Sunday Night at the London Palladium

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Sunday Night at the London Palladium was a British television variety show made by ATV for the ITV network, originally running from 1955 to 1967, with a brief revival in 1973-1974. The London Palladium is an actual theatre in London's West End. The programme was one of ITV's most watched shows, reaching its biggest audience in January 1960 whilst entertainer Bruce Forsyth was the host, in an edition featuring Cliff Richard and The Shadows, watched by over 20 million people.

An integral part of the show was the cheap and cheerful game show, Beat The Clock the format of which was rather like Bruce Forsyth's later hit in The Generation Game (see separate entry).

The regular hosts of the Palladium show were Tommy Trinder (1955-1958), Bruce Forsyth (1958-1960 and 1961), Don Erroll (1960-61), Norman Vaughan (1962-1965) and Jimmy Tarbuck (1965-67).

Perhaps the most famous episode of all took place during a strike by the British acting union Equity, who refused to allow any of its performers to appear that week. Exempt from this, host Bruce Forsyth and comedian Norman Wisdom appeared in the entire show, improvising wildly, to the delight of the audience.

In 1967, legendary TV mogul, Lord Grade, axed the show. The reasons for this remain, to this day, obscure, but he was the first to admit that, along with the axing of soap opera Emergency Ward 10 at the same time, were the two biggest mistakes he ever made.

The format was revived in the 1980s as Live From Her Majesty's, Live from the Piccadilly and Live From the Palladium with comedian Jimmy Tarbuck once again doing the hosting duties. Live From Her Majesty's is however mainly remembered as being the programme on which comedian Tommy Cooper suffered a fatal heart attack while performing live on air.

A further revival of the format, in 2000, was called Tonight at the London Palladium, fronted by Bruce Forsyth.