Boys from the Blackstuff is a British television drama series of five episodes, originally transmitted from 10 October to 7 November 1982 on
BBC2BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
.
The serial was written by
LiverpudlianLiverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
playwright
Alan BleasdaleAlan Bleasdale is an English television dramatist, best known for writing several social realist drama serials based on the lives of ordinary people.The Bleasdales live in prescot,liverpool,wales and london.-Early life:Bleasdale is an only child; his father worked in a food factory and his mother...
, as a sequel to a television play,
The Black Stuff. The
British Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
described it as a "seminal drama series... a warm, humorous but ultimately tragic look at the way economics affect ordinary people... TV's most complete dramatic response to the Thatcher era and as a lament to the end of a male, working class British culture."
The Black Stuff
The television play
The Black Stuff was originally written by Bleasdale for
BBC1BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
's
Play for TodayPlay for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted...
anthology series in 1978. After filming however, the play languished untransmitted until being screened on 2 January 1980. It concerned a group of
LiverpudlianLiverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
tarmacTarmac is a type of road surface. Tarmac refers to a material patented by Edgar Purnell Hooley in 1901...
layers (hence slang: 'the black stuff') on a job near
MiddlesbroughMiddlesbrough is a large town situated on the south bank of the River Tees in north east England, that sits within the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire...
.
The acclaim that
The Black Stuff received on its eventual transmission led to the commissioning of the sequel serial, of which Bleasdale had already written a considerable amount.
Boys from the Blackstuff
The series
Boys from the Blackstuff follows the stories of the five now unemployed men who lost their jobs due to the events of the original play
The Blackstuff. Set in Bleasdale's home city of Liverpool, and reflecting many of his own experiences of life in the city, each episode focuses on a different member of the group. The series was highly acclaimed for its powerful and emotional depiction of the desperation wreaked by high unemployment and a subsequent lack of social support. Although the series is and was noted by many reviewers as a critique of the
Margaret ThatcherMargaret Hilda Thatcher, Baroness Thatcher, was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990...
era, which was seen as being responsible for the fate of many of the unemployed lower and working classes, particularly in the North of England (and in fact fuelling the
North-South divideIn England, the term North–South divide refers to the economic and cultural differences between Southern England and Northern England...
), most of the series had actually been written in 1978 during Labour's
James CallaghanLeonard James Callaghan, Baron Callaghan of Cardiff, KG, PC , was a British Labour politician, who was Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1976 to 1979 and Leader of the Labour Party from 1976 to 1980...
's prime ministership, therefore preceding Thatcher's Britain by a year.
Indeed the most memorable and poignant of the characters was
Yosser HughesYosser Hughes is a fictional character from Alan Bleasdale's 1982 television series Boys from the Blackstuff, set in Liverpool, though ironically the character was played by Manchester-born actor Bernard Hill.Yosser appears as a tall man in his mid thirties who wears predominantly black clothes...
, a man driven to the edge of his sanity by the loss of his job, his wife, the authorities' continued attempts to take his children away from him and his constant attempts at salvaging his male pride (often the main give-away of his insecurity). His catchphrases, "Gizza' job!" ("give us a job") and "I can do that!" became part of the popular consciousness of the Eighties, summing up the mood of many who sought desperately for work during the era. Hughes was played by
Bernard HillBernard Hill is a British actor of film, stage and television. In a career spanning thirty years, he is best known for playing Yosser Hughes, the troubled 'hard man' whose life is falling apart in Alan Bleasdale's groundbreaking 1980s TV drama, Boys from the Blackstuff...
, who uses his obvious Mancunian accent, with slight Scouse vocal mannerisms. He subsequently went on to find fame acting in various films and television series, such as a lead role in the 1988 film
Drowning By NumbersDrowning by Numbers is a 1988 British film directed by Peter Greenaway. It was entered into the 1988 Cannes Film Festival.-Plot:The film's plot centers on three women — a grandmother, mother and daughter — each named Cissie Colpitts. As the story progresses each woman successively drowns her husband...
and including appearances in the blockbuster movies
TitanicTitanic is a 1997 American epic romance and disaster film directed, written, co-produced, and co-edited by James Cameron. A fictionalized account of the sinking of the RMS Titanic, it stars Leonardo DiCaprio as Jack Dawson, Kate Winslet as Rose DeWitt Bukater and Billy Zane as Rose's fiancé, Cal...
