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The Bill

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This article is about the British TV series. For the Polish punk rock band, see The Bill (band).
The Bill
File:Thebill.GIF
Created byGeoff McQueen
StarringA sizable list of regulars
No. of episodes2103(as of 24 August 2006)
Production
ProducertalkbackTHAMES
Running time60 min per episode
Original release
NetworkITV1
Release16 October 1984 –
Present

The Bill is a long-running British television police procedural shown on ITV1, at 8PM on Wednesdays and Thursdays.

Catch-ups of the show can be seen on ITV3. Past episodes can also be seen on UKTV Gold. In Australia, the show is shown on the ABC, and in Ireland by RTÉ One.

The setting is the Sun Hill district of the fictional London borough of Canley. Other police stations in the borough, mentioned but (usually) never seen, are Barton Street, which is the location of Borough Headquarters, Stafford Row and Spicer Street. Canley is approximately contiguous with the real London Borough of Tower Hamlets.

The Bill is unusual among police shows: it takes a serial format and it does not focus on one particular area of police work. Instead, the show's time is equally divided between the work of officers on one shift in the uniform division, and the work of the CID.

It started as a one-off drama for ITV entitled Woodentop: this pilot show starred Mark Wingett as PC Jim Carver and Trudie Goodwin as WPC June Ackland on Carver's first day on the beat at Sun Hill police station. It was originally devised by Geoff McQueen, and it impressed ITV so much that they decided to make a series out of it. Goodwin continues to star on the now twice-weekly show, while Wingett left the cast in early 2005.

In October 2003, a special episode of The Bill was broadcast live from its London studios to mark the show's 20th year on air. At 8pm on Thursday, 22 September, 2005 another episode was broadcast live to mark the ITV Network's 50th anniversary. The episode was written by Graham Mitchell and co-produced and directed by Sylvie Boden.


The originals

The first proper episode of The Bill was transmitted in 1984 and, with the exception of Carver and Ackland, the cast was almost totally revamped (PC Dave Litten is still played by Gary Olsen and Colin Blumenau played the same character with a slightly different name — Taffy Edwards rather than Taffy Morgan. The character of DI Galloway was retained but recast. The first episode also features an appearance by Christopher Ellison playing DS Frank Burnside (although his first name here is Tommy). The Sub Divisional Officer was Chief Superintendent Charles Brownlow.

File:Brownlow.jpg
The first SDO, Charles Brownlow

The original format was shows of fifty minutes in length. Only 35 episodes were made in the first three series of The Bill, and these are known as 'the originals'. The first series has its own unique title sequence, featuring images of the feet of two uniformed officers walking towards the camera interspersed with shots of the streets of Sun Hill. Then the camera zooms in on the male officer's helmet and the title of the show appears, followed by the credit 'devised by Geoff McQueen'. All this is accompanied by the first version of the iconic title music: written by Andy Pask and Charlie Morgan and entitled "Overkill".

For the second series in 1985, the titles were completely changed: now, they began with a shot of the Area Car approaching the camera with blue light flashing and siren wailing, and then its tyres screeching as the music began: the camera would end up with a close-up on the blue light atop the car. Two-second action shots of various members of the cast were then shown, interspersed with images of the blue light. "The Bill" and "Devised by Geoff McQueen" would then appear over a hold shot of the light, and then the episode would begin. The originals are also noted for their extremely long end credits, which last over one and a half minutes and feature the plodding feet again, this time walking away from camera. There has been three versions of these "walking feet"; Paul Page-Hanson's size nines appeared twice (Silver 1999).

Changing to half-hour format

After the conclusion of the 1987 series, the decision was taken to drastically change the format. The Bill would now run year-round, and instead of one 50-minute episode, two 25-minute episodes would air every week. Contrary to popular belief, although it was produced and broadcast in a manner more familiar to serialised television, most of the episodes were still stand alone stories, with each story rounded up in the half-hour timeslot.

The title sequence was also updated. The same Area Car was used, but with new cast shots to reflect changes, and the first remix of "Overkill", by Pask & Morgan: this version would become better known than the original. It also introduced another trademark to the titles: Sergeant Bob Cryer was always the last person to be shown. In this title sequence, he is talking and nodding.

The series continued relatively unchanged (except for cast) until 1992: This sequence is unique in that it does not actually feature the area car driving towards camera, and simply begins with the police light spinning before cutting through the cast footage. The credit "The Bill" is shown over a shot of the new area car driving past camera, and Cryer is now shouting at someone. From January 1993 three half-hour episodes were shown each week. In 1994, the title sequence changed once again to one closer resembling the one seen in 1988, with a new area car driving towards camera again and Cryer started looking up in amazement.

