Play for Today

6.3
19701h 15m

Play for Today is a British television anthology drama series, produced by the BBC and transmitted on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984. During the run, more than three hundred programmes, featuring original television plays, and adaptations of stage plays and novels, were transmitted. The individual episodes were between fifty and a hundred minutes in duration.

Seasons

24 Episodes • Premiered 1970

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 1: The Long Distance Piano Player

1. The Long Distance Piano Player

A man tries to break the world's record for nonstop piano playing

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 2: The Right Prospectus

2. The Right Prospectus

A couple look for the proper school, not for their children but for themselves.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 3: The Lie

3. The Lie

""The Lie"" refers to the 8-year marriage of a couple who are constantly hurting each other.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 4: Angels Are So Few

4. Angels Are So Few

A man claiming to be an angel enters the household of a bored housewife and teaches the family a few lessons.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 5: The Write-Off

5. The Write-Off

A man is made redundant but can't bring himself to let anyone know, plunging into a web of deceit as he keeps up the charade he is still in work.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 6: I Can't See My Little Willie

6. I Can't See My Little Willie

A man has a mid-life crisis in his brother's pub where sees life as a game show

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 7: A Distant Thunder

7. A Distant Thunder

A newly-appointed knight finds his celebrations cut short by someone who was witness to his treachery during the war.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 8: Hearts and Flowers

8. Hearts and Flowers

A TV host and his architect brother attend their father's funeral

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 9: Robin Redbreast

9. Robin Redbreast

A woman living in a country cottage thinks that someone is trying to get her.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 10: The Hallelujah Handshake

10. The Hallelujah Handshake

A petty thief and social misfit finagles his way into a church congregation

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 11: Alma Mater

11. Alma Mater

A civil servant working abroad revisits his old school

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 12: Circle Line

12. Circle Line

A cynical student has a radically different view of life from his landlady, leading to conflict. Matters come to a head when he sleeps with her fourteen-year-old brother.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 13: Hell's Angel

13. Hell's Angel

A couple are distressed by the changes in their adopted teenage son when he joins a biker gang.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 14: The Piano

14. The Piano

An old couple refuse to move when they find out that they can't take their piano with them

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 15: Billy's Last Stand

15. Billy's Last Stand

Billy, a self-employed coal-shoveller, gains a seedy business partner and competition in the form of a rival coal-shoveller.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 16: The Rainbirds

16. The Rainbirds

A man who attempted suicide by jumping out a window is saved only to live in a coma, in which he has fantasies about his relatives and nightmare creatures.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 17: Reddick

17. Reddick

Charges that the Rev 'Red' Reddick is exploiting his youth club members leads to an explosive confrontation.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 18: The Foxtrot

18. The Foxtrot

An odd menage a trois results when a woman and her lover are visited by her long-lost husband

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 19: When the Bough Breaks

19. When the Bough Breaks

When an injured baby arrives at the hospital, a social worker looks for the parents

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 20: Orkney

20. Orkney

A trilogy of plays--A Time to Keep, The Whaler's Return, and Celia--exploring the life of the islanders in the past and present

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 21: The Rank and File

21. The Rank and File

The story of the Pilkington glass workers strike of 1970

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 22: The Man in the Sidecar

22. The Man in the Sidecar

A succesful novelist Edith lives with her husband and his friend, but she decides to ask the friend to leave.

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 23: Everybody Say Cheese

23. Everybody Say Cheese

The story of a disintegrating marriage told through family photos

Still image for Play for Today season 1 episode 24: The Cellar and the Almond Tree

24. The Cellar and the Almond Tree

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