TV Cream

TV: E is for...

Educating Marmalade

Future telly drama overlord ANDREW DAVIES was responsible for unleashing The Worst Girl in the World on an unsuspecting public. Played with perfect bubblegum-popping malevolence by CHARLOTTE COLEMAN, she made her screen debut in , an edition of Thames Television’s children’s play miscellany THEATRE BOX involving a dormobile space shuttle, moustachioed male nuns, a nodding dog and the secret of the universe.

EDUCATING MARMALADE followed in short order, a sitcom that detailed the desperate efforts of her parents (played by JOHN BIRD and LINDA’ LA PLANTE’ MARCHAL/CAROL MACREADY) and education officer Wendy Wooley (ELIZABETH ESTENSEN, who developed an increasingly elaborate nervous tick as the series progressed) to find an educational establishment that could control her. each episode revolving around “hapless” local education authority personages trying to tame her – in one instance dispatching her to the latest establishment inside a nailed-up crate. Marmalade being Marmalade, all such plans were doomed to failure – in her own words, she put herself about, driving everybody potty. Regular parodies of other existing TV shows (always a good sign) featured, eg. “Cringe Hill” and “The Kids From Shame”.

There was a sort of mini-punk sensibility to Marmalade’s disinterested brand of mayhem, reinforced by a Bad Manners theme tune. In the second series, DANGER:MARMALADE AT WORK (in which various avenues of employment failed to contain the mop-haired wastrel) Coleman herself belted out a Sid Vicious-style opener (‘Jobs! I’ve had a few/and most of them/were pretty grotty-ah!’) But she’s still firmly in the catapult-twanging tradition of Minnie the Minx et al. ‘Marmalade Atkins, you are EXPELLED!’

6 Comments

6 Comments

  1. paulus (Bangkok)

    July 14, 2010 at 1:43 pm

    all that girl needed was a good spanking… probably still does.
    Feel free to contact me

  2. Jesus H. Christ

    July 14, 2010 at 5:30 pm

    There’s no spanking in heaven.

  3. paulus - bangkok

    July 15, 2010 at 5:28 am

    Oh dear… how unfortunate. I didnt realise it was her all grown up (although a bit midgetty) in 4 wegdings and a funeral.

  4. Cindylover1969

    July 15, 2010 at 7:44 am

    We know how YOU reacted to “Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit.” Remember, if you don’t stop it you’ll go blind.

  5. Cindylover1969

    July 15, 2010 at 7:46 am

    On a sadder note, it’s depressing to realise both she and her co-star in “Freddie and Max” (Anne Bancroft, in her only TV series – what with that and the Wogan thing, her television career in the UK can’t have been highly thought of by her) are no longer with us.

  6. Richardpd

    January 30, 2022 at 10:19 pm

    I was a bit too young to appreciate this, but I remember her doing daft things like jumping on a bed while playing the guitar.

    I believe she got in trouble for using the word schmuck in a link for Watch It! which a few parents misheard!

    The books could get quite surreal, with Marmalade having a talking donkey as a pet, something beyond Thames’s budget to bring to the small screen!

    Charlotte Coleman seemed to have a few unfortunate things happen to her, such as losing her boyfriend in the late 1980s in a cycling accident which affected her for a few years afterward.

Leave a Reply

Cancel reply

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

To Top