Compact was a British television soap opera shown by the BBC between 1962 and 1965. The series was created by Hazel Adair and Peter Ling who later went on to devise Crossroads. This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ... The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC, sometimes also known as the Beeb or Auntie) is the largest broadcasting corporation in the world, founded in 1922. ... 1962 (MCMLXII) was a common year starting on Monday (the link is to a full 1962 calendar). ... 1965 (MCMLXV) was a common year starting on Friday (the link is to a full 1965 calendar). ... Peter Ling is a writer for television and a novelist. ... Crossroads was a British television soap opera set in a motel near Birmingham, England. ...

In comparison to the "kitchen sink realism" of Coronation Street, Compact was a distinctly more middle-class serial, set in the more "sophisticated" arena of magazine publishing. In fact, one could argue that given its workplace setting, Compact was the first "avarice" soap, taking the viewer into the business world, and aligning the professional lives of the characters with more personal storylines. Coronation Street is Britains longest-running television soap opera, and, according to the people who make it, the UKs consistently highest-rated show. ...

The show was carefully scheduled for broadcast on Tuesdays and Thursdays, thus avoiding a clash with ITV's "Coronation St" on Mondays and Wednesdays.

Sadly, the show was hopelessly twee and middle class. Men made all the decisions while the women sat around and looked pretty and were patronised. There's no better illustration of this than the fact that, when "Compact" began, the editor was a woman, yet it wasn't long before she was replaced by Ian Harmon (Ronald Allen) the son of the magazine's editor, a dreadful example of both sexism and nepotism!

Morris Barry, a some-time actor and BBC director - he directed several "Doctor Who" stories in the 1960's - took over as producer and was given a brief to spice the series up in view of the criticisms it had received from the national press. Although there were token protestations about a suicide using a gas fire, and scenes of children smoking drugs, both critics and the public remained indifferent to the show, and the BBC, never comofortble with the concept of soap opera - at the time they considered it to be the realm of independent television - quietly dropped the series. Ronald Allen would go on to star in ATV soap opera "Crossroads" from 1969 to 1985.

Much of the series no longer exists in the BBC archive due to the corporation's wiping policy of the era. Wiping or junking is an economic move by radio and television companies in which old audiotapes, videotapes and telerecordings are wiped (deleted) and reused or destroyed. ...

External links

• Action TV
• British Film Institute Screen Online