Dramarama
Dramarama is the name of a British children's anthology series broadcast on ITV between 1983 and 1989. It tended to feature drama of a science fiction or supernatural bent. The series was created by Anna Home, then head of children's and youth programming at TVS, however production responsibilities were divided amongst most of the regional ITV franchise holders. Thus, each episode was in practice a one-off production with its own cast and crew, up to and including the executive producer. Dramarama was largely a place for new talent to prove themselves and was a launching pad for the likes of Anthony Horowitz, Paul Abbott, Kay Mellor, Janice Hally, Tony Kearney, David Tennant and Ann Marie Di Mambro. It was one of Dennis Spooner's last credits. One of Dramarama's episodes, "Dodger, Bonzo And The Rest", gained so much popularity that it was turned in to its own series the following year. It starred Lee Ross and was based around a large foster home. The episode "Blackbird Singing In The Dead of Night" was developed by Granada into the TV series Children's Ward. It was also repeated for the first time since its original broadcast on 5 January 2013, during CITV's 30th anniversary Old Skool Weekend. The Series 7 episode "Back To Front" – notable for featuring a mirror image of the Yorkshire Television logo card at the end – was repeated on 6 January 2013, again as part of CITV's 30th anniversary Old Skool Weekend.
Episodes
Rip It Up
E2The Venchie
E3Matt begins a new job as a play worker for an adventure playground - a "venchie". Despite being warned that the kids there are hooligans, Matt believes they just need to be given a chance and understanding
Jack and the Computer
E4Because I Say So
E5When a boy is injured in a classroom fight, his teacher and headmaster try to get at the truth of what happened.
Bully for Cosmo
E6Cosmo is being bullied in class by Sylvia after he refuses to take a note from her in the middle of a lesson. After a fight almost breaks out, the teacher calls in Cosmo's father and Sylvia's mother to attempt to resolve things.
Messages
E7The Young Person's Guide to Getting Their Ball Back
E8Sweet Revenge
E9Night of the Narrow Boats
E1Fowl Pest
E2Chaos results when Amy gives her mother a birthday present of four chickens.
Dodger, Bonzo and the Rest
E3When they overhear that their children's home may be closed, the youngsters hatch a series of plans, not all totally above board, to raise money to keep it open.
Que Sera
E4Fortune teller Rose is trying to teach young Stella the tricks of her trade when the new owner of the Pleasure Palace threatens her professional existence with his future business plans. Clairvoyance is urgently needed, but maybe one of them has real paranormal talents?
Stalemate
E5Snoop!
E6Colin Egan, a cub reporter, is sent on an apparently boring assignment. Events, however, soon take a dramatic turn.
Mr. Stabs
E7Mr Stabs is summoned to the City of Shadows, where he must perform various heroic deeds in order to defeat the evil Polandi, and ultimately face mortal, magical combat with Melchisedek.
Josephine-Jo
E8The Purple People Eater
E9On Your Tod
E1018-year-old Ben seems to have all the luck. In reality, he is bored and lonely - and it takes a gate-crasher at his party to force him to acknowledge his problems.
The Old Firm: Two for Starters
E11Rachel and Rosie
E12Wheelchair-bound Rosie is waiting in hospital for an operation. When she has to share her hospital room with Rachel, a very different girl with a more streetwise outlook, Rosie must learn to deal with Rachel's prejudices towards her.
Easy
E1Neil is a good footballer, but his father wants him to only develop his talent for the violin. But the concert of a great virtuoso changes everything.
The Coal Princess
E2Look At Me
E3Two children, one deaf and one hearing, are brought together by an accident involving the deaf boy's beloved dog.
A Young Person's Guide to Going Backwards In The World
E4Charlie is facing his exam and is suffering greatly under the pressure of expectations. Then the mysterious Mentora makes him a tempting offer: he can simply pass. But the pact takes him to a fantastical world, to the "Mouth," behind which lurks consequences for those who don't think and decide for themselves.
The Audition
E5The Universe Downstairs
E6Vincent and his parents move into an old house. When they hear noises coming from the cellar he goes down to investigate and finds a whole new world, Cosmos, with its own unique people.
A Proper Little Nooryeff
E7Frog
E8A satirical, political play as an enclosed garden represents the whole western world. Inhabiting the garden are various animals who speak directly to the viewers in rhyme and song, including a frog who has stolen all the water.
Private Eye
E9Emily
E10Silver
E11The Golden Conch
E12Purple Passion Video
E13The Come-Uppance of Captain Katt
E1Ludo French stars in a sci-fi series, but working with the arrogant, conceited, always dissatisfied man pushes the production to its limits.
A Couple of Charlies
E2A play about a neglected boy on a school pet day, this edition was awarded the Special UNICEF Prize at Prix Jeunesse, Munich.
Wayfarers
E3Play Acting
E4Last Days at Black Bert's
E5Things aren't looking good at the run-down hikers' hostel "Black Bert's." A health inspector has been announced, ordering a committee to close the place down. On top of that, everything is about to fall apart-but perhaps the new waitress can help?
Maureen Reid, Where Are You?
E6Flashback
E7Film material from the Second World War is leaked to two young people. The film stars a schoolboy who obviously doesn't belong there. Who is the boy and when did this happen?
Direct Action
E8Young Dawn seems to lack perseverance in her jobs. Things seem to be going better at Helliwell's toy store until the boss orders the same Christmas music to be played for months. Since everyone is dissatisfied, Dawn organizes a staff meeting. But there are still a few lessons waiting for her.