(1997) and
The Lord of the RingsThe Lord of the Rings is an epic film trilogy consisting of three fantasy adventure films based on the three-volume book of the same name by English author J. R. R. Tolkien. The films are The Fellowship of the Ring , The Two Towers and The Return of the King .The films were directed by Peter...
trilogy (2001–03).
The serial also helped to establish the career of
Julie WaltersJulie Walters, CBE is an English actress and novelist. She came to international prominence in 1983 for Educating Rita, performing in the title role opposite Michael Caine. It was a role she had created on the West End stage and it won her BAFTA and Golden Globe awards for Best Actress...
, who played the most prominent female role as Angie, the wife of Chrissie, played by
Michael AngelisMichael Angelis is an English actor and voice actor.Michael Angelis was one of the stars of the famous 1982 BBC drama serial Boys from the Black Stuff and another Alan Bleasedale drama G.B.H.. He also starred in comedies such as Luv and The Liver Birds, in which he appeared between series 5 and 9...
.
The serial was notable for being a high-profile production made not by the BBC's central drama department in London, but by the English Regions Drama department based at
BBC BirminghamBBC Birmingham is one of the oldest regional arms of the BBC, located in Birmingham, West Midlands. It was the first region outside of London to start broadcasting both the corporation's radio and television transmissions, the latter from the Sutton Coldfield television transmitter...
, although it was shot on location in Liverpool. The producer was
Michael WearingMichael Wearing is a British television producer, who has spent much of his career working on various drama productions for the BBC. He is best known as the producer of the highly-acclaimed serials Boys from the Blackstuff and Edge of Darkness , which created for him a reputation as one of...
, who was based at Birmingham with a specific remit to make 'regional drama', and who would later be instrumental in bringing the equally influential BBC drama serials
Edge of DarknessEdge of Darkness is a British television drama serial, produced by BBC Television in association with Lionheart Television International and originally broadcast in six fifty-five minute episodes in late 1985...
(1985) and
Our Friends in the NorthOur Friends in the North is a British television drama serial, produced by the BBC and originally broadcast in nine episodes on BBC Two in early 1996...
(1996) to the screens. The writer
Alan BleasdaleAlan Bleasdale is an English television dramatist, best known for writing several social realist drama serials based on the lives of ordinary people.The Bleasdales live in prescot,liverpool,wales and london.-Early life:Bleasdale is an only child; his father worked in a food factory and his mother...
went on to pen many more acclaimed television dramas, of particular note being
The Monocled MutineerThe Monocled Mutineer is a British television series made by the BBC in 1986, and shown on BBC1, the first episode being transmitted on 31 August 1986, intended to head BBC1's autumn season of drama...
(
BBC1BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
, 1986) and
G.B.H. (
Channel 4Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
, 1991)
Reception
The series was so successful upon its original broadcast that only nine weeks after it had finished transmission, it was re-shown on the higher-profile
BBC1BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
(also for the benefit of those who were still watching on
405-lineThe 405-line monochrome analogue television broadcasting system was the first fully electronic television system to be used in regular broadcasting....
TV sets, which were incapable of receiving BBC-2). It was also transmitted again on
BBC2BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
as part of that station's twenty-fifth anniversary season in 1989. In 1983 it won the
British Academy Television AwardThe British Academy Television Awards are presented in an annual award show hosted by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts . They have been awarded annually since 1954, and are analogous to the Emmy Awards in the United States.-Background:...
for Best Drama Serial, and in the year 2000 was placed seventh in a
British Film InstituteThe British Film Institute is a charitable organisation established by Royal Charter to:-Cinemas:The BFI runs the BFI Southbank and IMAX theatre, both located on the south bank of the River Thames in London...
poll of industry professionals to find the BFI TV 100 of the 20th century. It was also named as one of the forty greatest television shows in a 2003 list compiled by the
Radio TimesRadio Times is a UK weekly television and radio programme listings magazine, owned by the BBC. It has been published since 1923 by BBC Magazines, which also provides an on-line listings service under the same title...
magazine's chief television writer Alison Graham. In March 2007,
Channel 4Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
broadcast a "Top 50 Dramas", based on input from industry professionals rather than the public, which had
Boys from the Blackstuff at number two.
Episodes
- The Black Stuff ('Play for Today' pilot episode)
-
- The Black Stuff was the original precursor to the 1982 'Boys from the Blackstuff' series, in which we get to know the main characters Yosser, Loggo, Chrissie, George and Dixie and as his son, Kevin). It follows the group as they set off from Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
to undertake a casual tarmac laying job on a new housing development in MiddlesbroughMiddlesbrough is a large town situated on the south bank of the River Tees in north east England, that sits within the ceremonial county of North Yorkshire...
