Please Sir! (TV Series) The Welcome Mat (1968) User Reviews

The Welcome Mat

[Prismark10 · 6/10 · 25 June 2020]

Rather disconcerting to see that some of the pupils in the first episode of Please Sir! look older than their new teacher.

There was a time when you had to look that you were about to enter middle age if you wanted to be cast as a schoolboy on a British sitcom. Then again seeing mini skirted sensuous Sharon would give the viewer a fair idea why an older actress had to be used.

John Alderton is Bernard Hedges, a newly qualified teacher on his first day at Fenn Street school. He has been given the unruly pupils at 5C who have a reputation of being troublesome.

Hedges has also upset the officious and cranky caretaker Norman Potter (Deryck Guyler) who is not happy.

Hedges somehow wins over the class as he gets a reputation of knowing karate.

The sitcom was probably inspired by the success of To Sir with Love. Although I would also say that the Will Hay schoolmaster character might also be an inspiration. I think the casting of Guyler certainly led me to that conclusion.

The first episode establishes the characters and the task in hand for the new teacher. It also has the slightly cheeky and risque humour of late 1960s swinging Britain.

Hedges' First Day!

[ShadeGrenade · 10/10 · 24 May 2008]

It is the first day of a new term at Fenn Street School. Bernard Hedges, a newly qualified teacher, finds himself sitting on the bus next to a young man who requests a light for his cigarette. Hedges obliges, not realising the youngster ( Eric Duffy ) is a pupil at the school.

Mistakenly getting off at the depot ( which looks like the one later used in 'On The Buses' ), he has to run the rest of the way. Slipping in through the back gate, he faces the wrath of caretaker Norman Potter. His woes are not over; Miss Doris Ewell admonishes him for being late, and he is given 5C - the worst class in the school - to teach...

The seven episodes which comprised the first season of 'Please Sir!' were forty minutes in length, meaning that the writers had time to establish characters ( just as well as there were a lot of them ) and develop story lines. The pace was noticeably slower, in particular the staff room scene and Hedges' first encounter with 5C. Subsequent seasons reverted to the standard sitcom length of twenty-five minute episodes.

The sight of Potter lugging milk crates brought a shudder to this reviewer. I detest the sight and smell of milk first thing in the morning, and was made by my teacher Miss Eynon to drink the stuff whether I wanted it or not. Banning it was the only decent thing Thatcher ever did.

Hedges wears glasses and a college scarf, giving him a passing resemblance to 'Charley Farley' from 'The Two Ronnies'. When he first confronts 5C, they assume him to be a push-over. Craven nicknames him 'Privet', and he retaliates with 'Craven Cottage', resulting in an outburst of exaggerated laughter.

Potter seems a more menacing figure here than in later episodes, where he was regarded by teachers and pupils alike as an object of fun. He does not grovel to the headmaster either. Instead of magnifying his own abilities, Abbott does as much for Hedges, making him sound like a karate black belt. F.A. refers to his father, whom we never saw in the show.

Benny Hill's sidekick Bob Todd appears briefly as a bus conductor.

Funniest scene - Hedges tries to apologise to Potter for their earlier misunderstanding, but accidentally pushes him underneath a cascading flood of coal.

By the episode's end, Hedges has firmly established his authority ( with a little help from a woodworm-infested desk ), thus setting the scene for the rest of the series.