Mel Leach, Executive Producer for Twofour added, “Swimming the Channel is a monumental feat for even the very best swimmers, let alone those who can’t even swim a length. Our brave celebrities will have to overcome their fears and embark on a huge mental and physical transformation to complete this epic challenge.” In a nutshell, Sink or Swim has no real plot to speak of at all. It is, like Seinfeld would become years later, a show about nothing. It threatens to pursue a plot at various stages throughout all three series; the search for their estranged mother in series one, Steve dating the daughter of a work colleague in series two (a pre- EastEnders Gillian Taylforth playing TV legend Ron Pember’s daughter) and Brian’s pursuit of knowledge at university in series three, but on the whole this is a series which gets by on the charm of its three leads and Shearer’s gently comic writing. And the key players really are charming, with a good mix of chemistry that is a delight to watch on screen.

Like Only Fools and Horses, Sink or Swim was filmed in Bristol doubling for London. Shearer later wrote the Nicholas Lyndhurst sitcom The Two of Us for LWT. Production of the sitcom overlapped the first two years of Davison also starring as the Fifth Doctor in Doctor Who, which imposed constraints on the recording schedules. [1] Cast [ edit ] Rounding out the main cast is Sara Corper as Sonia. Like Glenister, this was Corper’s first major TV role, having previously appeared in an episode of The Jim Davidson Show, penned by Alex Shearer. For me, Corper is often the highlight of each episode and gains some of the biggest laughs. Perhaps this is because the many preoccupations of Sonia are still deeply relevant in today’s world of achingly right-on ‘vegan bores’. Again, this could have easily been a very one-note character, a ‘let’s all laugh at the mad veggie feminist’ trope, but Corper, like Glenister, finds the key to her likeability. She’s just an incredibly enthusiastic and well-meaning person, and the fervour with which she approaches her many causes (which she sometimes doesn’t fully understand) are therefore wholly sympathetic. In a nutshell, Sink or Swim is, like Seinfeld would become years later, a show about nothing. It threatens to pursue a plot at various stages throughout all three series… but on the whole this is a series which gets by on the charm of its three leads and Alex Shearer’s gently comic writing. And the key players really are charming, with a good mix of chemistry that is a delight to watch on screen.” But doesn’t this development mean 10 will have to do the swimming of 11? If it is not too late, they should bring in a ringer, ideally the heroic teacher Sadie Davies, who just swam 15 miles from the Hartland Point in north Devon to Lundy, to raise money for the environmental charity Surfers Against Sewage. But that probably wouldn’t be fair.The brothers buy a leaky and decidedly un-canal-worthy narrowboat and struggle to make it habitable.

Sink or Swim (4 x 60’) attempts to erase the stigma of being a non-swimmer and follows the progress of our cast some complete non-swimmers, some who just need to polish up their skills as well as those with a fear of open water or those who have been taught to swim as children but now struggle to do so for health reasons – as they are pushed to their absolute limits. No, I’m not talking about Only Fools and Horses. That series arrived on the BBC in September 1981. Instead, I’m talking about a sitcom that beat John Sullivan’s much-loved classic by almost a year, running for three series between 1980 and 1982. I’m talking about Sink or Swim, written by Alex Shearer of The Two of Us fame (which ironically starred Only Fools‘ Nicholas Lyndhust) and starring a pre- Doctor Who Peter Davison and, in his television debut, Robert Glenister, as the brothers Brian and Steve and Sara Corper as Brian’s girlfriend, Sonia. All three series of Sink or Swim were released as one DVD set by Network in 2016.The show also boasts a theme tune from sitcom veteran Ronnie Hazlehurst, the man behind the iconic opening tunes to the likes of Last Of The Summer Wine, Yes Minister and Sorry!. For Sink Or Swim, he opted not to compose an original tune, but instead arranged an instrumental version of The Hollies' 1969 hit He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother. Holding The Fort and Sink Or Swim both started in 1980, and for the last two series of the latter he was filming concurrently with his opening series of Doctor Who. Sink or Swim airs on Tuesday nights at 9:15PM on Channel 4, straight after the new series of The Great British Bake Off. They’re joined by The Last Leg’s Alex Brooker, TOWIE stars James ‘Arg’ Argent and Georgia Kousoulou, Blue singer Simon Webbe, Love Island’s Wes Nelson and Hollyoaks actress Rachel Adedeji. Like Only Fools and Horses, Sink or Swim was filmed in Bristol doubling for London. Shearer later wrote the Nicholas Lyndhurst sitcom The Two of Us for LWT. Production of the sitcom overlapped the first two years of Davison also starring as the Fifth Doctor in Doctor Who, which imposed constraints on the recording schedules. [1]

Brian lives in a flat above a petrol station in London (in the last series he moved to Newcastle to attend university). He's trying hard to make his way in the world, thus far with limited success. His girlfriend, Sonia, is a very serious minded young woman who is passionate only about things like vegetarianism and ecology. When Brian's younger brother, Steve, arrives in London looking for somewhere to stay, his lazy, cynical, noisy "Northern lout" attitude disrupts Brian's already messy life.

