''Crackerjack'' is a British

children's television series Children's television series (or children's television shows) are television programs designed for children, normally scheduled for broadcast during the morning and afternoon when children are awake. They can sometimes run during the early evenin ...

that initially aired on the BBC Television Service between 14 September 1955 and 21 December 1984 (with no series in 1971). The series was a

variety show Variety show, also known as variety arts or variety entertainment, is entertainment made up of a variety of acts including musical theatre, musical performances, sketch comedy, magic (illusion), magic, acrobatics, juggling, and ventriloquism. It is ...

featuring comedy sketches, singers and quizzes, broadcast live with an audience. On 11 February 2019, it was announced that ''Crackerjack'' would return in 2020, 35 years after it was last aired. It is now hosted by

Sam & Mark Sam Nixon and Mark Rhodes, known collectively as Sam & Mark, or simply Smark, are an English popular music and Television presenter, television presenting Musical ensemble, duo. They previously competed on Pop Idol (series 2), the second serie ...

, with an exclamation mark added to its original title, and has aired on

CBBC CBBC (initialised as Children's BBC and also known as the CBBC Channel) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the bran ...

since 17 January 2020. The second revived ''Crackerjack!'' series was confirmed to start filming in October 2020. In 2022, ''Crackerjack!'' announced that the show had been cancelled. Its initial long run featured

Eamonn Andrews Eamonn Andrews, (19 December 1922 – 5 November 1987) was an Irish radio and television presenter, employed primarily in the United Kingdom from the 1950s to the 1980s. From 1960 to 1964 he chaired the Radio Éireann Authority (now the RTÉ A ...

Max Bygraves Walter William Bygraves (16 October 1922 – 31 August 2012), best known by the stage name Max Bygraves (adopted in honour of Max Miller), was an English comedian, singer, actor and variety performer. He appeared on his own television shows, s ...

Leslie Crowther Leslie Douglas Sargent Crowther, CBE (6 February 1933 – 29 September 1996) was an English comedian, actor, TV presenter, and game show host. Biography Crowther was born on Monday, 6 February, 1933 in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, son of ...

, Ed "Stewpot" Stewart, Joe Baker, Jack Douglas,

Stu Francis Stuart G. G. Francis (born 30 January 1948 in Bolton, Lancashire, England) is a British comedian with a camp style of delivery who achieved celebrity as lead presenter on the children's television programme '' Crackerjack'' (1980–1984). His pr ...

Peter Glaze William George Peter Glaze (17 September 1917 – 20 February 1983) was an English comedian born in London. He appeared in '' Crackerjack!'' with Eamonn Andrews and Leslie Crowther in the 1960s, and with Michael Aspel, Don Maclean and Bernie ...

Don Maclean Don Maclean (born 1942/1943) MBE KSS is an English actor and comedian, who appeared on the BBC television series '' Crackerjack'' with Michael Aspel, Peter Glaze and Jan Hunt in the 1970s. Born in Birmingham, he attended Clifton Road S ...

Michael Aspel Michael Terence Aspel (born 12 January 1933) is an English retired television newsreader and host of programmes such as '' Crackerjack'', ''Aspel & Company'', ''Give Us a Clue'', '' This is Your Life'', '' Strange but True?'' and ''Antiques Ro ...

, Christine Holmes, Jacqueline Clarke, Stuart Sherwin,

Little and Large ''Little and Large'' were a British comedy double act comprising straight man Syd Little (born Cyril John Mead; 19 December 1942) and comic Eddie Large (born Edward Hugh McGinnis; 25 June 1941 – 2 April 2020). Comedy duo They formed their p ...

Jan Hunt Jan Hunt (born 15 February 1938) is a British comedian, actress and music hall performer, who appeared on BBC television series '' Crackerjack'' with Michael Aspel, Ed Stewart, Peter Glaze and Don Maclean in the 1970s. She would often be seen pl ...

The Krankies The Krankies are a Scottish comedy duo who enjoyed success as a cabaret act in the 1970s and on television in the 1980s, featuring in their own television shows and making pop records. Since this period, they have also regularly appeared in pant ...

Basil Brush Basil Brush is a fictional red fox, best known for his appearances on daytime British children's television. He is primarily portrayed by a glove puppet, but has also been depicted in animated cartoon shorts and comic strips. The character has f ...

Geoffrey Durham Geoffrey Durham (born 22 July 1949) is a British comedy magician and actor who was known for many years as "the Great Soprendo". Early life Durham was born in East Molesey, Surrey, England. At the age of ten, he developed an interest in mag ...

Bernie Clifton Bernie Clifton (born Bernard M. Quinn, 30 April 1936) is a British comedian and entertainer, known for his work with his orange ostrich puppet costume Oswald the Ostrich. Early life Clifton was born on 30 April 1936 in St Helens, Lancashire, wh ...

, Rod McLennan and

Ronnie Corbett Ronald Balfour Corbett (4 December 1930 – 31 March 2016) was a Scottish actor, broadcaster, comedian and writer. He had a long association with Ronnie Barker in the BBC television comedy sketch show ''The Two Ronnies''. He achieved promine ...

, amongst many others. Performers who appeared as singers/dancers, assisting the host with games, included

Sally Ann Triplett Sally Ann Triplett (born 15 April 1962, London, England) is a British singer and actress. She participated in two editions of the Eurovision Song Contest and West End productions. Career Triplett first represented the United Kingdom in the Eu ...