. The episode itself was produced in 1978 but was not broadcast until 1980
-
- Along the way at a motorway service station, the group encounter a female student who hitch-hikes a lift to Leeds
Leeds is a city and metropolitan borough in West Yorkshire, England. In 2001 Leeds' main urban subdivision had a population of 443,247, while the entire city has a population of 798,800 , making it the 30th-most populous city in the European Union.Leeds is the cultural, financial and commercial...
. Part of the group (particularly Yosser) mocks her, but Yosser's insecurity and unwillingness to be dominated by women is especially manifested after she taunts him when she is dropped off. In Middlesbrough, the group are approached by two IrishIreland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
gypsies, Brendan and Dominic, who offer them the chance of a side job, claiming that they had been laid off. Although initially uneasy with the idea of working with them, the group (except group leader, Dixie and his son, Kevin), spurred by Yosser's dream of fleecing the gypsies and starting their own tarmac laying business, agree to invest vast amounts of their own savings to undertake the 'foreign' job. The group manager, McKenna, later discovers this and fires them all. However, despite being convinced that they had made the right decision, the group are nonetheless outsmarted by the gypsies who pretend they have been given a cheque (when in fact they had been paid cash) and claiming they would get the cheque cashed at a bank. Chrissie agrees to accompany Brendan in Brendan's van (who later manages lose Chrissie in tricking him into pushing the van so as to jump-start it after pretending it had broken down), while Yosser decides to hold Dominic hostage until they return. Yosser soon discovers that cash had in fact been handed over, but Dominic manages to escape to Brendan who is waiting for him - Loggo tripping and tumbling over as he gave chase through a farmer's field.
-
- Yosser speeds off in the group's own van and gives chase to Brendan and Dominic, who attempts to puncture Yosser's tyres by smashing empty milk bottles on the road from the back of the van. Yosser swerves and avoids them, but runs out of petrol, shouting and venting his anger by bashing his head on the steering wheel. He finds a can of petrol in the back of the van, partly refuels and sets off in vain to find the pair, before giving up on a roundabout, bringing traffic on it to a halt and breaking down in tears, ignoring the tailback and horns being blown hehind him. He returns to the group after stopping by where he had abandoned a number of items from the van, headbutting a man he believes to be an Irish gypsy and kicking his companion to the ground, who protests he is neither a gypsy nor Irish and was "just hitching a lift". Yosser is clearly distressed upon his return to the group and begins to smash the tarmac they had laid with a pickaxe, but is restrained by Loggo and Chrissie before knocking Chrissie to the ground for his optimistic outlook despite what has happened. Yosser launches an emotional monologue about wanting to be rich, noticed and seen, and is clearly close to breaking point, to the extent that Loggo and George continue to restrain him from further attacking Chrissie who is on the floor with a bleeding nose. George reassures Yosser and gently advises him to grow up, but Yosser is unconvinced and kicks the grille of the van. The episode ends with the group, almost penniless, arriving at the Tees Transporter Bridge. A man who they meet earlier is on his way to Shetland to undertake a casual job there, and Loggo promptly chooses to join him. The episode finishes with a long-distance shot of the Tees Transporter Bridge and the opening theme song, sung by the cast, is played over the end credits..
-
- Shown in 1981 as a standalone between the initial drama and the subsequent series, it centres on Danny Duggan played by Peter Postlethwaite, the building boss who employs people cheaply by being complicit in the social security
Social security is primarily a social insurance program providing social protection or protection against socially recognized conditions, including poverty, old age, disability, unemployment and others. Social security may refer to:...
fraudIn criminal law, a fraud is an intentional deception made for personal gain or to damage another individual; the related adjective is fraudulent. The specific legal definition varies by legal jurisdiction. Fraud is a crime, and also a civil law violation...
of his employees and therefore guilty of a crime himself.
-
- Featuring most of the characters from the initial drama. They take a cash-in-hand job on a building site whilst still claiming unemployment benefit
Unemployment benefits are payments made by the state or other authorized bodies to unemployed people. Benefits may be based on a compulsory para-governmental insurance system...
. Typical of the show's humour, it is later revealed that the building being renovated is going to be used by the Department of Employment. They are followed by the authorities and Snowy Malone falls to his death trying to flee during a subsequent raid by the "sniffers" (social security officers working undercover).
