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Entertainment Links: (Jump to TV)


NOTE new URL from November 1st 2023: http://ftp.whtech.com/Users/stephen/ent.htm

Films

Like Warner Brothers cartoons (Merrie Melodies, Looney Tunes) of old? There are lots of references which are now obscure but never fear there is an old website out there with a glossary of terms at Warner Bros Cartoon Companion - see Warner Bros Cartoon Companion or see archive.org copy.
Date order filmography of Warner Brothers Cartoons. || Music by Raymond Scott used in the cartoons - from archive.org.

My Music and on-line audio and radio links are now on their own page.| Star Trek, Babylon 5 and SF links

Radio:

I have a section of this website dedicated to early (1925-1940) articles on radio and television.

For many years (1978 to 2006 : not 1973 as the BBC state) Radio 4 used to start up with the Radio 4 theme, but there is an archived BBC web page about it (NB the stream is no longer available) : BBC Radio 4 UK theme. The theme was placed on the Radio 4 web site in response to the thousands who complained about its removal from the broadcast day (now the file has gone!) and in 2006 a CD single was released which made the top 30 for a week. There are several new recordings of it.

I have an episode list of the BBC Radio comedy series The Men from the Ministry.
For a good TMFTM site, Gary Schajer's cannot be beaten . Did you know that there were South African and Finnish variants of the Ministry?

I have on this site a very large (83k) listing of radio and tv shows by Tony Hancock.. [Wanted: a scan of "Junior Goldfish Keepers Weekly" which originated the Hancock series. Not a trace of it...]
Some of my favourite UK radio programs are dealt with very well on Steve Arnolds excellent British Comedy web site. Also see Epguides Radio List and also The Global British Comedy Collabrative with episode guides in PDF and DOC format via archive.org. (GBCC alternate -older, from 2020- at thegbcc.info) (GBCC Site at jalucasii is hostile).

Radio episode lists for: Dad's Army from archive.org.
Yes Minister ||   It Sticks Out Half a Mile ||   All Gas & Gaiters. ||    The Navy Lark from wikipedia.
   Take it from here first lines. |   | The Navy Lark First lines

RADIOLISTINGS:

An worthwhile resource for old UK radio program lists used to be "Radio Listings" (sadly a site rewrite hid the content pages!!! Nothing could be found or seen with javascript off. They now seem to have gone.) BUT you could go back to before the site was rewritten: here is a working archive.org copy from 10.2017

For listings of US old time radio shows, a large set of lists are at OTRSite.com. For more on old radio programs including downloads and streams take a look at my music page which has lots of other things on it too.

A superb radio comedy web site is an unofficial Just a Minute homage , with episode guide and transcripts up to 2017. || There is also a possibly 24/7 stream of JAM programs from a Facebook streamer. Link is to a .pls on Internet-radio .

I enjoy Alistair Cooke's program Letter from America. A huge number of these were available on the BBC website to listen to or to read, but in 2021 a rotten redesign hid them away somewhere. There are a few (the BBC have more if you can locate them) to be found on archive.org: Up to 1960s    |   1969-1980    |   1981-1988    |   1989-1992    |   1993-1996    |   1997-2000    |   2001-2004

Search for UK radio drama:

For a British slant on radio drama programs (but no audio), Diversity has lots of information on British drama - to access the site I sometimes have to use a proxy as it occaisionally only serves https and only uses EC.
Search (using Google) by anything listed in Radio Times radio pages (title, actor, director etc) here:

To identify old British radio programs and research BBC radio and tv programs, I find the BBC Program Index website useful. Scroll down the results for page content.
Note that due to use of OCR some names may not be correct and be prepared to search separately on two items to locate a program! eg program name then if that fails try an actor or director. NOTE that the BBC have tagged a number of very very innocent programs as "may be offensive", too clumsily to have value but effective at interfering with research.
You can also see programs on any particular date. Some programs alas never had much detail in Radio Times. Some broadcasts will therefore not be searchable. As the BBC search uses the most modern scripting, here is my own none-script search form for them:

Search BBC Genome:

Television

TV viewers can enjoy P Hills British TV Comedy database with brief synopses and some episode guides (from 2015 web archive), or see lots of episode lists and guides at Epguides.com (who now have some UK radio shows also).

The next two websites are archives of an old website, since hijacked-
I am fond of I Love Lucy which has not been shown in the UK for some time, and the radio program which came before it, My Favorite Husband.
NEW My Favorite Husband new website. I Love Lucy new website.

Encyclopaedia of Television was once a useful website but has become a paywall with no accessible navigation, (images only, javascript only, no visible content) - it was US based but covered UK TV shows as well- indexes articles on shows and actors. Try this archived link (2012): TV museum on webarchive.org


My favorite cartoons include:
The late Frank Dickens used to draw Bristow.    ||   free fall

From webarchive: Meldrum tv for testcards and TV nostalgia.