Doctor in Charge

This LWT sit-com gem from1969-1979 was the Doctors series, a comedy series that was inspired by the success of the 1950's and 60's films starring none other than Dirk Bogard, Leslie Phillips and the bombastic James Robertson Justice. In reality ran for ten years but it was actually broken up into six series that first started with 'doctor in the house' and finally ended with on the other side of the world with 'doctor down under' in 1979.

Many would say that the golden years was 'doctor in charge' although it lasted only two seasons over forty episodes were packed in and it probably had the best cast who were all at their peaks. We had the smooth and charming Dr.Stewart- Clark, the devious Dr Collier, the groveling square Dr Bingham, and the ever chirpy Dr Duncan Warring all of course all held in check by their tormentor the ever sufferable (now knighted) Sir Geoffrey Loftus.

Very much in tune with the original films 'doctor in charge' followed the antics and the hilarious capers that Warring and his cohorts got up too. For example, missing corpses, doctors with hangovers, patient misdiagnosis, wild parties, trouble with the police, missing patients, gambling and chasing nurses were all routine at St.Swithans. That's just for starters, they were also consistently falling foul of the hospital administrators and senior members of the hospital faculty because of their ineptness and general incompetence when it came to their responsibilities. Over the series they must have broken every medical code and violated every medical ethic! Put it this way you would not want to be treated at St.Swithans!