TV Cream

TV: T is for...

Terry and June

Is it my turn to be a punk rocker or your turn to buy a new video recorder?Parasol not picturedSTURDY EIGHT o’clock suburbacom, with the rock solid SCOTT-WHITFIELD conglomerate in a sequel of sorts to HAPPY EVER AFTER with the Fletchers becoming the Medfords, upping sticks to Purley and moving in next to uppity neighbours Tarquin, Malcolm and Beattie, with blustery boss Sir Dennis Hodge (REGINALD MARSH, of course) completing the set. Too many memorable moments to mention, but we’ll do it anyway: the one where they had a barbecue – Terry’s food was awful, and the closing shot was three beefburgers going round on a record player, for some reason; the one where they go to France, and get assailed on the ferry by a kid acting badly, because he’d written in to JIM’LL FIX IT to be in Terry & June; the one where June became a punk (in 1985) – loads of Frankie Goes To Cricklewood “jokes”; the one where Terry has to buy a satellite dish so that a Middle East client he was entertaining could watch his favourite TV show (which turned out to be…Dallas); the one involving giant It’s A Knockout costumes – inevitably Terry got trapped in a giant rabbit’s outfit. Oh, and the one in which Terry fell in a river/lake/canal/giant pond, which was the one on every week.

14 Comments

14 Comments

  1. Pingback: Resorting To Threats Of Violence Is A Fascist Reaction « Ten Percent

  2. Great Bustard

    August 14, 2010 at 7:15 pm

    Remember when Smith and Jones parodied this as Achmed and June? Mel Smith’s Terry Scott impersonation was stupendous.

  3. Tellycabbage

    March 3, 2011 at 11:58 am

    Yes and it was that one with the beefburgers on the record player yesterday on ITV3!

    Plus may I say “MEDFORD!” as well, thank you…

  4. Lee James Turnock

    July 3, 2014 at 6:37 pm

    Not forgetting Terry entering the living room wearing a Hawaiian shirt and a panama hat and bumping his head on the lampshade.

  5. Glenn Aylett

    July 28, 2014 at 11:02 pm

    Not forgetting the one where they go on local radio and demolish the studio, or something similar, and the one where Terry stands for parliament as a blue candidate( I don’t know why they just didn’t say he was a Tory FFS). Occasionally brilliant as with the election one and the radio studio, but too often lacking in laughs, overly middle class and safe to some viewers and about four series too long. Still no one can fault the theme tune.

  6. THX 1139

    January 1, 2019 at 10:54 am

    Watching the tribute to June Whitfield yesterday, and I laughed at T&J more than I thought I would, they had such great comic timing with one another. But what instrument is the theme tune played on, the main melody? I can’t work it out.

  7. Richardpd

    September 27, 2021 at 10:56 pm

    Often getting a drubbing from the Alternative crowd for being too safe, middle aged & middle class, but normally an undemanding way to spend 30 minutes.

    Often remembered for Terry driving an Austin Princess, but later on he owned a Ford Sierra, especially the episode where he had to go to a dinner party wearing a false beard & forgot to turn the lights on driving home.

  8. Glenn Aylett

    September 28, 2021 at 7:28 pm

    @ Richard PD, technically this was called a Leyland Princess as Princess was a standalone brand, but never mind, we all remember this wedge shaped car from the seventies that was supposed to appeal to middle management types like Terry Medford. I’m surprised his ineptness didn’t earn him a demotion to a pale blue Austin Allegro.

  9. Richardpd

    September 28, 2021 at 10:41 pm

    BL did some odd marketeering with the “Wedge”, launching it under the Austin, Morris & Woslesley brands as the 1800 / 2200, then relaunching it a few months later as the Princess.

    It was one of those cars that suited a character, like Alan Partridge & his Rover Vitesse Fastback.

    I did wonder how June put up with some of Terry’s dafter moments, same with Betty over Frank Spencer.

  10. Richardpd

    September 21, 2023 at 10:09 pm

    I was quite amused to notice the theme tune being used on an episode of Young Sheldon of all things!

    Being a stock track it’s been used elsewhere, such as on Come Down With Me a few times.

  11. Richardpd

    December 8, 2023 at 2:47 pm

    Oddly this was a reimagining of mid-late 1970s sitcom Happily After After, which had Terry & June with an additional two grown up daughters & an Aunt with a Mynah bird.

    I’ve only ever seen the pilot when BBC2 had a season pilot repeats in the mid 1990s.

    Apparently the head writer thought the show had run it’s course & took the copyright with him, but the BBC simply removed the additional family members, changed their surname from Fletcher to Medford, & moved them from Croydon to Purley.

    It somehow lost an episode about Terry getting a home computer, along with a 10th series & a even a proposed film.

  12. Glenn Aylett

    December 8, 2023 at 3:32 pm

    Terry and June had its critics, but at times only Eastenders and Coronation St could beat it in the ratings, so it must have done something right and lasted eight series. Rather like Sorry of the same era, Terry and June could be classed as safe middle England comedy that had a huge following in the eighties.

  13. Adrian

    December 8, 2023 at 3:46 pm

    One bizarre episode I recall involved Terry travelling in the back of a removal lorry, and then being thrown around with the furniture when it negotiated tight curves & hump backed bridges on a country lane..

    • Richardpd

      December 8, 2023 at 10:25 pm

      That sounds similar to what happened to Frank Spencer, ending up with him landing in a barrel of tar!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

To Top