A series of outstanding and memorable programmes to mark 40 years of BBC TV

Dr Finlay's Casebook: A Right to Live
by Doreen Montgomery
Created by A.J. Cronin
with Andrew Cruickshank, Barbara Mullen and Bill Simpson

Andrew Cruickshank on his partnership with Dr Finlay:
Dr Finlay's Casebook presented a hefty British challenge to popular American medic Kildare and captivated viewers from 1962 to 1969. Andrew Cruickshank recalls: 'At the beginning the BBC were worried that, because of the accents and the Scottish background, Dr Finlay wouldn't have general appeal. But it caught on from the start. It was very vivid for me. Being a Scot, and having left Aberdeen at the same time that Cameron set up practice - 1928 - I identified with him very much.' An enormous amount of research went into the programme. One episode - which dealt with a case of epilepsy - was later used by the University of Melbourne to teach its students about the illness. 'I would have liked very much to play Cameron's end - to have had him catch pneumonia, perhaps, and slip off peacefully saying to Finlay "I'm away now". But it's just as well he lived - because the partnership's still going on radio.'

and at 9.50
Z Cars: Police Work
by John Hopkins
The Coroner's demand for a witness sends Jock and Fancy to a lonely cottage where they meet unexpected violence.

Stratford Johns remembers early days as Barlow:
Z Cars, the series which presented policemen as 'real' people - warts and all - stormed off to a controversial start in January, 1962, and survived the adverse criticism it attracted to father such spin-offs as Softly, Softly, Task Force, Barlow at Large, and Second Verdict. Stratford Johns recalls: 'I was playing a murderer in Maigret when I was approached to play Barlow in a new police series which had the provisional title of Crime Cars. I liked the script immediately - especially the idea of playing a copper as a realistic human being. But it wasn't until we got into the series that I made him an abrasive character. I was in a mood one day, and said my lines a bit grumpily. The producer asked what was wrong. "Barlow's had a row with his wife and he's got a hangover", I said.They liked the idea, and they made him bad-tempered after that. 'I don't think I ever really identified with him. He was an amalgam of a lot of coppers I'd met. Anyway, I haven't his expertise, his incisiveness.'