Closedowns reappear on Yorkshire Television when its experiment with 24-hour television, which had begun last August and had consisted of a simulcast of music video channel Music Box, is put on hiatus.
The Guardian reports that Central has acquired the European division of the American production company Filmfair for £1.5million.[4] Filmfair goes on to produce several of the station's networked children's series before being sold onto the Storm Group (Caspian) in 1991.[5][6]
Inspector Morse, based on the books by Colin Dexter, makes its debut on ITV with John Thaw in the title role; the series will run until 2000 and generate spin-offs.
12 January – The five-part Australian World War I drama Anzacs makes its UK debut on BBC1, starring Paul Hogan.[7]
13 January – Yorkshire Television becomes the second ITV region to launch a Jobfinder service. It broadcasts for an hour after closedown.[8]
16 January – The Zircon affair becomes public knowledge when The Guardian reports that the government ordered the BBC to shelve a documentary in the Secret Society series about the Zircon satellite. Two days later, documentary maker Duncan Campbell is subject to an injunction preventing him from discussing or writing about the programme's content, but he subsequently writes an article about the episode for the New Statesman.
29 January – Alasdair Milne is forced to resign as Director-General of the BBC by the newly-appointed Chairman of the Board of Governors, Marmaduke Hussey.[9] His deputy, senior BBC accountant Michael Checkland, becomes acting D-G.
February
5 February – Princess Anne appears on the long-running sports quiz A Question of Sport on BBC1, a matter of weeks after team captain Emlyn Hughes famously mistook a picture of her on a horse for jockey John Reid. The episode gains a record audience of 19 million viewers.
21 February – An apparently inebriated Oliver Reed appears on the ITV chat show Aspel & Company where he stumbles and lurches around the set.
24 February – The sitcom Hardwicke House, set in a dysfunctional comprehensive school, makes its debut on ITV. However, the series is badly received by critics and viewers and is abruptly cancelled after just two episodes are shown, the second being broadcast the following evening. The remaining five episodes scheduled are never transmitted.
26 February – Michael Checkland is formally appointed as Director-General of the BBC.
27 February – The BBC and ITV begins a week of programming aimed at educating people about the AIDS virus. Highlights include AIDS – The Facts on BBC1, a short programme of facts and figures covering frequently asked questions about the disease and First AIDS, an ITV comedy-sketch show produced by London Weekend Television and featuring Mike Smith, Jonathan Ross and Emma Freud.[10][11]
21 March – Opportunity Knocks returns after a decade-long break on BBC1. It is presented by Bob Monkhouse and airs under the title Bob Says Opportunity Knocks.[13]
Channel 4 starts broadcasting into the early hours on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays when it launches Nightime.[16] One of the programmes is the discussion show After Dark which is broadcast live and with no scheduled end time.
Yorkshire extends broadcasting into the early hours on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights by introducing a Through Till Three strand.
24 April – The final episode of the music series The Tube is broadcast on Channel 4.
25 April
The Australian soap opera Prisoner: Cell Block H makes its debut on Central. This is believed by many viewers to be the series debut on British television, but in fact it has been running in the Yorkshire region since 1984. Central is the first region to conclude the series, in December 1991.
Central becomes the first station to keep its transmitters on air all night when it launches More Central. Programmes are shown into the early hours with the rest of the night filled by its Jobfinder service which airs from closedown until the start of TV-am.[17]
28 April – BBC television programming in Hindi and Urdu finishes after more than 20 years following the transmission of the final editions of Asian Magazine[18] and Gharbar.[19] A new programme for the Asian community will be launched later in the year but will be broadcast in English.
May
1 May – Launch of the late-night discussion programme After Dark on Channel 4 which is broadcast live and is notable for having no scheduled end time.
3 May – The groundbreaking youth show Network 7 makes its debut on Channel 4. It is shown live at Sunday lunchtime.
10 May – ITV airs Escape from Sobibor, a made-for-television film telling the story of the mass escape from the Sobibór extermination camp during World War II, the most successful uprising by Jewish prisoners of German extermination camps.[20]
22 May – 20 June – The BBC airs coverage of the first Rugby World Cup from Australia and New Zealand. This is the only time that they have shown the tournament.
24 May – Two TV reporters, Michael Buerk from the BBC and Peter Sharp from ITN, are expelled from South Africa as a result of their coverage of university demonstrations.[citation needed]
June
1 June – Live presentation of Children's ITV is launched and are presented by former Central announcers Gary Terzza and Debbie Shore.[21]
9 June – Debut of the Tyne Tees-produced chart show The Roxy, presented by David Jensen and Kevin Sharkey. The show is intended as a stablemate for the Independent radio hit parade The Network Chart Show following a similar format to the BBC's Top of the Pops, but its Newcastle upon Tyne location impinges on its ability to secure live performances. It also suffers from poor ratings because it does not have a regular slot on the ITV network and is cancelled in April 1988.
