A Revised Schedule of Programmes

One thing I’ve become vaguely obsessed with over the past year is how often the things that “everyone” knows about a TV show turn out to be incorrect. Of course, by “everyone”, I don’t actually mean everyone. The person on the street doesn’t mutter Brittas Empire TX dates as they go about their shopping. At least not in my local Tesco.

Somewhere which should know its Brittas Empire TX dates is epguides.com, mind you. Here is their page for the show, although I’ve screengrabbed the relevant section below, for reasons which will soon become apparent.

According to epguides.com, Series 1 of The Brittas Empire aired weekly from the 3rd January 1991, ending on the 14th February, skipping a week on the 31st. Wikipedia has the same details, as does The Brittas Empire Wiki. For complete transparency, seeing as I was writing for the site when it was published, Ganymede & Titan‘s guide has the same broad dates, but skips the 10th rather than the 31st; IMDB follows these latter dates too.

Every single guide mentioned above is wrong.

So, how do we track down exactly what was broadcast? For a start, let’s check what the Radio Times says was transmitted on the first three dates listed:

Our job here is rendered a little trickier due to the fact that Series 1 of Brittas never had official episode titles – the ones in current circulation are fan-bestowed. Nonetheless, we can easily tell which episode is which from the descriptions. The first three episodes above do indeed match what epguides.com and Wikipedia tell us.

Let’s now take a look at the last four dates:

Note that the listings for the 31st January and 7th February describe the same episode¹, with the capsule for the 7th February stating that the episode in question was postponed from the 31st. If we go by the information given in the Radio Times, then epguides.com and Wikipedia still seem to be entirely correct. Series 1 of The Brittas Empire aired between the 3rd January and the 14th February 1991, with the 31st January being the week that was skipped.

But this isn’t actually what happened at all. The 31st January was never skipped. Nor was it the 10th which was skipped, as given in the other guides. The date Brittas was removed from the schedules was, in fact, the 17th January. And the reason for this is a fairly obvious one if you consult the history books; it was the start of Operation Desert Storm, and the beginning of active combat in the 1991 Gulf War. An event which brought a substantial number of changes to the BBC’s schedules.

We don’t even have to guess at this. Helpfully, somebody has uploaded to YouTube some continuity which gives a rundown of the revised evening schedule for the 17th:

Brittas was supposed to be at 8:30pm; instead, we have an episode of Wildlife on One. Clearly, the BBC considered Brittas just a tad too rambunctious, given the news agenda. Indeed, given that the scheduled episode involved a character threatening to “knock the everlasting shit” out of Gordon Brittas, this perhaps seems a wise decision.²

With the 17th now confirmed as the week which was skipped, we already have proof that the generally accepted TX dates for Series 1 of Brittas are incorrect. We do have one further question on our hands, however. Did the rest of the series go out in the expected order, or did they skip the episode entirely and come back to it later?

The Radio Times is often of limited use in these situations; the lead time for publication is simply too long. In these circumstances, it is usual to simply check what the daily newspaper TV listings say instead; for obvious reasons, they capture late schedule changes far more readily. So let’s take a look at what The Times had to say across these seven weeks.³

Unfortunately, The Times is spectacularly unhelpful here.⁴ In fact, it reflects exactly what the Radio Times states. You would, of course, still expect an episode of Brittas to be listed on the 17th January – only papers with evening editions would be able to catch that particular late schedule change – but surely the correct episodes should be listed for the 31st January and 7th February. Instead, it has exactly the same error that the Radio Times has, and lists the same episode twice.

Even worse, every single other newspaper I’ve checked has been similarly unhelpful. What’s going on here is difficult to determine, and I can only assume that the schedules were so in flux that somebody, somewhere dropped a bollock. I guess when war coverage is ripping the schedules apart, exactly which episode of a yet-to-be-established sitcom is going to air doesn’t seem that important.

