of Series Five (1989). Cover photo of DC "Tosh" Lines and DC Mike Dashwood.
  • The Bill 5 (published 1991) - Adapted select episodes of Series Five (1989). Cover photo of DS Ted Roach.
  • The Bill 6 (published 1992) - Adapted select episodes of Series Six (1990). Cover photo of Inspector Andrew Munroe and DI Frank Burnside.

Spin-offs

The Bill has spawned three spin-off productions.

The first of these was known as Burnside. It lasted a single series of six episodes, the first of which debuted on 7 July 2000. The series focused on the newly promoted DCI Burnside as a member of the National Crime Squad. It was created and produced by Richard Handford. The DVD release in Australia will feature all of the episodes in a 3 disc set. It is scheduled to be released 8 October 2008.

The second spin-off debuted in 2001, and also lasted only six episodes, although was more of a break away from the regular Bill (it was shown in the Bill timeslot) than a complete spin-off. Beech is Back focused on dodgy ex-DS Don Beech, still on the run from Claire Stanton who wants him brought to justice for the murder of her boyfriend DS John Boulton. None of the episodes were given a title, with each being part of a single six part serial. At the end Beech is brought to justice and sent to prison, although he would return in The Bill three years later.

In 2003, ITV debuted the third spin-off of the show, entitled MIT: Murder Investigation Team. The first episode investigated the drive-by shooting of Sgt. Matthew Boyden, who had been at Sun Hill for eleven years. The first series consisted of ten one-hour episodes. The second series was filmed in 2004, but not shown until mid 2005, and consisted of four ninety-minute episodes. It featured Eva Sharpe (Diane Parish) from The Bill, who had transferred to MIT. (Before it was broadcast, it was also rumoured to feature Chris Simmons as Mickey Webb, who had recently departed from The Bill, but these rumours turned out to be false). The series was created by Paul Marquess. The second series was produced by Johnathan Young.

A German version of The Bill, utilising original Bill scripts was produced for RTL Television from 1994 to 2006. It was called Die Wache. http://www.transdiffusion.org/emc/tvheroes/haldaneduncan/the_cologne_diaries.php http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_Wache

References

External links

cy:The Bill fr:Brigade volante ga:The Bill sv:The Bill

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