11–12 June – Coverage of the results of the 1987 General Election is shown on BBC1 and ITV.
19 June – Debut of The Grand Knockout Tournament, an It's a Knockout special featuring members of the British Royal Family alongside sporting and other celebrities. Also known as It's a Royal Knockout, the event attracts much media derision and is deemed to have been a failure, although it raised £1 million for charity.
22 June – The BBC's lunchtime children's block moves from BBC1 to BBC2. It is shown slightly earlier, at 1:20pm.
27 June – Family Fortunes returns to ITV after a 2-year break, with new presenter Les Dennis who goes on to become the show's longest-serving host until 2002. The new series also sees the debut of the short-lived coloured game board.
29 June – Schools programmes are broadcast on ITV for the last time.
7 July – Jeremy Isaacs, Chief Executive of Channel 4, announces that advertising revenue for the channel for 1986–87 has exceeded costs for the first time since its launch, providing a £20m profit.[22]
16 July – Channel 4 shows the first day-long coverage of women's cricket in the UK when England play Australia at Lord's.[23] Coverage begins at 10.45 am and finishes at 6.30 pm, with breaks for the lunch and tea intervals. However, only the late-night highlights are shown in Wales, where S4C show Glamorgan against Pakistan instead.[24]
17 July – ITN's News at One airs for the last time, it also marks Leonard Parkin's retirement from newsreading.
18 July – After a hiatus of a year, BBC1 starts showing the US crime series Miami Vice again, with the second season's feature-length episode The Prodigal Son.
20 July – ITV's lunchtime news programme moves to a 12:30pm slot. Consequently, News at One ends after eleven years on the air.
22 July - ITV's investigational show The Cook Report airs its first edition.
25 July – A new weekly programme for the Asian community, Network East, makes its debut on BBC2. Broadcast in English, the show replaces Asian Magazine and Gharbar which had ended three months earlier.[25]
July – TV-am reintroduces a weekday news programme, GMB Newshour, airing initially from the start of programmes until 7am. Good Morning Britain now airs between 7am and 9am.
17 August – Thames begins 24-hour broadcasting and becomes the first ITV region to begin transmitting all through the night on a permanent basis.
20 August – In the wake of the previous day's Hungerford massacre in which 16 people were shot dead by gun enthusiast Michael Ryan, the BBC, ITV and Channel 4 pull several forthcoming films and programmes containing violence from their schedules. Among them are the 1966 western Nevada Smith, an episode of The Professionals and the 1982 post-apocalyptic film Battletruck. A showing of First Blood is also cancelled. The BBC also takes Miami Vice off the air, initially for three weeks, then completely for ten months, due to the on-going debate about screen violence.[26]
25 August – BBC1 finally airs Dennis Potter's television play Brimstone and Treacle which was originally scheduled to air in 1976 but was withdrawn shortly before broadcast.[27]
28 August – LWT and Anglia begin 24-hour transmissions.
31 August – The final episode of the sitcom Terry & June is broadcast on BBC1.
September
5 September – BBC1 show the network premiere of the 1983 Tom Cruise-starring teen comedy film Risky Business.
7 September
TV-am recommences broadcasts each day from 6am. This is the first time since its launch in 1983 that they have transmitted throughout their allocated broadcast hours.
ITV launches a full morning schedule with advertising for the first time. The new service includes regular five-minute national and regional news bulletins. The new game show Chain Letters makes its debut today as part of the service, presented by Jeremy Beadle.
Sylvester McCoy becomes the seventh actor to play the Doctor in the long-running science-fiction series Doctor Who, making his first full appearance in the role in the serial Time and the Rani. He also makes his sole cameo debut as the Sixth Doctor following Colin Baker's refusal to reprise the role for the serial, in part due to his abrupt removal from the show.
The Disney animated series DuckTales makes its UK debut on Children's ITV before being aired in the US in syndication several days later.
Debut of the children's adventure game show Knightmare on Children's ITV.
8 September – Anglia announces that its Anglia knight ident will be replaced by a computer-generated logo from early 1988. However, the knight will continue to have a presence in the Anglia headquarters reception.[28]
14 September – After 30 years on ITV, ITV Schools moves to Channel 4. Consequently, Channel 4's weekday programming begins at 9:30am, or noon when schools programmes are not being shown.
17 September –
CNN International launches its UK operation from an office located at 25/28 Old Burlington Street, London.[29]
21 September – As part of Channel 4's expansion of programme hours, a new weekday lunchtime schedule is introduced. The first edition of a weekday business and financial news programme Business Daily is broadcast and this is followed by a new children's slot called Just4Fun. At 1pm, a one-hour block of programmes from the newly formed Open College begins.
