Grange Hill is a British children's television drama series, originally produced by the BBC and portraying life in a typical comprehensive school.

It was created by Phil Redmond, who is also responsible for the Channel 4 dramas Brookside and Hollyoaks; other notable production team members down the years have included producer Colin Cant and script editor Anthony Minghella.

[1] The drama was centred on the fictional comprehensive school of Grange Hill in the equally fictitious North London borough of Northam.

[2][3] As well as dealing with school-related issues such as bullying, learning difficulties, teacher-pupil relationships and conflicts, Grange Hill "broke new ground over the years, with the kind of hard-hitting storylines not usually seen in children's dramas",[2] such as racism, drugs (e.g. Zammo McGuire's heroin addiction, LSD), teenage pregnancy, HIV/AIDS, homosexuality, knife crime, homelessness, rape/sexual assault, mental illness (e.g. bipolar disorder), divorce, cancer (e.g. leukaemia), gun crime, child abuse, alcoholism and death.

The series was originally to have been called Grange Park, which would go on to be used as the name of the school in another Redmond creation, the Channel 4 soap opera Brookside (1982–2003).

Grange Hill was originally conceived by ATV writer Phil Redmond, who first approached various television companies with the idea in 1975, unsuccessfully.

In 1976, he managed to sell the idea to the BBC, and the children's drama executive Anna Home commissioned an initial series of nine episodes in a trial run, the first being broadcast on 8 February 1978.

[citation needed] This led to Redmond being summoned to lunch by BBC bosses and forced to agree that there would be no further series unless he toned certain elements down.

This storyline ran over two series (1986–87) and focused on Zammo's descent into drugs and how it strained his relationship with girlfriend Jackie and friend Kevin.

Script editor Anthony Minghella, who worked on the series for several years during the 1980s, later won an Academy Award for Best Director for the film The English Patient in 1996.

In 1994, two characters were introduced with disabilities: Denny Roberts (Lisa Hammond), who had dwarfism, and Rachel Burns (Francesca Martinez), who had cerebral palsy.

[8] Beginning on 4 April 1993, in celebration of the programme's 15th anniversary, the first fifteen series of Grange Hill were repeated during Children's BBC's Sunday (and later, Saturday) morning slots on BBC1 and BBC2.

In the 1990s Grange Hill was repeated in full on digital satellite and cable channel UK Gold, which broadcast the late 1970s and early 80s episodes of the show.

Interest in Grange Hill was renewed in the late 1990s and the series celebrated its 20th anniversary with the introduction of sinister Scottish bully Sean Pearce (Iain Robertson), who carried a knife and slashed the face of a classmate.

In series 9, the Upper School building was condemned after a fire, allowing production of Grange Hill to fully move to Elstree including studio work.

Early in 2002, it was announced that Grange Hill creator Phil Redmond had signed a deal for his production company Mersey TV to produce the next three series of the programme.

Production moved to Mersey TV's studios in Childwall, Liverpool from Series 26 onwards and for the first time in some years the appearance of Grange Hill School itself would change radically.

[14][15] Phil Redmond originally wanted children from all over the country to participate in the relaunched Grange Hill, having a variety of regional accents in the series as opposed to just the London area voices which had become associated with the programme; however, almost all new characters were exclusively cast from the north-west of England due to the logistics of the child employment laws.

[16] In 2005, the former Brookside Parade set at Mersey TV was redeveloped to benefit Grange Hill and the new "Creative Learning Centre" subsequently became an integral part of the show.

The emphasis was now on younger characters with a group of Year 6 pupils regularly coming to use The Grange from primary school; storylines were much lighter and fantasy sequences were introduced.

[17] Phil Redmond responded in the same article by calling for Grange Hill to be scrapped, saying the programme had been "robbed of its original purpose".

Redmond had been planning a hard-hitting storyline to return Grange Hill to its gritty origins in series 31, and although he signed off the changes he believed it wasn't his show any more.

In 2006, the BBC had announced big plans for the show's 30th birthday including special programming on BBC2, possible repeats and a lavish reunion of former stars during 2008.

[19] But in the event, none of these celebrations happened aside from a special BBC Radio 4 programme Grange Hill: Soap Pioneer, hosted by fan and comedian Robin Ince, broadcast on 4 September 2008.

The 1986 cast released Grange Hill: The Album, with two singles: "Just Say No" (tying in with a character's heroin addiction) and "You Know the Teacher (Smash Head)".

The documentary featured: auditions, rehearsals and filming for series 11, the child actors' opinions on being tutored and chaperoned and what impact being in Grange Hill had on their schooling, as well as dealing with fame.

The last four notes of the original theme song were heard when Brookside, one of Phil Redmond's other TV series, aired its final episode in November 2003.

Mr Starling appeared only once during Series One, and his initial, E., was shown underneath the name of the school in the first episode: the authority figure most regularly seen during this time was the Head of First Year, Mrs Monroe (Dorothea Philips).

There were 14 short story books and novels, some of which were written or co-written by series creator Phil Redmond, but which also involved authors such as Robert Leeson and Jan Needle.

Some episodes have been edited to remove pop music tracks that could not be cleared for DVD release, and studio scenes originally shot on video have been filmized.