Robin of Sherwood | |
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Opening title
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Created by | Richard Carpenter |
Starring |
Michael Praed Judi Trott Nickolas Grace Robert Addie Jason Connery Mark Ryan |
Opening theme | "Robin (The Hooded Man)" by Clannad |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
No. of seasons | 3 |
No. of episodes | 26 (list of episodes) |
Production | |
Executive producer(s) | Paul Knight Esta Charkham Patrick Dromgoole |
Running time | 50 mins (1 hour with adverts) |
Production company(s) |
HTV Goldcrest Films |
Distributor | ITV Studios |
Release | |
Original network | ITV |
Original release | 28 April 1984 – 28 June 1986 |
Robin of Sherwood (retitled Robin Hood in the United States) is a British television series, based on the legend of Robin Hood. Created by Richard Carpenter, it was produced by HTV in association with Goldcrest, and ran from 1984 to 1986 on the ITV network. In America it was retitled Robin Hood and shown on the premium cable TV channel Showtime and, later, on PBS. The show starred Michael Praed and Jason Connery as two different incarnations of the title character. Unlike previous adaptations of the Robin Hood legend, Robin of Sherwood combined a gritty, authentic production design with elements of real-life history, 20th century fiction, and pagan myth. The series is also notable for its musical score by Clannad, which won a BAFTA award.
There were three seasons, composed of a two-hour opening episode and 24 one-hour long episodes, although the pilot is sometimes screened as two one-hour episodes. The episodes comprising "The Swords of Wayland" were transmitted as one episode in the UK on their original screening, on a bank holiday weekend in 1985. The show was shot on film and almost entirely on location, mostly in the northeast and southwest of England; HTV West in Bristol was the base of operations, and most of the filming was done in and around Bristol and its surrounding counties. Primary locations were the Blaise Castle Estate in North Bristol and Vassals Park to the south.
Together with Richard Lester's 1976 film Robin and Marian, Robin of Sherwood is one of the most influential treatments of the core Robin Hood legend since The Adventures of Robin Hood, featuring a realistic period setting and introducing the character of a Saracen outlaw.