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Diane's Panda Party [28/09/72]

28 Sep 1972
11m

Puppet pandas Bubble and Squeak help Princess Diane Mewse introduce Roger Stevenson's marionette songs.

Puppeteer Roger Stevenson was not a household name, but his puppet performances were a feature of television for three decades. He helped Ken Dodd bring his mythical Diddy Men to the screen, resulting in their own BBC series starting in 1969. At the same time a deal with ITV broadcaster Yorkshire Television led to the series Diane's Magic Book and Diane's Magic Theatre airing between 1968 and 1970. Both centred around young Diane Mewse and the glove puppet rabbits Bubble and Squeak, who introduce a variety of marionette acts.

Diane's Panda Party used the same formula, but ditched the theatre for a woodland backdrop, putting Diane into a pantomime princess outfit and transforming Bubble and Squeak into pandas. It was the perfect recipe for children's television: cheap and easy to produce with a simple, inoffensive appeal.

Roger's puppets kept the party going through the decades, featuring in Play it Again, Stewpot (1974) - with disc jockey Ed Stewart replacing Diane, Bubble and Squeak. They were still riding on Dooby Duck's Disco Bus in 1989.

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Kid's TV

Our relationship with the small screen starts early in life, opening our square eyes to a heady mix of drama and comedy; fantasy and fact.

Dedicated children’s programming has been part of the television mix from its earliest years, growing from short intervals “For The Children” after WWII, to a plethora of standalone channels today. The start of the BBC’s long-running “Watch With Mother” series in 1953 set much of the template for pre-school television, blending puppets, song and animation, with the implicit expectation that mum - assumed to be a housewife - would supervise. Catering for older children, meanwhile, sought to balance the kinds of programmes children want to watch with those their parents want them to see. Eventually a fuller menu of drama, comedy, factual and magazine programmes for children - in other words, versions of 'grown-up' programmes for 'small people' - came to fill the schedules of weekday afternoons and Saturday mornings. Sadly, the segregation of children’s television to its own satellite, cable and digital channels has made its much less likely for adults to experience the frequent delights of kids’ TV. But our collection welcomes all ages! (Though please note that some programmes maybe flagged as unsuitable for young children.)

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