-
- Follows Dixie Dean (Tom Georgeson
Tom Georgeson is a British actor, known for his television and film work. His most notable credits have been supporting parts in Between The Lines and in three dramas by Alan Bleasdale; Boys from the Blackstuff Scully and G.B.H....
) in his new position as a security guard, where he is strongarmed into accepting bribes for allowing the removal of goods under his charge in a docked ship. Apart from Dixie's son Kevin this episode also features Chrissie, Loggo and George, the other members of the original gang, during a scene prior to Snowy Malone's (Chris Darwin) funeral.
-
- Concentrates on Chrissie (Michael Angelis
Michael Angelis is an English actor and voice actor.Michael Angelis was one of the stars of the famous 1982 BBC drama serial Boys from the Black Stuff and another Alan Bleasedale drama G.B.H.. He also starred in comedies such as Luv and The Liver Birds, in which he appeared between series 5 and 9...
) and the domestic pressure unemployment and the attentions of the benefit fraud officers place on him and his wife (Julie WaltersJulie Walters, CBE is an English actress and novelist. She came to international prominence in 1983 for Educating Rita, performing in the title role opposite Michael Caine. It was a role she had created on the West End stage and it won her BAFTA and Golden Globe awards for Best Actress...
). We also see more of his closest friend, Loggo, and appreciate more Loggo's character as least affected by the social climate. At the end of the episode Chrissie is driven to strangle and shoot his geese. He also worries about his children's rabbits which may be an ironic reference back to Angelis's breakthrough TV role as Lucien in The Liver BirdsThe Liver Birds is a British situation comedy, set in Liverpool, Merseyside, North-West of England, which aired on BBC1 from 1969 to 1978, and again in 1996. It was created by Carla Lane and Myra Taylor. The two Liverpool housewives had met at a local writers club and decided to pool their talents...
who was excessively sentimental about them. In an act of desperation, lacking money and food, he shoots his geese in an attempt to provide dinner.
-
- As previously mentioned this is the most often cited of the series, following Yosser's struggle to avoid losing his children (who are played by Alan Bleasdale's own children) to the authorities as his mental health disintegrates. It is also notable for being the only one of the series shot on 16mm film, as opposed to videotape
A videotape is a recording of images and sounds on to magnetic tape as opposed to film stock or random access digital media. Videotapes are also used for storing scientific or medical data, such as the data produced by an electrocardiogram...
, although the original play was also shot on this format. Graeme SounessGraeme James Souness is a Scottish former professional football player and manager.Souness was the captain of the successful Liverpool team of the early 1980s and player-manager of Rangers in the late 1980s as well as captain of the Scottish national team. He also played for Tottenham Hotspur,...
and Sammy LeeSamuel "Sammy" Lee is an English football coach and former player. He played most of his career for hometown club Liverpool during the 1970s and 1980s as a midfielder, and also represented England fourteen times....
, then of Liverpool F.C.Liverpool Football Club is an English Premier League football club based in Liverpool, Merseyside. Liverpool has won eighteen League titles, second most in English football, seven FA Cups and a record seven League Cups...
make cameo appearances in this episode. The episode also contains the often repeated scene in which Yosser goes to confession looking for help, and tells the priest he is desperate. The priest, trying to comfort Yosser, tells him "Call me Dan – Dan"; to which Yosser replies "I'm desperate, DanDesperate Dan is a wild west character in the British comic The Dandy. He first appeared in its first issue, dated 4 December 1937. He is apparently the world's strongest man, able to lift a cow with one hand. Even his beard is so tough he has to shave with a blowtorch.-History:The strip was...
".
-
- In this episode we find out something of George's politically active past. His trip (Chrissie wheeling him in his chair through the docks) leads him to reminisce about his younger days, the contrast between his recalled hopeful youth with the abandoned industrial infrastructure around him is marked. The death of George causes the main characters to be reunited if, in some cases, only briefly. The episode concludes with a well-known yet surreal scene at the Green Man
A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit...
pub in Liverpool.
DVD release
The series, including the original play
The Black Stuff but without the episode
The Muscle Market, was released on DVD as a three-disc set by
BBC WorldwideBBC Worldwide Limited is the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the British Broadcasting Corporation, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in 1995. In the year to 31 March 2010 it made a profit of £145m on a turnover of £1.074bn. The company had made a profit of £106m...
in 2003.
A popular counterpart for the series is the book "Boys from the Blackstuff", the making of TV drama, by Bob Millington and Robin Nelson.
External links