Author Description

Volume 6 of the well-received book guides to classic British TV series, exploring a show through a single iconic episode. Television drama rarely receives the analytical attention paid to a landmark painting, sculpture, play, poem or film, frequently marginalised as a piece of fleeting popular culture rather than ‘a more lasting art form’. The disappearance of many 1950s and 1960s TV dramas – the videotape wiped and re-used – seems merely to confirm its temporary status. The emergence of television studies has helped to question this mind-set. Innovative television drama can rival any field of the arts in terms of material worthy of critical exploration. This series of books focuses on ‘outstanding’ examples of British television dramas, centring on a single episode in an attempt to explain what makes both the episode in particular, and the series in general, remarkable. The social context, script, characters sets/locations, music, and direction are all focal points. In terms of both genre and style, The Persuaders! is hard to label, with action-adventure, light comedy, buddy mini-movies and an almost camp satire converging to create what is, paradoxically, both ITC’s ultimate action-adventure and a collapsing of said genre. It is a lavishly stylish endgame.