Spatz
British children's television series (1990-1992)
Spatz is a children's comedy series that ran on Children's ITV during the 1990s, produced by Thames Television and created by Andrew Bethell. The programme originally ran from 21 February 1990 to 10 April 1992. The programme centred on a fast food restaurant situated in a fictional shopping centre in Cricklewood, London. It was operated by two Canadians, Karen Hansson (Jennifer Calvert), Spatz International's self-centered European Co-ordinator, and Thomas "TJ" Strickland (Paul Michael), the restaurant's kind-hearted manager. Vas Blackwood, Stephanie Charles, Jonathan Copestake, Sue Devaney, Joe Greco, Katy Murphy, Ling Tai and Samantha Womack appeared as Spatz restaurant employees. Guest stars included David Harewood, Rhys Ifans, Gary Lineker, Danny John-Jules and Nicholas Parsons.
01History
Spatz was devised by Andrew Bethell as a drama for teenagers set in a 1930s themed burger bar, so named because spats might have been worn there. Alan Horrox at Thames Television bought the concept and title and passed them to Grant Cathro and Lee Pressman, already established at Thames Television as the writers of T-Bag and creators of Mike and Angelo, to develop Spatz as a sitcom. While updating the setting to a standard fast food restaurant, the name Spatz was retained, with the writers noting that it suggested spats or disagreements.
Series 1 of Spatz was a co-production between Thames Television and Canada's YTV. From Series 2 onwards, Spatz was produced solely by Thames Television.
02Old Skool Weekend
On 6 January 2013, an episode of Spatz from 1992 ("Tango", the third episode of Series 3) was repeated on CITV as part of its 30th anniversary.
03Transmissions
| Series | Start date | End date | Episodes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 21 February 1990 | 16 May 1990 | 13 |
| 2 | 3 January 1991 | 4 April 1991 | 13 |
| 3 | 28 February 1992 | 10 April 1992 | 7 |
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Spatz”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- Spatzlogo2.jpg by Unknown author, Fair use
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