Which means we have to look to a different source to find out exactly what was going on.⁵ And luckily, somebody has furnished me with the paperwork for Episode 3 of Brittas, which hopefully clears up this mystery once and for all:

Clearly, that sheet originally said the 17th January… and was hastily tippexed out and stamped over. Moreover, I’ve checked the accompanying list of exactly what was transmitted on the 24th January, and everything matches up. The description of the episode matches up too. This episode is “Bye Bye Baby”, and it definitely transmitted on the 24th January.

Which means that the TX dates for Brittas Series 1 can now be confirmed as the following:

Which leaves me yet again pondering how easy it is for this kind of misinformation to spread. Every single source I have checked online about Series 1 of Brittas is incorrect in some fashion or another. And this is not some obscure programme. We’re talking about a mainstream 90s sitcom, on the most important TV channel in the UK. It seems immensely peculiar that these dates have been so confused.

Moreover, Operation Desert Storm isn’t exactly a footnote in history. While it’s easy to see how the incorrect dates were arrived at – an over-confident reading of the Radio Times, essentially – if you actually sit back and consider things carefully, then the 17th is the obvious date to check for changes in the schedule. And while I fully admit that I have resources today which make it easier to track down this error than in times past – in particular, the video embedded above was only uploaded in 2020 – it still feels strange that this was so wrong, for so long, and in so many different places.

Still, maybe that’s just the kind of thing which happens over the years. I’m sure something much closer to the original TX date probably got this correct. So let’s leap right back across the decades, and take a look at this Usenet post, sent on the 15th December 1994. Yes, it’s a Brittas Empire episode guide – and a guide so contemporary that it ends with Series 5. The last two series of the show hadn’t even been made yet.

Shall we scroll down, and check out the entry for that troublesome Episode 3? Surely the cultural memory won’t have faded that quickly? It’ll give the date as the 24th, yes?

1-3 17 Jan 1991 “Bye-Bye Baby”⁶

Laura: You know what Brittas said – if he found it in here again, he’d confiscate it.

Brittas finally finds out about Carole keeping her baby in the desk drawers, and in the subsequent removal of Carole and the baby, the baby goes missing. Carole thinks Brittas has taken it and goes berserk with an axe. Brittas also manages to bank up dozens of customers in the foyer and destroy a relaxation lecturer while he’s at it.

Sigh. The 17th January 1991. And indeed, the rest of the dates are the same as that incorrect epguides.com listing. And this is from a guide put together while the series was still in production.

These dates have been wrong for nearly 30 sodding years. Please, someone, send me some of Helen’s special pills.

1. Although note the typo on the 7th February capsule: “Fegan” rather than “Fegen”. ↩

2. Yes, those are the exact words used. In a pre-watershed BBC sitcom. ↩

3. Incidentally, it’s fun watching The Times try to decide exactly what it thinks of the show throughout the run. It’s quite a rollercoaster. ↩

4. We do learn one thing, however; 8:30pm on BBC1 on a Thursday was an opt for Northern Ireland. The series eventually ended up going out there on BBC2 from the 31st January. ↩

5. You might think that the BBC website listing would clear everything up here. It does indeed get the week which was skipped right – click on the episode titles to see the TX dates, and you’ll see that the 17th is correctly missing. There is one problem, however. As we know, Series 1 doesn’t have official episode titles, and the titles used here are different to the ones often seen elsewhere. That wouldn’t be a problem per se. Different titles, who cares?

   Unfortunately, the title given to Episode 4 – “Happy And Fulfilled” – is a title which actually applies to Episode 3 instead. Even more strangely, the actual title given to Episode 3 – “Carole’s Husband” – still works for Episode 3!

   The descriptions of each episode are correct for each TX date, but the above makes things highly confusing, and I ran away from it very quickly. ↩

6. Some of you will already be frantically waving your hands at this point. Yes, it seems this document is also the origin for a lot of the fan-created episode titles in circulation for Series 1. I’ll probably write something about this at some point. ↩

Read more about...

best of, the brittas empire, tx date investigations