25 September – A US version of Top of the Pops makes its debut on CBS in the US with Nia Peeples as its presenter. The launch of a US version of TOTP allows American acts to make live appearances on the show more easily without the need to travel to London while also giving British acts a chance to appear on US television as each edition includes footage from the UK series and details of the current UK Top Ten.
Debut of the long-running children's series ChuckleVision on BBC1.[30]
30 September – BBC2 airs Malcolm McKay's ScreenPlayThe Interrogation of John, a film concerning the police questioning of a potential murder suspect,[31] starring Denis Quilley, Bill Paterson and Michael Fitzgerald; it later forms the first of a three-part series titled A Wanted Man which further develops the story and airs in 1989.[32]
October
5 October – Following his expulsion from South Africa in May, Michael Buerk presents the BBC One O'clock News for the first time.
9 October–8 November – The BBC covers the 1987 Cricket World Cup. However, due to the time difference – the tournament is held in India and Pakistan – live coverage is restricted to the final overs of England’s matches, although England's semi-final and the final are broadcast live, and in full.[33]
11 October – The children's strand Now on Two is launched on Sunday mornings on BBC2. It airs during the Open University off-season.[34] Consequently, Sunday Ceefax transmissions all-but end although on Saturdays, Ceefax continues to air throughout the morning, generally until around midday.
12 October – The debut of Going for Gold on BBC1, a general knowledge quiz presented by Henry Kelly in which contestants from fourteen different European countries compete to become the series champion. The winner of the first series, Daphne Hudson, later Fowler, receives ringside tickets at the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul and goes on to become a familiar face on television after appearing in a number of other shows including Fifteen to One which would debut the following year and Eggheads which started airing in 2003.[35][36]
15 October – During a weather forecast, BBC meteorologist Michael Fish reports "Earlier on today, apparently, a woman rang the BBC and said she heard there was a hurricane on the way. Well, if you're watching, don't worry, there isn't, but having said that, actually, the weather will become very windy, but most of the strong winds, incidentally, will be down over Spain and across into France.".[37] Hours later, Britain is hit by the worst storm for 284 years.[38] Fish later draws media criticism for the comments, but later claims that they referred to Florida, USA and were linked to a news story immediately preceding the weather bulletin, but had been so widely repeated out of context that the British public remains convinced that he was referring to the approaching storm.[citation needed]
16 October – As a result of the Great Storm of 1987, electrical power to TV-am's studios is lost and an emergency programme has to be transmitted from facilities at Thames's Euston Road centre using reports from TV-am's own crews and those of ITN, TSW and TVS. The BBC's Breakfast Time which would usually come from Lime Grove is unable to broadcast as the studios are without power, as is most of BBC Television Centre at Wood Lane. The early part of the programme is broadcast from the continuity suite at TV Centre usually used for Children's BBC presentation as this area has generator support, before a larger studio is able to be brought into use.
17 October – The network television premiere of the 1983 horror film The Dead Zone on BBC1, which is the first of three films based on Stephen King's works to receive their UK debuts over three consecutive Saturdays.[39]
18–19 October – Channel 4 airs the landmark 1985 Holocaust film Shoah over two nights. It is shown from 8:15pm to 12:45am on 18 October and 8:30pm to 1:20am on 19 October and without ad breaks.[22]
24 October – The network television premiere of the 1983 Stephen King horror film, Cujo on BBC1.[40]
29 October – The popular Spanish animated series Around the World with Willy Fog makes its UK debut on BBC1.[41] The 26-part series concludes on 28 April 1988.[42]
30 October – Debut of Channel 4's flagship current affairs documentary series Dispatches.
2 November – Channel 4's fifth anniversary includes a showing of Tony Harrison's controversial televisual poem V which attracts complaints due to its frequent use of extreme language.[22]
4–18 November – Damon and Debbie from Brookside becomes the first 'soap bubble' where they have their own miniseries which took them into new locations and told their own story.
11 November – BBC1 airs Paul Hamann's documentary Fourteen Days in May, a film that recounts the final days before the execution of Edward Earl Johnson, an American prisoner convicted of rape and murder and imprisoned in the Mississippi State Penitentiary.[44]
17 November
Fireman Sam, a children's series about a fireman voiced and narrated by John Alderton, makes its debut on BBC1.
