Week Ending

Week Ending

Genre	The Associates

Week Ending was a

.

The show's title was always announced as "Week Ending..." followed by the broadcast date, although the ellipsis was dropped from its billed title in Radio Times during the mid-seventies. The show was written and recorded shortly before the first broadcast (which was usually on a Friday evening) and satirised events of the week. Each show concluded with "And now here is Next Week's News", although this collection of one-liners was abandoned in the early nineties. Short gags were thereafter scattered throughout the show.

Relatively few editions survive in the BBC archives, and they are rarely repeated. There is an obvious issue of topicality, but this did not prevent annual Year Ending compilations or the re-recording of sketches for a 1989 cassette release.

Contributors and cast

Week Ending was considered a "training ground" for a large number of comedy writers, performers and producers. Many young BBC production recruits were given the programme for a month or so in order to get to grips with scripted comedy and working with performers, while the writers' meetings welcomed anyone who cared to wander in off the street. The programme also accepted material by post, fax and e-mail. This open door policy, which it shared with Radio 2's long-running

, made it a point of entry for writers who went on to successful careers in British radio and television.

Script contributors included

, Bob and Barbara Boulton, Nick R. Thomas, Chris Stratford and Dave Morley, Andrew Whelan, Mark Perkins, Gill Perkins and John Handley. Regular performers during the run included David Jason, Bill Wallis, Nigel Rees, David Tate, Jon Glover, Sheila Steafel, Alison Steadman, Tracey Ullman, Toby Longworth, Chris Emmett, Sarah Parkinson, Dave Lamb and Sally Grace.

For several months during 1997, Week Ending carried a musical number written by Gerard Foster and performed by Richie Webb. This broke a lengthy hiatus for musical content, which until 1982 had involved Bill McGuffie, David Firman and Steve Brown.

Amongst the producers were

. There were over 40 in all.

Broadcast

Until 1983, Week Ending was taken off the air during election campaigns. As sensitivities eased, it was allowed to remain on air during the 1987, 1992 and 1997 elections, albeit with rigid levels of political balance.

During the 1980s and 1990s, the BBC World Service broadcast a highlights programme once a month. This would include sketches from Week Ending episodes transmitted during the previous four weeks, more usually the items that could easily be understood by an international audience. This was broadcast by the World Service, usually on the last Friday of the month, under the title of "Two Cheers for [month] ". For many years, there was also an annual highlights show, akin to Year Ending, called "Two Cheers for 1982" (etc.).

From the early 1980s, the theme tune was a loop of the instrumental section of

", which replaced the original 'whistled' flute piece, "Smokey Joe". Over the years, the tune changed a number of times – totalling four pieces, the third debuting in 1993 and the fourth in 1997 – but the final edition in 1998 finished with the original (each of the others having been heard briefly in sketches set in earlier decades).

Tie-ins

Series writers Ian Brown and James Hendrie wrote a book based on the series in 1985, The Cabinet Leaks. Ten Years With Maggie, a cassette compilation of sketches written during Thatcher's tenure as Prime Minister, emerged in 1989 and was reissued on CD as Week Ending with Maggie in April 2009.

References

Further reading

• Prime Minister, You Wanted To See Me? – A History of Week Ending by Ian Greaves & Justin Lewis,
  ISBN 1900203294
  .

External links

• Week Ending at British Comedy Guide
• from "The Encyclopedia of Radio British Radio Comedy"