Broaden Your Mind (Television Series)

**Broaden Your Mind: An Encyclopaedia of the Air** is a British television comedy series, broadcast on BBC2 and starring Tim Brooke-Taylor and Graeme Garden, joined by Bill Oddie for the second series. Guest cast members included Michael Palin, Terry Jones, Jo Kendall, Roland MacLeod and Nicholas McArdle. The series largely consisted of short skits.

All of the programmes were wiped by the BBC after their first broadcast in 1968, and only a handful of brief filmed sequences survive, including the Peelers sketch, Turgonitis, and "Ordinary Royal Family". These are all from the fifth episode of the second series, and were included, digitally restored, on Network DVD's 2003 release *The Goodies at Last*. All of the programmes, however, survive as off-air audio recordings made by a fan at the time of original transmission.

## Episodes

### Series One

* Episode 1 - October 28th, 1968
* Episode 2 - November 4th, 1968
* Episode 3 - November 11th, 1968
* Episode 4 - November 18th, 1968
* Episode 5 - November 25th, 1968
* Episode 6 - December 12th , 1968

### Series Two

* Episode 1 - November 17th, 1969
* Episode 2 - November 24, 1969
* Episode 3 - December 1st, 1969
* Episode 4 - December 8th, 1969
* Episode 5 - December 15th, 1969
* Episode 6 - December 22nd, 1969

## Trivia

* The series was a precursor to the television comedy series *The Goodies* (of which early titles under consideration included "*Narrow Your Mind*").
* It was one of BBC2's earliest programmes to be completely broadcast in colour, which had been introduced by the channel a year earlier.

* Filming on the programme ran from 29 July, but after a couple of weeks it was clear that more time would be needed to prepare the studio shows. As such, on 15 August, the six recordings were all set back by one week, allowing rehearsal time following the end of pre-filming on the first four shows which concluded on 13 August.
* In the first script, Graeme's "El Budgerigar", known as "Joke Opera", had recently appeared in Series 5 Programme 8 of "ISIRTA". The "Police Sketch" was contributed by John Law.
* Sequences which were filmed for the first show included the opening questions posed to the audience in the pre-credits which were voiced by Graeme and interspersed with animated question marks. The main filmed item on this debut edition was the police image film, on which shooting was performed on 29 and 30 July by Tim, Graeme and Nick.
* Music was provided by Dave Lee who had worked with Tim and Graeme extensively on "ISIRTA". The only item of commercial music was "There's No Business Like Show Business" played by Werner Miller and his Orchestra from a Decca LP; this was the music that the policemen danced away to at the end of the police film.
* The programme over-ran and one sketch was cut. This was a sketch about "SCIENCE" in which Graeme as Uncle Hugh discussed the invention of the steam engine with his young nephew, Timothy, played by Tim. This was re-enacted and appeared in a later show, but originally came after the police film. Of the finished programme, the "Magna Carta" sketch which introduces Teddy and Freddy (who are effectively the elderly characters Tim and Graeme play in the closing scenes of "The End") is probably the real gem, while the police film foreshadows the visual fun made at the constabularies expense which would re-surface in "The Goodies".
* The series debuted on BBC2 at 9.35pm on 28 October as a replacement for "The Morecambe and Wise Show".
* The broadcast was seen by 1.7 million people in the UK.