In 1996, an ingenious addition was made. Separate title sequences were created with specially-filled footage: one for episodes that took place during the day and one for those set at night. Again, a new Area Car in the credits, and the timing of the music was subtly changed. Instead of kicking in immediately after the screech of tyres, it now begun at the same time. In both title sequences, Cryer looks up for the camera.

Throughout this era, the focus of the show remained broadly the same: very much focused on police work, with very few personal stories for the characters unless they were on their way out. Episodes would often feature interesting crimes which were wrapped up by the end of the episode. A common plot feature would be an episode following two incidents in parallel, that started off seemingly unrelated would end up directly related. The twist was usually in how.

The 1998 revamp

Template:Spoiler The second major revamp of the show took place in 1998, as Richard Handford took over as Executive Producer of the show from Michael Chapman. Handford had worked variously on the series in the capacity of Line Producer since 1992, and had an intimate understanding of how the series format had been used in the past. This said, the show's focus was altered so that interactions between the officers became as important as the solving of crimes. The look of the show was also updated. The old titles were thrown out entirely, in favour of new opening titles featuring images of generic police things: dayglo jackets, hats, a suspect being interviewed, and a map in CAD (Computer Aided Dispatch) among other things. The theme tune was also completely revamped, with a change from the original irregular time signature of 7/8. Episodes moved to being 1 hour long later in 1998, though for quite a while the times & days the episodes were shown varied, along with the number of episodes a week (for a period in Spring 2002, only one episode was shown a week), but by late 2002, it had finally settled at 8PM on Wednesdays & Thursdays, which is still the case as of August 2024.

In late 2000, Handford made sweeping changes to the cast. Chief Superintendent Brownlow (Sun Hill's first Sub-Divisional Officer) was removed and replaced by the smooth, enthusiastic Superintendent Tom Chandler.

Nearly the whole of CID was replaced, following the explosive exit of DS Don Beech (Billy Murray), who always bent the rules slightly. Beech finally crossed the line — lying in court in exchange for a £20,000 bribe paid by a gangland boss. CIB became aware of his corrupt activities and placed undercover officer DS Stanton at Sun Hill to expose him. Beech came undone when his relationship with arch villain Fallon spiralled out of control. So he fled to foreign climes (which led to a one off special, Beech on the Run, which was filmed exclusively in Australia, home to one of The Bill's largest audiences, and his own six part series Beech is Back).

PC Eddie Santini also appeared in the dock, charged with murder. He was acquitted (although he had killed the victim accidentally) but was later shot dead in cold blood by another corrupt officer.

More changes followed in 2001, as Sgt Bob Cryer was forced into early retirement by an accidental shooting — the perpetrator was the now Duty Sgt Dale Smith, at that time assigned to SO19. He was replaced by Duty Sgt Craig Gilmore. PC Des Taviner arrived as the new Area Car Driver: he was to form an odd-couple friendship with long-standing PC Reg Hollis that would provide some of the series' greatest moments. The titles were changed again to include static cast photographs and the music was remixed to take it back closer to the 1988 Pask/Morgan mix of "Overkill". The series was also shot in Widescreen ratio for the first time.

Also, a new trend emerged: no more would cases be solved in 25 or 50 minutes: now, they spanned many episodes, and quite often a minor offence dealt with by Uniform a few weeks ago would re-appear as part of the major case in CID.

Changing to the Serial Format (2002)

Template:Spoiler February 2002 saw Handford replaced by Paul Marquess. Marquess, unlike Handford, had never worked on the series before and was more famous for helming the soap opera Brookside. As soon as Marquess took over, there was a complete revamp of the show's cast, format and formula. The series adopted its now familiar serial format, with the iconic separate episode titles used since 1984 dropped in favour of each episode being known only by a number. The last episode to have its own given title was "Set in Stone", broadcast on 31st of January 2002. There followed a six-part storyline which had no on-screen title but is familiarly known as "Quinnan" (for the character who leaves in its duration, PC Dave Quinnan: This was also the last storyline in which Richard Handford was in charge). The first to use the new format was #001, broadcast on 28th of February 2002. As of 2006 there have been over 400 episodes using the new numbering system.

