Girls in Love

Girls in Love
Genre	Drama
Written by	Carol Noble Steve Turner Diane Whitley Jacqueline Wilson
Directed by	Indra Bhose Rachel Tillotson
Starring	Olivia Hallinan Amy Kwolek Zaraah Abrahams Ian Dunn Sam Loggin
Composer(s)	Nick Harvey
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Language(s)	English
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	27
Production
Executive producer(s)	Anne Brogan
Producer(s)	Grainne Marmion Diane Whitley
Editor(s)	Annie Kocur Sebastian Morrison Sue Wyatt
Location(s)	London Manchester
Cinematography	Roger Bonnici David Katznelson
Camera setup	David Budd
Running time	30 minutes
Production company(s)	Granada Media
Broadcast
Original channel	ITV Network (CITV)
Picture format	16:9
Original run	1 April 2003 – 20 May 2005

Girls in Love is a British children's drama series produced by Granada Television which aired on CITV. It is based on the book of the same title (ISBN 0385408048), both created by UK author Jacqueline Wilson that follows the romantic thrills and spills of three teenage girls - Ellie, Magda and Nadine. The show ran for two series, and explored the somewhat weird and wonderful world of boys through the eyes of Ellie Allard, who is played by Olivia Hallinan. She likes to draw, and usually portrays her life's events in her sketchbook, which blends the show's live action with animation in a similar manner to American teen comedy hit Lizzie Maguire. She lives with her dad and his girlfriend (later wife) Anna, and her baby brother Eggs. Ellie has had two significant crushes in the course of the past two series - Russell (played by Adam Paul Harvey) and American exchange student, Darius (played by Alp Haydar).

Magda (played by Zaraah Abrahams ) according to Ellie "goes through boys like I do through takeaway pizzas"; she is quite a gossipy, bubbly sort of character, and had a brief fling with Russel in series four. . And then there's Nadine played by Amy Kwolek who is a goth, and has always had a wild child reputation about her.

The show has received criticism from fans of the book, a lot due to Ellie and Magda's appearances. In the book, Ellie is short, bespectacled, chubby, frizzy-haired, whereas in the television series, she is taller, thinner, has straight hair and doesn't wear glasses. Magda was also portrayed differently - in the series she is mixed-race with dark hair; in the book, she is caucasian and has blonde hair. Girls In Love is due to be repeated for the first time since 2005 on CITV's digital channel from September 2010.

Main book characters

Ellie - Witty, artistic and vivacious, the book starts by meeting a thirteen year old Ellie in Year 9. She has curly hair, glasses, a passion for art and is self-conscious about her weight and appearance.
Nadine - Ellie's childhood best friend. Nadine is a tall, thin and striking goth. Her wild, rebellious attitude tends to get her into trouble.
Magda - Ellie and Nadine's best friend whom they befriended at the start of High School. Magda is beautiful, popular, confident and optimistic. She attracts a lot of male attention.
Benedict 'Eggs' - Ellie's little half-brother.
Dad - Ellie's father, widowed when her mother died, remarried to Anna. An artist and tutor at the local college.
Anna - Ellie's step mother, much younger than her father. Attractive and kind, her and Ellie often fight despite the fact they care for each other really. They are like sisters to each other.

More characters

Russell - Ellie's boyfriend, who is first introduced in the 3rd book, Girls Out Late. Like Ellie, he is interested in art. He is two years older than Ellie, and is in Year Eleven at his school, Halmer High.
Dan - Ellie's kind-of boyfriend before Russell. He should be in Year Eight, but because of his intelligence he was moved up a year, to year Nine. They met at during a summer holiday in Wales, and they wrote letters to each other when they got back. Dan 'stayed' with Ellie once. Dan now has another girlfriend, called Gail.
Natasha - Nadine's little sister. She is spoiled and slightly manipulative who acts cute in front of her parents, but is a nightmare in front of Nadine, Ellie and Magda. She is friends with Benedict (Eggs).
Kevin - An older student whom Ellie develops a crush on in the first book. Later they become friends and Ellie starts to flirt with Kevin, but to her shock she finds out that he is gay. Ellie has a habit of 'bumping into him'.
Liam - Nadine's sleazy, but extremely good-looking, ex-boyfriend who had a reputation for using girls for sex. Nadine claimed to be in love with him in the book Girls In Love.
Greg - Magda's boyfriend, a student at Anderson High School for Boys. Wears a lot of hair gel to darken his natural red hair. He gives Magda one of his pet hamsters in the book Girls In Tears.
Mr Windsor (however in the TV series the name is changed to Mr Green) - Ellie, Magda and Nadine's art teacher whom the girls are all attracted to.
Mrs Henderson - Ellie, Magda and Nadine's form tutor and P.E teacher in Year Nine. She is usually strict and often unfair on the girls but she becomes very concerned with Ellie in the book Girls Under Pressure when she notices how much weight Ellie loses.

External links

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0372063/