The Beiderbecke Trilogy

***The Beiderbecke Trilogy*** refers to three television serials written by Alan Plater and made by Yorkshire Television for the ITV network in the United Kingdom between 1984 and 1988. Each serial centres on schoolteachers Trevor Chaplin (James Bolam) and Jill Swinburne (Barbara Flynn) who work at a rundown comprehensive school in Leeds. Woodwork teacher Trevor enjoys football and jazz music while English teacher Jill is a political activist concerned with saving the environment.

In each of the three serials – The Beiderbecke Affair, The Beiderbecke Tapes and The Beiderbecke Connection – Jill and Trevor inadvertently become embroiled in a series of unlikely adventures involving such things as political corruption, nuclear waste dumping and serious fraud. In each serial, the plot rambles, moving from one seemingly unrelated event to another, all of which are eventually shown to be interconnected. However, it is the clever interplay between the characters that is the core of each these stories.

Each episode unfolds to a soundtrack of jazz music in the style of Bix Beiderbecke performed by Frank Ricotti with Kenny Baker as featured cornet soloist. Extensive use is made of leitmotifs for the various characters. Ricotti won a BAFTA award for his work on The Beiderbecke Connection.

> "Bix Beiderbecke. The first great white jazz musician. Cornet player. Born in Davenport, Iowa, March 1903. Drank himself to death. Died August 1931, aged 28. Amazing man. They say his playing sounded like bullets shot from a bell."
>
>

— Trevor Chaplin, The Beiderbecke Affair, episode 1: "What I don't understand is this..." by Alan Plater.

Jill is a keen conservationist, interested in the environment as well as social issues. Trevor on the other hand is interested in jazz, football and snooker and has little interest in conservation. Jill being the more headstrong of the pair, often coaxes Trevor into involvement in her political activities.

### Cast

* James Bolam as Trevor Chaplin
* Barbara Flynn as Jill Swinburne
* Terence Rigby as Big Al (The Beiderbecke Affair and The Beiderbecke Connection)
* Danny Schiller as Little Norm (The Beiderbecke Affair and The Beiderbecke Connection)
* Dudley Sutton as Mr Carter
* Dominic Jephcott as Hobson
* Keith Smith as Mr Wheeler

### The Beiderbecke Affair (1985)

Aired from January 6, 1985; six episodes

The central characters Plater created for ***The Beiderbecke Affair*** – Trevor Chaplin and Jill Swinburne – were virtually identical to that of Neville Keaton and Judy Threadgold from Get Lost!, a 1981 drama starring Alun Armstrong. Both were teachers of woodwork and English respectively and Trevor was a fan of football and jazz music (especially Bix Beiderbecke) and Jill was an environmental activist just like Neville and Judy. Since Neville's surname had been Keaton, Plater named his new male character Chaplin (after Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin respectively). Similarly, since Judy Threadgold had been named in homage to Sunderland A.F.C. goalkeeper Harry Threadgold so Jill Swinburne was named after Newcastle United F.C. goalkeeper Tom Swinburne. However, despite the on-paper similarities, inevitably, the two new lead performers brought their own acting styles to the central characters, making Trevor and Jill entirely memorable and original in their own right.

In coming up with a name for the serial, Plater decided that, since it would be Trevor's pursuit of a rare set of Bix Beiderbecke records that would kickstart the plot, he would use the title The Beiderbecke Affair. The individual episodes got their titles from the first line of the script of each episode e.g. "What I don't understand is this..." (episode 1), "We are on the brink of a new era, if only..." (episode 6).

### The Beiderbecke Tapes (1987)

Aired from December 13, 1987; two episodes

Shortly after the completion of The Beiderbecke Affair, David Cunliffe asked Plater to write a new serial with the same characters. At this point Plater decided to create a jazz-themed trilogy; The Beiderbecke Affair would be followed by The Gillespie Tapes and The Yardbird Suite, referencing Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker respectively. However, YTV felt that they wanted to stick with the Beiderbecke "brand" and so the first sequel was renamed ***The Beiderbecke Tapes***. Plater intended The Beiderbecke Tapes to be another six-part serial set in Yorkshire, the Netherlands and Athens. As well as Trevor and Jill, returning characters would include Big Al, Little Norm, Hobson (now an officer in British Intelligence), Mr Carter and the Headmaster. When financial problems at YTV delayed production, Plater reworked his scripts as a novel, also titled The Beiderbecke Tapes. YTV later decided that they would film the novel as a two-part serial, each episode of ninety minutes duration. To fit the shorter length, Big Al, Little Norm and Hobson were dropped from the script. Financial constraints meant that the action originally intended for Athens had to be relocated to Edinburgh, an event which became an in-joke when it was worked into the script as a planned trip to Greece being changed at the last minute for the trip to Scotland.

### The Beiderbecke Connection (1988)

Aired from November 27, 1988; four episodes

Plater began work on ***The Beiderbecke Connection***, the third part of the trilogy, in late 1987. At the conclusion of The Beiderbecke Tapes Jill had discovered that she was pregnant with Trevor's child. The new serial would pick up six to nine months after the birth of their child. The presence of the baby was a restricting factor on the plot; hence the introduction of the character of Yvonne, who would mind the child while Trevor and Jill went about their adventures. The plot this time called for Trevor and Jill to look after "Ivan", apparently a refugee, for Big Al and Little Norm. Plater originally intended that Trevor and Jill would have to keep Ivan hidden from his pursuers by means of different disguises and cover stories – for example, one scene called for him to pose as a school inspector – but this was dropped. A subplot concerned the challenges of teaching in the face of budget cuts that meant the necessary books and materials were not available. In this respect, Plater sought to ask the question, "If education is a universal right, if you are deprived of that by people in authority, how do you think you will resolve that?".

One major change to the production team was that David Cunliffe had by this stage moved on from YTV. He was replaced by Keith Richardson, best known as the producer of the thriller serial Harry's Game (1982). The Beiderbecke Connection was broadcast in four parts in November and December 1988 and averaged 8.8 million viewers over its run