BBC Election 87 trails and Dallas

David Dimbleby trails the Election 87 news later that evening and there's a promo with Sue Lawley for a forthcoming programme in which viewers can put questions to the party leaders. Though not Margaret Thatcher who presumably didn't want to take part after her uncomfortable experience on Nationwide a few years earlier when she was tackled about the sinking of the Belgrano (also presented by Sue Lawley). Then it's Dallas.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• election 87
• bbc
• dimbleby
• sue lawley
• politics

[RobinCarmody]

Oh, and the date is Wednesday 20th May 1987. The Dallas episode was showing only five days after its US transmission - it was usually shown from autumn to spring in line with the US seasons until the last series, which was flung out on Sunday afternoons in the summer because, here as there, its ratings had completely collapsed by that point.

[doubledeckers]

@RobinCarmody - the falling popularity of Dallas also seemed to be tied with the BBC transmitting it from an NTSC conversion instead of importing the 35mm prints? People complained that it wasn't so glossy looking.

[AidanLunn]

Mrs Thatcher seemed to have quickly forgave the BBC during the 1987 election campaign, according to the video description!

She seemed perfectly happy to appear in an interview with Robin Day on panorama - her most hated programme - where she made her "I shall go on and on and on". Too right, she served for 11 and a half years and never shut up!

[givemethevalium]

did Dimbers read the whole bulletin I wonder...sport as well?!

[RobinCarmody]

'Best of British' ending at the start, I presume. Thatcher did appear on a Radio 1 phone-in just before the election, of all places, but then she'd have had no opinion of that station, at least compared to her paranoia about the rest of the BBC. Note the Lime Grove address - Current Affairs was always based there, with News at TVC, and it was John Birt's merger of the two later that year, combined with the terrible condition of the building, that finally did for BBC TV's post-war home.