Old RTE listings

Winter Olympics coverage & a National Song Contest, interesting week from 1968.

2. I think we really need further investigation into this TBH. What comedies from BBC/ITV are we seeing on these listings from the 1960s.

The 1 pound pommies were all over Oz in the 1960s so to import their shows to their channels seem likely, Oz had rules for Austrialian Drama, unlike Canada … who were much more likely to import American lowbrow programming.

As for Canadian TV Beachcomers is from the 1970s to 1980s, do you not remember Katz and Dog or the Littlest Hobo? ENG? or Street Legal?

The Wodehouse adaps were made by the comedy department so are technically sitcoms.

Wojeck, seen in the listings was Canadian.

Did RTE show Quentin Durgens, MP?

I know they showed Adventures in Rainbow country.

Think MPFC was belatedly shown on Network 2 in the late 90s, maybe as part of the End.

Dads Army was shown up to the final series in 1977 but unlike a lot of British sitcoms its seems to have never been re-run by RTE.

Don't think they ever showed Steptoe And Son, the series though I do remember both of the spin off films being shown circa 1989.

And I suppose the classic serials were seen as neutral, being seen as educational, and also especially because increasingly, the classic serials became more aimed at international sales (especially to PBS, to Masterpiece Theatre or to McDonald's Presents Once Upon A Classic with Bill Bixby).

I do wonder what difference that made if Cruise O'Brien got his way. Because RTE bought BBC2 shows as well. I suppose it would have got Doctor Who and EastEnders a place in two channel land that they didn't get until the late 90s/early 2000s when TG4 and RTE belatedly picked them up. Also, RTE's budget cuts meant RTE2's programming became more esoteric, but I like that. It meant RTE started showing weird Italian kids shows like Margheriti's Treasure Island in Outer Space, and Frankenstein's Aunt. And we got more Canadian stuff.

In fact, RTE's schedules with its weird mix of American imports, the odd British show and rural local programming, does resemble the schedules of CBC Nova Scotia https://www.kevinmccorrytv.ca/tvlist4.html