The new serialised format allowed for storylines to continue indefinitely, with no need for an immediate resolution. This allowed for more prolonged story arcs In the first of these, six officers were killed in an explosion accidentally caused by PC Des Taviner: he would escape for two years before finally being forced to face the music. There was also the decision to kill off several other characters in dramatic circumstances, such as the death of PC Cass Rickman at the hands of a serial killer, and that of Superintendent Tom Chandler who shot himself after raping his wife DS Debbie McAllister (Natalie Roles). Tom Chandler was replaced by Superintendent Adam Okaro, a black Superintendent played by Cyril Nri. There was also the decision not to replace the Chief Inspector, a rank that Marquess found desk-bound and boring, following the unfortunate death of Chief Inspector (Operations) Derek Conway (although there is still a space in the station carpark marked 'CI Ops'). In some recent episodes a memorial plaque to this long serving character can still be seen outside the police station.

While the series remained fairly grounded in the early days of the serial format, gradually more sensational storylines were introduced. The misguided PC Gabriel Kent became the most prominent of these, joining the series in early 2003 and lasting out the remainder of the Marquess era. Kent sometimes stretched viewer credibility with the crimes which he was willing to commit in order to keep his secrets, including deliberately killing several of his colleagues while managing to avoid the evidence ever pointing back to him. In early 2005, the show staged the first ever gay wedding in the police force, between the characters PC Lance Powell and Sergeant Mark Rollins.

Another sensational storyline of Marquess's tenure came when station suffered another explosion in February 2005, three years after the previous, this time caused by disaffected PCSO Colin Fairfax, who drove a van into the front of the station, killing DC Ken Drummond, (who was in the back of the van), SRO Marilyn Chambers and PC Andrea Dunbar (a journalist under cover). A few months after the episode aired, Paul Marquess was signed away by Endemol, the makers of Big Brother, to head their new drama division. His replacement is Johnathan Young, whose name first appeared on the credits in September 2005.

Johnathan Young's retooling of the programme has led to noticeable changes in the show. Sensational plotlines have been dropped and whilst personal storylines remain, more time is spent on crime based stories. Although the serial format remains in place, the storylines are generally more self-contained and are often dealt with in two or three episode blocks. In this way the programme closer resembles the earlier period helmed by Richard Handford.

Spin-offs

The Bill has spawned three spin-off productions.

The first of these was known as Burnside. It lasted a single series of six episodes, the first of which debuted on 7th of July 2000. The series focused on the newly promoted DCI Burnside (recently reintroduced in The Bill itself) as a member of the National Crime Squad. It was created and produced by Richard Handford.

The second spin-off debuted in 2001, and also lasted only six episodes. Beech is Back focused on dodgy ex-DS Don Beech, still on the run from Claire Stanton who wants him brought to justice for the murder of her boyfriend DS John Boulton. None of the episodes were given titles, with each being part of a single six part serial. At the end Beech is brought to justice and sent to prison, although he would return in The Bill years later.

In 2003, ITV1 debuted the third spin-off of the show, entitled Murder Investigation Team. The first episode investigated the drive-by shooting of Sgt. Matthew Boyden, who had been at Sun Hill for 11 years. The first series consisted of 10 one-hour episodes. The second series, airing two years later, consisted of 4 ninety-minute episodes. The series was created by Paul Marquess. The second series was produced by Jonathan Young.

Cast

Main article: List Of The Bill Characters

Current cast

Police Constables

Criminal Investigation Dept - Detective Constables

Sergeants

Senior Officers

Uniform

C.I.D.

File:Dcijackmeadows.jpg
Simon Rouse as DCI Jack Meadows

Other recurring characters

  • DCI Frank Keane. Keane is a Detective Chief Inspector with the Directorate of Professional Standards (DPS) and takes over investigations into the conduct of both serving and retired Police Officers. He recently was involved in the investigation into Louise Larson as it was believed that Sgt. Smith was the murderer. Keane is also the father of PC Emma Keane.
  • Mia Perry. Perry is the Metropolitan Police Service's Press Officer and has recently been making a recurring appearance when there are big investigations going on within Sun Hill. She was recently involved in the Louise Larson case and also the Bombastic Nightclub disaster.

Mia is also engaging in a relationship with DC Mickey Webb.

  • Chief Superintendent Adam Okaro (Borough Commander) (Cyril Nri) - Formerly lower rank of Superintendent based at Sun Hill.

Upcoming

See also

References

  • Silver, Rachel (1999). The Bill: The Inside Story: Behind the Scenes of Britain's Top Police Drama. London: HarperCollins. ISBN 0002571374.
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