PROGRAMME HISTORY

Thames Television set up Euston Films Limited at the beginning of the 70s as a subsidiary company to allow them to produce television and film drama in an easier, more flexible way.

One of the first projects embarked upon was a series of TV Movies (90 minute films designed and made exclusively for television) titled "Armchair Cinema". Originally, 13 Armchair Cinemas were required, but in the end only 6 were ever made, those being: "The Prison", "Regan", "Sea Song", "When Day Is Done", "In Sickness And In Health", and "Tully".

Each film cost around £85,000 to make - which was considered expensive at the time. The expense, however, became justified when Euston managed to sell most of the films to many other countries - 47 countries in the case of The Prison and Regan.

From the start Regan was seen as having series potential, and when the film ranked high in the ratings work began on developing it into a series of 13 one hour programmes. Most elements of the film remained unchanged for the series, bar the name which was changed to "The Sweeney".

Writers were brought in and given quite strict guidelines to follow: "Each show will have an overall screen time (minus titles) of 48mins 40secs. Each film will open with a teaser of up to 3 minutes, which will be followed by the opening titles. The story will be played across three acts, each being no more than 19 minutes and no less than 8 minutes in length. Regan will appear in every episode, Carter in approximately 10 out of 13 episodes. In addition to these main characters, scripts should be based around three major speaking parts, with up to ten minor speaking parts."

Throughout The Sweeney's four series, writers were given a month to write each script, but were pushed to get them done as quickly as possible. This led to one episode being written in just three days. Second drafts of scripts were frowned upon, and third drafts virtually unheard of.

The filming of each episode took normally ten working days, shooting about five minutes of edited screen time per day. Because of this the number of different filming locations had to be restricted to ten, ie: one location per day. There was a standing set built of the Flying Squad offices which provided an alternative option should the weather restrict a day's filming. Two days would normally be spent filming on the set, equaling 10 mins of any episode being set in the offices. Shooting took place through the summer, so exterior night shooting was expensive and limited to 3 minutes of external night material in any episode.

Each episode had an eight and a half week production schedule: Two weeks pre-production (for casting, finding locations etc...), two weeks shooting, four weeks picture editing (the first two weeks of which overlap with the shoot), two weeks sound editing and two and a half days dubbing.

The Sweeney! film was produced after the roaring success of the second Sweeney series. It was shot on location in London over five weeks during Spring 1976.

The film was followed by a third and then fourth TV series, and then another film, Sweeney 2.

Finally a Sweeney special was made with Morecambe and Wise guesting! This came about as a return invitation, after Morcambe and Wise invited John Thaw and Dennis Waterman onto their 1976 Christmas Special for a comedy sketch.

In the end The Sweeney ran for 4 series, with 53 episodes made in all. It has been shown in 51 countries, and was regarded by many as the most successful police series ever made for British television.