London's Burning 

The lives of firefighters at Blackwall Fire Station.

Stars:

Glen Murphy, Richard Walsh, Ben Onwukwe

1 win & 2 nominations.

Cast

Series cast summary:
Glen Murphy	...	George Green / ... 170 episodes, 1988-2002
Richard Walsh	...	Sicknote / ... 147 episodes, 1988-2000
Ben Onwukwe	...	Recall / ... 138 episodes, 1991-2002
Shirley Greenwood	...	Maggie 130 episodes, 1988-2001
Michael Garner	...	Geoffrey 'Poison' Pearce / ... 129 episodes, 1993-2002
Amanda Dickinson	...	Jean / ... 109 episodes, 1988-2000
Andrew Kazamia	...	Nick / ... 96 episodes, 1991-1998
Vanessa Pett	...	Kelly / ... 95 episodes, 1990-2001
Sean Blowers	...	Hallam / ... 87 episodes, 1988-1996
James Hazeldine	...	Bayleaf / ... 83 episodes, 1988-1996
Ross Boatman	...	Kevin / ... 83 episodes, 1988-2000
John Alford	...	Billy / ... 71 episodes, 1993-1998
Kim Clifford	...	Sandra / ... 71 episodes, 1988-1998

Storyline

The lives of firefighters at Blackwall Fire Station.

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Plot Keywords:

firefighter | london england | place name in title | city name in title | firefighting | 

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Genres:

Drama

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Did You Know?

Trivia

In the 14 series of the show (including the pilot TV movie) the uniform that is used on a shout has changed 4 times and the station uniform has changed once. The only uniform which has not changed since the pilot been the function uniform in that time. All 3 of the latest uniforms at the time were featured in series 13.

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Connections

Referenced in Drama Trails: 'Secret Diary of a Call Girl' to 'London's Burning' (2008)

User Reviews

A Good Start

London's Burning was a mainstay of ITV's Sunday night scheduling during the late 80's and 90's. The series emerged from the TV film written by the late and great Jack Rosenthal and followed a group of fire fighters belonging to Blue Watch at London's Blackwall fire station.

Initially the series kept a lot of Rosenthal's influence. The humour was lively with station pranks and the loves and lives of the watch being the backbone of the series. In between all this were the fires and other shouts which helped to highlight the diverse work of the fire brigade as their role has changed over the shows lifespan. A few dark moments relating to death or injury of the fire fighters or victims put a dark edge on the show which helped to prevent it from becoming a farce and the whole package made for extremely addictive viewing.

Sadly the last few series beginning in 2000 started the downward spiral. By 2000, most of the original cast had left as they had become disillusioned with the writing or wanted to pursue other opportunities before they became typecast. Their replacements were usually dour characters that had plenty of personal baggage and the humorous aspects were replaced by deep thoughts and crisis in relationships. ITV also tried to increase the number of episodes per year whilst reducing the budget which diminished the number of spectacular fires that the brigade would attend in a series and it became more of a soap rather than the refreshing series that it had been when it first started.

Eventually around 2001 the series was axed and it has now been replaced by Steel River Blues which has all the promise to be like London's Burning was in the early days.

Details

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

20 February 1988 (UK)

Also Known As:

Brand meester

Filming Locations:

Dockhead Fire Station, Wolseley Street, Bermondsey, London, England, UK

Company Credits

Production Co:

London Weekend Television (LWT)

Technical Specs

Runtime:

50 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1