Hazell

Writing this in late 2020...and now in my late 50s...I had very little recall of this show. The particular episode on now features some very poor American accents, some wooden acting, and low budget sets and filming. And for all that, it's still better than the virtue signalling woke clap trap produced today. Would have been better for the Euston films treatment...The Sweeney has aged much better IMHO. I can't believe Nick Ball was considered too young, that's a passage of time thing, he'd have been about 30 at time of filming, which these days would seem about right. Terry 'El Tel' Venables co-wrote this. The corny bits I assume, after all El Tel, when in his 20s, a pro footballer at the time, at the height of Beatlemania made a version of Waddaya Wanna Make Those Eyes at me For'.

Hazell, a gem of a show on ITV, flew under the radar but boasted stellar performances, particularly from Nicholas Ball as the confident yet vulnerable private detective James Hazell.

Roddy McMillan added complexity as Choc Minty (eh fly boy), a Scottish detective who made Hazell's life difficult. Featuring familiar faces like Derrick O'Connor and Michael Elphick, and written by Trevor Preston, Leon Griffiths, and Tony Hoare, Hazell embraced a slower pace, allowing its stories to unfold without patronising its audience.

The show is also a chance to see the London of the 70s, part glamour, part seedy, part post apocalypse.

While the series is of its time (especially in regard to race) it does its best to portray things with nuance. Remember folks, the past is a foreign place, they do things differently there.

I would recommend anyone, young or old to give this show a go.

I loved this show. I was 18 and thought Nick Ball was the dream man. That Pam left him for the Big Yin!! (Who I thought was really funny but not a bit, well, sexy! Really unnerved me.)

I don't think the show needs a remake(other great and more modern ideas need a public airing) However, I have to say - if it were to be re-made please spare TV fans from the prospect of ex-east-ender's actors hamming it up as Hazell!

I have never really understood the need to re-film really great pieces of TV history. Very few even touch the originality or charm of the first take.

You will notice Season 1 has ten episodes while Season 2 has twelve.

This is because at the time that Season 1 was being broadcast the actor John Bindon, who was playing a gangster in the episode "Hazell and the Public Enemy", was up at the Old Bailey on trial for the murder of Johnny Darke in a pub in Putney (improbably named Ranelagh Yacht Club).

At the request of Bindons defence team, who felt that a jury might confuse the character with Bindon in real life, Thames Television 'pulled' the episode from the schedule.

During the trial fellow actor Bob Hoskins was one of those who appeared as a character witness for Bindon.

By the time Season 2 of Hazell was broadcast, Bindon had been acquitted of the murder, so Thames just tagged the episode "Hazell and the Public Enemy" on to the end of Season 2.

In an era of reality TV and Netflix it's probably strange that I can be bothered to write a review? The show was created a long time ago but it's utterly brilliant. Kids would scoff at the fashions and everything else but this show portrays London and all its filthy dead end locations and weaves it into a fascinating PI detective show. Nicholas Ball was wonderful and it's a shame he didn't get a massive break from this. Raw, gritty and a little bit strange at times it represents London in the 70s In all of its glory with fascinating characters and story lines. Watch for nostalgia but definitely watch.