(Series 26; as a member of the duo

Bardo In some schools of Buddhism, ''bardo'' ( xct, བར་དོ་ Wylie: ''bar do'') or ''antarābhava'' (Sanskrit, Chinese and Japanese: 中有, romanized in Chinese as ''zhōng yǒu'' and in Japanese as ''chū'u'') is an intermediate, transitio ...

, Sally Ann represented the

United Kingdom in the Eurovision Song Contest 1982 The United Kingdom was represented in the Eurovision Song Contest 1982 by Bardo with the song "One Step Further". It was chosen as the British entry through the ''A Song for Europe'' national selection process and placed seventh at Eurovision, r ...

), Leigh Miles (Series 26–27; Leigh was also a popular Hill's Angel in ''

The Benny Hill Show ''The Benny Hill Show'' is a British comedy television show starring Benny Hill that aired on the BBC and ITV (from 1969) between 15 January 1955 and 1 May 1989. The show consisted mainly of sketches that were full of slapstick, mime, parody ...

''), Julie Dorne-Brown (Series 27–28; later MTV VJ "Downtown" Julie Brown), Sara Hollamby (Series 28–29; now a television news and travel reporter),

Ling Tai Ling Tai is a Chinese actress, remembered for being a presenter on the final year of children's programme '' Crackerjack!'' as well as playing Lily in the first series of children's comedy '' Spatz''. Early life In 1960, she was found abandon ...

(Series 29), Jillian Comber and Pip Hinton.

Format

The shows were frantic, being broadcast live in front of an audience largely of children, originally at the King's Theatre on Hammersmith Road, London, used by the BBC as the King's Studio for live and recorded broadcasts until 1963, then at the

BBC Television Theatre Shepherd's Bush Empire (currently known as O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire for sponsorship reasons, and formerly known as the BBC Television Theatre) is a music venue in Shepherd's Bush, West London, run by the Academy Music Group. It was originally ...

(now the

Shepherd's Bush Empire Shepherd's Bush Empire (currently known as O2 Shepherd's Bush Empire for sponsorship reasons, and formerly known as the BBC Television Theatre) is a music venue in Shepherd's Bush, West London, run by the Academy Music Group. It was originally ...

). The format of the programme included competitive games for teams of children, a music spot, a comedy double act, and a finale in which the cast performs a short comic play, adapting popular songs of the day and incorporating them into the action. One of the games was a quiz called Double or Drop, where each of three contestants was given a prize to hold for each question answered correctly, but given a cabbage if incorrect. They were out of the game if they dropped any of the items awarded or received a third cabbage. While the winner took his or her pick from a basket of toys, every runner-up won a much-envied marbled propelling pencil as a prize, which became so popular that in 1961

Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. She was queen ...

, who visited the programme, was presented with ''Crackerjack'' pencils for her children Prince Charles and Princess Anne. During the early 1970s, high-profile pop guests included

The Sweet The Sweet (often shortened to just Sweet), are a British glam rock band that rose to prominence in the 1970s. Their best known line-up consisted of lead vocalist Brian Connolly, bass player Steve Priest, guitarist Andy Scott, and drummer Mic ...

Mud A MUD (; originally multi-user dungeon, with later variants multi-user dimension and multi-user domain) is a Multiplayer video game, multiplayer Time-keeping systems in games#Real-time, real-time virtual world, usually Text-based game, text-bas ...

Gary Glitter Paul Francis Gadd (born 8 May 1944), best known by his stage name Gary Glitter, is an English former singer, songwriter, and record producer. He achieved success during the glam rock era of the 1970s and 1980s, and his career ended after he w ...

and, on more than one occasion,

Slade Slade are an English rock band formed in Wolverhampton in 1966. They rose to prominence during the glam rock era in the early 1970s, achieving 17 consecutive top 20 hits and six number ones on the UK Singles Chart. The ''British Hit Singles ...

. In 1982, in a bid to boost flagging ratings, ''Crackerjack'' introduced gunge into its games and launched a new game called Take a Chance in which the celebrity guests – one female, one male – could score extra points for the contestant they teamed up with by competing against

in a quickfire question tie. A wrong answer or the opponent answering first would lead to Francis or the celebrity guest being covered in gunge. The gunge was always given a name relating to a random theme or to the celebrity guest (Howling Wind for Ian McCaskill, for example) and usually the ladies escaped clean!

Transmissions

Original

Only 148 out of 451 episodes from the original 29 series of the show survive in the BBC archives. The earliest episode known to exist is Episode 12 of series 3 with Eamonn Andrews; of his tenure, Episode 16 of Series 6, Episode 2 of Series 7, Episode 3 of Series 8 and Episodes 1 and 17 of Series 9 also survive. None of the Leslie Crowther episodes are known to exist, and two episodes only (Episodes 12–13 of Series 18) of the Michael Aspel period survive. However, all of the Ed Stewart (Series 19–24) and Stu Francis (Series 25–29) periods remain.

Revival

References

External links

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''Crackerjack''
at BFI * {{DEFAULTSORT:Crackerjack (Tv Series) 1955 British television series debuts 2021 British television series endings 1950s British children's television series 1960s British children's television series 1970s British children's television series 1980s British children's television series 2020s British children's television series CBBC shows BBC children's television shows British television series revived after cancellation English-language television shows Lost BBC episodes Television series by BBC Studios Television series featuring gunge