Case Studies

Waterloo Road
click here for the official website

About the show
The staff are overworked and underpaid and the budget only ever seems to be getting tighter and even worse the kids are continuing to become more trouble!
The school is full of upper to lower class pupils with a mixture of races; each child seems to have their own dramatic ways to catch pupils, teachers and the community’s attention. However, each individual pupil knows that at Waterloo Road they will always be cared for by the staff members and given much support in order for them to achieve an education. Furthermore, the teachers aren’t too perfect themselves but with every problem, with the help of a few motivated and inspiring individuals, there is always a solution.   

Christine Mulgrew
Played by Laurie Brett

Last term Christine cracked under the pressure of being Headteacher and lost sight of her leadership abilities. She had many squabbles with the Deputy Head, Simon, but finally managed to regain her natural teaching instincts. She is now more determined than ever to prove is can handle the role. However, this term doesn’t seem to bright as the risk of losing her son Connor threatens to undo everything Christine has achieved.

Will her loss send her back to the bottle?

The cast
This page on the official website allows fans and other people to learn more about each cast member. This is good as it allows the audience to form a connection with the cast members that may be in the same situation as they are.

Hollyoaks

click here to see what IMDb has to say

The facts
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollyoaks

• A British soap opera, first broadcast on Channel 4 on 23^rd October 1995
• Originally devised by Phil Redmond (also devised the Channel 4 soap Brookside)
• Set in a fictional suburb of Chester, called Hollyoaks
• Features a large cast of characters primarily between the ages of 16 and 35
• Begun with a cat of just 7 major characters in 1995 but now the serial has approximately 50 main cast members – high cast turnover in comparison with other British soaps
• Currently UK’s youngest television soap opera
• Won many awards – 28 British Soap Awards, 11 Inside Soap Awards, 1 TRIC Award and 1 National Television Award
• Latest achievement was at the 2014 British Soap Awards, it won ‘Best British Soap’ foe the first time in 15 years
• Produced by Lime Pictures (formerly known as ‘Mersey Television’ prior to its takeover by All3Media)
• Filmed mainly at studios in Childwall, Liverpool

Broadcasting

• Main transmission is currently broadcast at 18:30 each weekday on Channel 4, with the launch of Channel 4 +1 in 2007 allowing viewers to see the main broadcast replayed at 19:30
• Since the channel’s launch in 2001, Channel 4’s digital sister station (E4) airs daily ‘First Look’ feature at 19:00 each weekday – the viewers are able to watch the episode to be shown on Channel 4 the following day
• Repeats of each day’s edition air of E4 the following weekday – previously at 14:35, but as of 2012 this occurs at 12:30 (E4 +1 at 13:30)
• In July 2012 4seven was launched and Hollyoaks was repeated of the preceding day’s at 11:30, but now has moved to the early hours of the morning
• All the week’s episodes are also complied into an omnibus edition

Opening title sequence and theme tune

• On 26^th February 2007, the programme launched a revamped title sequence with a faster version of the theme tune, the new sequence regularly underwent minor changes usually caused by characters leaving and joining the programme
• March 2008 saw an updated ‘style’ to the titles, with a purple background and new character segments
• 26^th December 2008saw the background change from purple to black
• 1^st June 2009 saw the pink and blue lettering changed to monochrome and the characters shown in full colour before and after the advert segments
• The next title sequence was delayed for many months, the titles (when they were finally aired) were different from pictures of filming of the original credits suggesting a reshoot was the reason for the delay

è  Paul Marquess: "We're sorry to the fans who have been waiting to see them, but they've taken a while to perfect. I'm very happy with them and I hope that the fans like the new-look show