Regional ITV programmes

Central Weekend and Central Weekend Live most famously hosted by Nicky Campbell amongst others. There are various clips on YouTube if you search.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CchkNr8CGLQ

There a short clip on "itv 50 Tyne Tees":

There was It's Your Shout on Sunday afternoons on Central for a while, although the only time I ever rememeber watching it when I lived in ATV Land was before an FA Cup match where the picture kept on failing and eventually they abandoned it.

London Bridge was the Carlton soap, which ran for a few years. Granada showed it for a bit too, albeit at 11pm, which I think was simply returning the favour for Carlton showing Granada's ridiculous Russell T Davies-penned CofE soap Revelations. There was also Family Pride, Central's Asian soap, which ran for a while and was also later repeated on C4. I remember Central showing that on Tuesdays at 8.30, relegating Wheel of Fortune to Sunday afternoons.

Remarkable to think of regional soaps these days when ITV seemingly can't afford any network drama.

You're right that Granana did show various things at 6.30 in 1997 between moving Home and Away to 5.10, which they did in January 1997, and extending Granada Tonight to an hour, which they did in January 1998, including Girls Who Shop, a fashion show presented by Trinny and Susannah, and also Schools Challenge which, as the name may suggest, was simply University Challenge, on the same set and everything, but with schools. And presented by Mark Radcliffe, while he was doing the Radio 1 Breakfast Show! Who said he was too low profile?

A Granada show we always used to enjoy was House Style, a bog standard interiors show, which ran for several series and I remember was repeated on the network during daytimes a bit later. I also remember really loving Quest, which involved contestants doing a treature hunt around Granadaland, I remember the final was co-hosted by Stuart Hall from Camelot (the theme park, not the mythical land).

There was Scrumdown, a rugby league championship highlights programme, on both Granada and Yorkshire, though it ended when BSB got the rights.

Yorkshire had so many regional programmes with the Calendar tag including
Calendar...
- Kids
- Goes Pop (with Richard Madeley!)
- Fashion Show
- Countdown (the original regional version - some clips on You Tube - awful!)
- Tuesday, Thursday, Sunday

Also rememer the annual series of Enterprise programmes at 6.30 on Mondays in the 80s - to find best new local business

UTV's longest running regional series was "Kelly", which ran for 16 years from September 1989 to December 2009.

Although if "Lesser Spotted Ulster" comes back later this year, it will take the honours as the longest-running regional series shown on UTV, it first went to air in March 1995.

The only ones I can think of that began local but ended up in other regions are the various Jenny Bristow series, and McGilloway's Way", the precedent to "Lesser Spotted Ulster" (same production team) which got a night-time slot in the late 1990s.

UTV used to really roll out the regional series - especially studio-based entertainment series ("Kelly", "All Mixed Up", the dreaded "School Around the Corner") - until 2005; now you'd be hard pushed to see *anything* that isn't UTV Live.

Towards the end of HTV Wales there was a reality show on Sunday afternoons hosted by Gabby Logan called Presenters which was looking for the next big... well, presenter. All I can remember from it is that there was a really odd American bloke who refused to tell his age which for whatever reason (lack of decent content?) was a major talking point amongst the judges, and that the winner hosted one series of some HTV programme and then disappeared.

I remember there being some sort of comedy show on late at night that was always advertised but it looked awful.

Also, they might not have been regional but I remember Granada used to show short Crime Stoppers films either before or after CITV. I seem to remember they only made a few and were constantly on a loop. They were hosted by some bald guy which for some reason repulsed me as a child.

I remember seeing a business in Holmfirth whose signage proudly displayed the YTV Chevron with winner Enterprise XX (or something similar) under it only a couple of years ago. Just had a look on Streetview and it's no longer there.

One of my very first bits of work experience in telly was on a Central regional show called "Hit the Town". Made by Mentorn Midlands and presented by the then relatively unknown Rory McGrath, it was a mash-up of "What's On" guide and studio gameshow. The set featured an approximation of Spaghetti Junction with roads sweeping downstage to where the four contestants sat in cars. They had to watch features of bands appearing in gigs in the region, press-previews of pantos etc and art exhibitions, then answer questions on what they'd just seen and also related subjects. In order to buzz in, contestants had to sound the horn - leading to the utterly hilarious catchphrase "Ok, round two, hands on horns..."

It was great to be involved - my job was to persuade people to be in the audience at Lenton Lane for the recording (on Thursdays I think). We resorted to phoning care homes and schools in the end... The show went out on Sunday afternoons, about 4ish I think.

Granada had that too, of course, Flying Start, which ran for years and years and years. My cousin was a contestant on it once and our auntie wore an orange frock to sit in the audience, which meant you could see her prominently in every single shot.

In 1996 Westcountry did a lad-mag-on-telly thing called The Lads, presented by Terry Alderton and Sophie Anderton, which did so well on Westcountry - I remember reading it got about a 50% share at 10.40pm - that a couple of other regions picked it up, including Granada, where I watched it, and Carlton, and a second series was extended to 26 episodes and networked, albet at 1am. One of the few Westcountry productions for the network, of course.

There were a few networked series that got their first outing regionally, I remember Harry Enfield's Guide To Opera in 1993 was shown on Channel Four on Thursday nights but every episode was first shown six days earlier on Yorkshire, I'm not sure why. Also Roy and HG, the Australian comedians who you may recall on Ben Elton's BBC1 series (whenever I see their names I always hear Elton saying them), had a series on Anglia in 1998 which was then repeated on Channel Five the following evening. And Granada made Stuff The White Rabbit, an anarchic magic show for BBC2, in 1996, but showed it themselves six months before BBC2 did. It was certainly commissioned for the Beeb, though, as on Granada it was 35 minutes.

Granada regional programmes I seem to remember off the top of my head during the 80's and 90's are.....

Granada Upfront (Lucy Meacock and the late Tony Wilson)
Srcamble
House Style
The Green Show
Down To Earth (Bob smithies)
Revelations (Soap)
The there was holiday/travel show presented by Eamonn (forgotten his surname)
The Acid Test
The Motor Show
Granada Soccer Night/Kick Off


and what was the name of the business competition programmme with Tony Wilson?

O'Neal? (he of Granada Lunchtime Live, IIRC?)