A long-running drama anthology series that ran on BBC1 from 1970 to 1984, which—as the title suggested—showed a different one-off teleplay each episode. The series featured some early works of famous directors such as Barry Hines and Mike Leigh, alongside some seminal stuff from less-cinematically-inclined writers such as Dennis Potter.
Tropes Present Throughout the Series
- Folk Horror: The episodes Penda's Fen and Robin Redbreast, notably.
- Men Are the Expendable Gender: Rob is Killed Offscreen at the end of Robin Redbreast.
- Ripped from the Headlines: "The Falklands Factor" was produced shortly after, and in response to, The Falklands War. It takes an indirect approach to the subject, dramatizing an earlier conflict over The Falkland Islands and drawing parallels to make its points about the more recent events.
- Spin-Off:
- Rumpole of the Bailey began as a one-off episode of this show.
- The episode "Headmaster" was spun off into a six-episode miniseries.
- The episode "Gangsters" was spun off into a TV series which ran for two seasons.
- A companion series called Play for Tomorrow, focusing on science fiction stories, ran for one season.
- Boys from the Blackstuff originated from the play The Black Stuff.