Waiting for Elvis
E9In 1960, Elvis Presley returns to the USA from Germany by plane, and there will be a stopover in Scotland. That evening, the paths of six people cross in the waiting lounge, each with a different hope for this event: a journalist, a fan, a beauty queen, her jealous boyfriend, an agent, and his protégé, whom he hopes to make a star.
Just a Game
E10A school quiz broadcast on the radio is a huge success until two students from a losing team realize that their teacher is helping the competition. Proving the cheating and convincing their teachers and parents proves difficult. And the station doesn't want to be in the headlines either.
Flyaway Friend
E11Jennie is new at school, misses her father and has no friends. But there is her imaginary friend Tom, who has similar concerns. But is he really imaginary?
Pig Ignorance
E12Little crook Darryl has to do community service on an inner-city farm. Most of the time he doesn't care about the work, but when the owners have to sell the only pig for lack of money, his attitude changes.
Jessie's Place
E13A girl from a snobbish middle class family is desperate to break free, and ends up forging an unlikely friendship with a younger working class boy
Frankie's Hat
E14Sonia travels from London to Oxford to make a Birthday visit to her sister Frankie who has moved away and started a family. But Frankie takes the opportunity to make up for her lost youth, much to the younger girl's distaste.
Cannondrum
E1Snap
E2Peter's dad reluctantly gives him a lift to some marshlands for a school photography project. Yet why is Peter able to see a mysterious hooded figure at the site, but it's unseen by his dad?
The Horrible Story
E3Bobby is given a tent from his uncle, and plans to sleep in it overnight with his friend Allan. Yet their plans are disrupted by Bobby's younger brother Christopher tagging along, so they try to scare him away with a "horrible story".
My Friend Julie
E4A story told entirely in song of the difficult friendship between two teenage girls who both love the same boy.
The Creature Beyond Torches' End
E5Because his parents are constantly arguing, Henry takes his desire for adventure and dinosaurs into his own hands. He follows the path under his bedclothes into a fantastic world.
My Mum's a Courgette
E6Brainwaves
E7Karen has enrolled on a communications course in a college for school underachievers. She spends her nights fantasising about a rebellious classmate, but her epilepsy causes her problems fitting in with the rest of her class.
Undertow of the Armada
E8Stan's First Night
E9In 1906, Stan Jefferson is given the chance to perform on stage for the first time ever at a theatre in Glasgow. The events of this night set Stan on a path that will eventually lead to becoming the Stan Laurel we know and love of Laurel & Hardy fame.
Living Doll
E10When Dawn's mother wants to work full-time, it leads to arguments between her parents. So, in her imagination, she creates the perfect couple out of her dolls. Or so she thinks.
Peter
E11Since the death of his father in the Falklands War, Paul has become increasingly withdrawn. One day, while fishing, he meets a strange boy named Peter who challenges him.
The Halt
E12Football hooligans get their comeuppance when they find themselves abandoned on a deserted railway station where strange things happen and voices make arrival announcements for trains that never come.
Mr Magus is Waiting for You
E13A repeat screening of a three-part "Middle English" story from 1986, repackaged as a single episode and presented under the Dramarama banner.
A Spirited Performance
E14Two boys stumble into a chaotic medieval film production and help out. But then they should look for a mystical sword.
Badger on the Barge
E15Badger on the Barge
E16Forever Young
E1The Macramé Man
E2The Wrong Button
E3A school art class visits a noble country estate, with a disused fairground next door. At the same time, a devil-in-training causes chaos among the visitors. But a rascal student can see him and brings his two best friends for a ride.
Bubbles
E4Blackbird Singing in the Dead of Night
E5Kim, a girl rendered deaf by an accident, has to return to the children's ward for a second time when the first operation fails. Whilst there, she befriends a boy who is immature on the outside, but has a good hear
Big T for Trouble
E6Jackie's outrageous lies always get her into trouble, but she can't escape her job as a bridesmaid in pink.
Room for One More
E7Making Waves
E8Just a Normal Girl
E9Sandy is left paraplegic as a result of a car accident, but finds courage through meeting other disabled children.
Now You See Them
E10Bogeymen
E11New neighbours in the street - a scary thing for four children, because the newcomers are from the West Indies. Their wild imagination brings them to break into the neighbours court.
The Alien
E12The Secret of Croftmore
E13A teenage Scottish boy named Calum Gillies, who does not want to leave his beloved Croftmore in the Highlands to move to Edinburgh, receives assistance from the ghosts of his distant relatives.
The Bubblegum Brigade
E14Playing for Wales
E15Snap Decision
E16Tennis playing schoolboy Peter is anxious over an upcoming tournament. When his wheelchair-bound and photo-obsessed younger brother begins to attract more attention from his girlfriend, Peter's bitter resentments come to the surface.
Codzmorf
E1A father spends a Saturday turning household objects into live animals, things go wrong when he transforms himself and his son has to retrieve the spell book for the reverse spell
Ghost Story
E2Badger
E3Back to Front
E4 22mWe all know that mirrors take real life and reflect it back to us the other way. But what if the mirror's world goes beyond the pane of glass?
Monstrous
E5A friendly and familiar group of monsters, witches and ghostly figures live and work in a "Tunnel of Horror" at the fairground. On this day, an envious authority wants to close the fairground and sends its employees out.
The Pisces Connection
E6Rosie the Great
E7Once learned their island is free from British rule, the leader sought ways of getting the island on the map, until a researcher informed them the island is really a monarchy under the control of their local girl Rosie.
Snakes and Loofahs
E8Three girls set up a neighbourhood watch, but their "cases" soon annoy the police. But the discovery of a constrictor and a strange burglar soon change that.
Just Wild About Harry
E9Mitchin
E10Two boys skip school aka "mitchin" one boy is hiding from something curious