With one in five British adults being unable to swim and one in three children leaving school without being able to swim, Channel 4 and Twofour, part of ITV Studios, today reveal the line-up for the new large-scale celebrity series, Sink or Swim (w/t) in support of Stand Up To Cancer (SU2C). Meanwhile, the experts helping them out include Olympic silver medallist Keri-anne Payne and adventurer Ross Edgley (best known for being the first person in history to swim around Great Britain), with support from Paralympic champion Ellie Simmonds. Sink or Swim air date Sara Corper rounded out the cast as Brian's headstrong, vegan girlfriend Sonia, with whom Steve frequently clashed. Corper previously appeared in an episode of The Jim Davidson Show penned by Shearer, and he gets good mileage out of the comic contrast between her outspoken worldview and Brian's meek meanderings. Though other actors did appear, including Amanda Orton, Briony McRoberts, Gillian Taylforth, Ron Pember and Russell Wooton, the show rested on the shoulders of Davison and Glenister. Wes added of the ultimate challenge: “It’s not the distance I’m worried about, being out in the open sea, fingers crossed it will all be okay.”

When Brian’s younger brother Steve (Robert Glenister) arrives in London looking for somewhere to stay, his lazy, cynical, noisy “Northern lout” attitude disrupts Brian’s already messy life. As a Northerner myself, I especially liked her belief that Brian and Steve’s father must be a miner as, in her mind, all Northern men work down the pit. When Brian corrects her, she comes to question whether he really is Northern after all! The character of Sonia also gets the prize that many a sitcom desires in an effort to establish the show in the public’s mind; the catchphrase. Seemingly every other earnest diatribe or long-winded monologue she delivers in an attempt to educate either Brian or Steve ends with “You know?”, delivered in an inimitable manner by Corper. Costume-wise, she’s often kitted out in dungarees, which was of course the shorthand for militant women at the time. A vintage BBC sitcom about two brothers. The older brother is ambitious, eager to grasp what the world has to offer. The younger brother is scruffy and hopeless, forever tempering the enthusiasm of his older sibling and raining on the parade of his aspirations. The setting is London at the dawn of the ’80s – Thatcher’s Britain – though in reality location filming in Bristol stands in for the capital. The producer/director is Gareth Gwenlan.In the lead role, Peter Davison is at his well-meaning, slightly wet best as Brain Webber, a bespectacled prototype of the ’80s ‘New Man’ who is mostly wholly enamoured by the beliefs of his girlfriend Sonia, but whose more pragmatic Northern roots occasionally rise to the surface thanks, in the main, to Steve’s influence. In Steve, Robert Glenister delivers a fine comic performance which ought to be congratulated far more, given that this was his first TV role. Before starring as the fifth incarnation of television's favourite Time Lord, Peter Davison was a character actor. He got his big break in 1978 when he was cast as Tristan Farnon in drama All Creatures Great and Small Alongside Christopher Timothy and Robert Hardy, and his first foray into sitcom was Marks & Gran's Holding The Fort in 1980, alongside Patricia Hodge and Matthew Kelly; a sitcom that has, inexplicably, never been made available on home media. In many ways, Sink Or Swim was a victim of circumstance. In 1981, the year after the show premiered, Only Fools And Horses launched on the BBC. Although it took time to build the huge audience figures it would go on to receive, the similarity in concept - two brothers sharing a flat in London - meant that Sink Or Swim fell by the wayside as Only Fools And Horses's popularity grew. Gareth Gwenlan, the producer of Sink Or Swim, went on to produce Only Fools And Horses in 1988, and further mixing the two worlds, Nicholas Lyndhurst starred in Alex Shearer's next sitcom, The Two Of Us. Like many BBC sitcoms from this golden era, Sink or Swim is blessed with a theme tune and score by the illustrious composer, Ronnie Hazlehurst– the man behind the themes for Are You Being Served? Last of the Summer Wine, Just Good Friends, Some Mothers Do ‘Ave ‘Em, Yes Minister, Sorry! and, yes, even the first series of Only Fools and Horses. Like his memorable theme tune for Carla Lane’s Butterflies (an arrangement of the Dolly Parton 1974 hit, Love is Like a Butterfly) Sink or Swim was not an original composition. Instead, for this show about the fractious, chalk and cheese relationship of siblings, Hazlehurst was asked to arrange an instrumental version of He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother –a 1969 hit for The Hollies. Brian Webber (Peter Davison) lives in a grotty bedsit at the least-fashionable end of Portobello Road and is trying hard to make his way in the world – so far with limited success.