The first episode of EastEnders to feature a gay kiss airs on BBC1. The scenes see Colin Russell, played by Michael Cashman kiss partner Barry Clark (Gary Hales) on the forehead. The episode attracts a record number of complaints from angry viewers. In addition, some sections of the British media reacts with fury, dubbing the show EastBenders.[45] Questions are also asked in parliament about whether it is appropriate to have gay men in a family show when AIDS is sweeping the country.[46]
22 November – The original run of the game show Play Your Cards Right comes to an end on that day on ITV, although the series would return in March 1994 on the same channel with Bruce Forsyth presenting again.[47]
23 November – The TV-am strike begins after members of the technicians union, the ACTT walk out in a dispute over the station's ‘Caring Christmas Campaign’. What is meant to be a 24-hour stoppage continues for several months when staff are locked out by Managing Director Bruce Gyngell. TV-am is unable to broadcast Good Morning Britain, instead, the regular format is replaced with shows such as Flipper, Batman and Happy Days. By December, a skeleton service that sees non-technical staff operating cameras and Gyngell himself directing proceedings, begin to allow Good Morning Britain to start broadcasting again. The strikers are eventually sacked and replaced with non-union staff. Viewing figures remain high throughout the disruption which continues well into 1988, although normal programming gradually resumes. Other ITV stations later follow Gyngell's example.
25 November – BBC1 airs the first part of Desmond Wilcox's two-part documentary The Visit – Coma, a film about 11-year-old Connie who is left in a coma after being hit by a taxi while on her way home from Christmas shopping in Glasgow. The film follows Connie's journey as she begins the slow process of recovery. The second part airs on 2 December.[48][49]
28 November – Ventriloquist Jimmy Tamley wins New Faces of '87, coming just ahead of comedian Joe Pasquale who is second.
November – Michael Grade is appointed Chief Executive of Channel 4 and will succeed Jeremy Isaacs on 1 January 1988.[22]
December
7 December –
TV-am is able to switch from airing 100% pre-recorded material with the introduction of a 30-minute live segment presented each morning by Anne Diamond.[50]
Tyne Tees begins 24-hour broadcasting by launching a Jobfinder service which broadcasts each night from its usual close-down time until the start of TV-am at 6am.
14 December – TV-am extends its live broadcasting to an hour a day.[50]
16 December – Yorkshire Television announces that 3-2-1 is to be cancelled as a regular series but will continue to be shown in a series of 'special' shows. An Olympics special and Christmas special are shown in 1988, but after that it is cancelled altogether.[51]
18 December – Frank Bough, who launched breakfast television on 17 January 1983, presents Breakfast Time for the final time.[52]
25 December
Christmas Day highlights on BBC1 include Julie Andrews.... The Sound of Christmas, a show featuring music and presented by Julie Andrews from Salzburg, Austria.
The final episode of the long-running comedy sketch show The Two Ronnies is broadcast on BBC1.
ITV enjoys a record-breaking audience when more than 26 million viewers tune in to the Christmas Day episode of Coronation Street in which Hilda Ogden (Jean Alexander) makes her last appearance in the show after 23 years.[54]
26 December
The network television premiere of the blockbuster 1984 supernatural comedy Ghostbusters on ITV, starring Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Sigourney Weaver. This is the television edit of the film containing alternate takes to accommodate for a more family friendly viewing, such as Dan Aykroyd's profanity towards the character Walter Peck being changed to "Wally Wick".
The pilot episode of the comedy sketch show A Bit of Fry & Laurie airs on BBC1; a full series would begin in January 1989.
In an unusual move for a pre-recorded series, the chimes of Big Ben are integrated into an episode of EastEnders on BBC1. Character Den Watts (Leslie Grantham) brngs a television into the bar of the "Queen Vic", 'watches' the chimes in their entirety and the episode resumes.[55]
BBC2 airs a five-hour Whistle Test special to welcome in 1988 which airs from 9:35pm on New Year's Eve to 2:55am on New Year's Day. The special takes a look back through the archives in what is the programme's final outing.[56] It will be three decades later in 2018 before a new edition of the programme is broadcast.[57]
Frontcaps which are shown before programmes on ITV are used for the last time after 32 years.
The final edition of the long-running game show University Challenge, presented by Bamber Gascoigne, is broadcast on ITV. The series will return for a one-off episode on BBC2 in 1992 and then full-time in 1994 on the same channel, presented by Jeremy Paxman.
December
The switching on of Channel 4 from all of the UK's television transmitters is completed when the relays at Cerne Abbas and Gunnislake have Channel 4 added.[58]
Thamesside TV, an unlicensed TV station set up by Thameside Radio, goes on the air in London. There are only two known broadcasts.[59][60]
Unknown
Network 21, an unlicensed television station in London, broadcasts for around 30 minutes on Friday evenings.
Two separate government studies identify spare frequency space on the UHF band, prompting political debate about the viability of a fifth UK terrestrial TV channel.[61]