Glenroe

Was looking for something else but as you do went down a rabbit hole. Schedule from Sunday November 19 1983. The synopsis of the Glenroe episode sounds like they were doing a "who shot J.R.?" type storyline. Was this the time Mary's husband (not Dick, the guy before him) beat her up, refered to by a couple of posters?

1983 was also the year that RTE showed the ill fated comedy "Amanda's By The Sea" which starred a pre- Golden Girls Bea Arthur and was another attempt by the American networks to adapt Fawlty Towers.

This from Wikipedia:

John Cleese: The most extraordinary remake was with Bea Arthur. I remember at a party I met these chaps from Viacom, who said they were working on a new Fawlty Towers. My ears pricked up at the sound of cash registers and said, "That's wonderful, are you going to change anything?" They said, "Well we have changed one thing, we've written Basil out". And that's absolutely true, they took Basil and Sybil's lines and gave them all to Bea Arthur.

It was cancelled before the end of its run. Bea Arthur must have thought "That's me finished " . Little did she know….

Im surprised the Sunday night primetime movie was from 1958! Yikes.

Remember RTE were essentially broke, trying to fill two channels with declining ad revenue in a deep recession. They didn't even send a song to the Eurovision that year.

Stop, you're scaring me :)

I know films took a long time to come to TV screens back then, but even so, I'd have thought a 1958 would already have been shown, but maybe not.

It's not like it is an especially renowned \ award winning film.

The particular film looked perfect for a Sunday afternoon though.

Weirdly a few years earlier, the failed Harvey Korman remake Snavely starred Betty White as Sybil.

The first Glenroe episode I remember seeing in full was part two of a two episode storyline where Biddy and Mary are held hostage by armed raiders. I'd been trying to identify it in recent years without success, till now. Id assumed it was from the first series but turns out it was October 1985 (third series?) when Glenroe was already on air for two years.

It was pretty funny, the raiders force Biddy and Mary to cook them breakfast and one guy has his balaclava on the whole time, one of his buddies admonishes him for not taking it off when eating. Miley later tackles balaclava lad while yer man is pointing a sawn off shotgun at him. It got a lot of complaints including letters to Arthur Murphys Mailbag. (Sunday Press October 13th 1985)

A few more contemporary letters and articles about the Glenroe burglars storyline.

A bit of a drifter who I think outstayed his welcome. Miley's uncle - think he was a brother of Miley's mother. Shifty character with an annoying wisping voice who muttered a lot.

There was also a priest Fr Jim who was Dinny's brother - appeared in a couple of episodes.

Coincidentally tonight I watched The Italian Connection (1972) and Cyril Cusack is in it.