It was, therefore, a bit of an inbetween time by way of fashion for what was popular on tv and what would be so. Into this almost empty space stepped a new British series, rooted in the private eye world of the past, but paving the way for more successful series owing much to it to come in the future. That series was Shoestring.

Shoestring was initially conceived by two veteran writers of British episodic drama, Robert Banks Stewart and Richard Harris. Both had started in television around the same time as writers, and while Harris remained firmly on that side of production, Banks Stewart ventured into production with credits as a producer from as early as 1966 on series such as Intrigue and Riptide.

Harris started his writing career on the Ian Hendry series Police Surgeon in 1960, graduated to The Avengers when Hendry's character was moved by ABC boss Sydney Newman over to the new show and from there carried on writing for lots of genre shows including Ghost Squad, The Saint, Sergeant Cork, Redcap and The Edgar Wallace Mysteries. In 1966 he helped create the BBC's rival to The Avengers, Adam Adamant Lives, and continued on writing for many other shows both as writer and as creator; other creations over his long career include Man In A Suitcase with Richard Bradford and the successful tv adaptations of his own stage play, Outside Edge, both in 1982 and the later more successful remake and series in 1994. Other writing credits before Shoestring were episodes of Spyder's Web, Dial M For Murder, The Sweeney, Target and just before developing the show, Hazell.

Banks Stewart started a year before Harris, but they soon came to each other's attention because they worked on many of the same shows, such as The Avengers and Edgar Wallace Mysteries, his first work though was in 1959 on Knight Errant Limited for Granada. He went on to write for Adam Adamant as well as other series such as Public Eye, Callan, Special Branch, Jason King, Sutherland's Law, Doctor Who and Charles Endell, Esquire. It was while working on this series that he and Harris got together to create Shoestring for the BBC. This initially came out of the offer to re-launch Target starring Patrick Mower with a new format and different star. However, the Head of Drama, Graeme McDonald decided that as successful as Target had been, this wasn't such a good idea after all. He asked Banks Stewart for an alternative, and the private detective was born.

It was not without problems. Although Harris worked with Banks Stewart to create and is credited as such, his first episode diverged wildly from the format McDonald had agreed to and he refused to accept it. Banks Stewart as producer took the script back to his colleague, assuming he would rewrite it, but Harris refused to do so; he had his ideas of what Shoestring should be and was not about to change them. Banks Stewart has also been quoted as saying that Harris was also tired at this point after coaxing Hazell into a coherant shape for transmission (created as it was by the partnership of sports writer Gordon Williams and manager Terry Venables). With less than a week before, as producer, he needed to be able to brief other writers to write further episodes, Banks Stewart sat down to produce an alternative season opener.

The setup

Eddie Shoestring, unlike a lot of the American private eyes, actually had both a personality and a character background that both emerged over the course of the series, and was also referenced within it. That's not to say that the others didn't, but you never really found out that much about them after the first episode. With Eddie it was written in from the start along with many of his traits by Banks Stewart, but things kept emerging - though one original aspect thankfully dropped was for Eddie to have been Jewish! He had originally been a computer operator, but had suffered a nervous breakdown and had reprogrammed one with an axe! He had recovered through extensive counselling and was now rehabilitated back into society, though his acquired habit through therapy of doodling could be both a help and a hindrance. Having lost his job of course, he had to make ends meet and had turned his hand to being a private investigator. It was during the course of his investigations that he fell foul of the law, although it would seem as more of an hampering of official investigations than actually breaking the law. However, it was always possible for the local force to keep tabs on Eddie, as his long-suffering landlady Erica Bayliss worked in the local police as their staff barrister. They probably felt that she would be as good as anyone at keeping a watchful eye on him for the law, although often it seems she was more use to Eddie at providing information than for any mindful eye she might keep on him.Although it was never really stated, it seemed that Eddie and Erica were much more than just tenant and landlady, as various events shared between them during the course of Eddie's cases would show.

The series was based in and around the Bristol area of England, and we first meet Eddie when he is called to investigate the mysterious death of a young girl found beside a white Rolls Royce belonging to a star disc jockey at the local radio station, Radio West. As a result of that case, the station boss Don Satchley approaches Eddie to become a retained employee, doing a weekly radio programme as Radio West's 'Private Ear', helping the listening audience with their problems and cases. A confidential phone-in service to leave messages for Eddie is set up, and he would receive his new batch of calls every week from the station's receptionist Sonia. It was from here that most of Eddie's cases would come, although a fair few would come from other sources.

Key Radio West personnel

Before he came to play the lead in Shoestring, Trevor Eve's background had been in the theatre. Born on 1st July 1951, he trained initially for a career in architecture, but after a short time realised it was not for him and plumped for acting as an alternative. He got into RADA and one of the early jobs he got was as Paul McCartney in the play John, Paul, George, Ringo and Bert which went into the West End. He had little previous television experience prior to playing Eddie, but came to the notice of producer Robert Banks Stewart through his portrayal of Jonathan Harker in the 1979 film of Dracula and was offered the part. Eve would go on to land many other roles on both stage and screen after Shoestring ended; more of his later work in the concluding part of this article.

The veteran in the group of regulars was the station executive Don Satchley, played by Michael Medwin. Medwin, born 18th July 1923, had his first big screen appearance, though uncredited, in Piccadilly Incident in 1946. His first TV appearance was in 1957 in Dick and the Duchess, the same year that he found fame amongst tv audiences with his portrayal in the hit army sitcom The Army Game as Corporal Springer, a role he reprised in the spin-off I Only Arsked! Little tv work followed, though various roles in film did until Shoestring materialised as an offer he wasn't sure was for him in 1979; he later said "I thought they must have confused me with Leslie Crowther. My agent - a very honest man - said the offer was a mystery to him, too." However, the BBC got their man while Medwin continued in the role he had occupied for 15 years before - producer of films in collaboration with actor Albert Finney. These included If... with Malcolm McDowell and Charley Bubbles with Liza Minelli.

Doran Godwin was born in Harrow, Middlesex. Her first TV acting role was in a small part in Softly, Softly in 1967, but her first major work was as one of the many supporting actors who worked on the early Seventies series with Irish comedian Dave Allen in Dave Allen At Large. In 1972 she took the title role of Emma Woodhouse in the mini series Emma and had supporting roles in Rooms, Devenish and Armchair Thriller before the part of Erica came along.

Liz Crowther was born in December 1954, one of the daughters of the late comedian and host Leslie Crowther. Her television career started with an adaptation of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe in 1967, followed by The Queen Street Gang in 1968 and an episode of The Ronnie Barker Playhouse. After a period of mainly stage work, two roles in 1979 gave her needed exposure to gain her the part of Sonia; the first was in one of a series of Six Plays by Alan Bennett: One Fine Day and the other was in an episode of Hazell, bringing her to the attention of co-creator of Shoestring, Richard Harris.

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article copyright PPS / M.Hearn 2005