Bosco (TV series)


Bosco is an Irish children's television programme produced during the late 1970s and 1980s. It was produced and shown by RTÉ in Ireland. Designed by Jan Mitchell, Bosco was voiced by Jonathan Ryan initially, in the pilot series that was broadcast, with four presenters per show, in 1979. When the show went into full-time production in 1980, with two presenters per show, Miriam Lambert took over. From the 1981 season onwards, Paula Lambert took over. Bosco's name was chosen by Helen Quinn, sister of presenter Marian Richardson.
It ran for 386 episodes, ending production in 1987. The show was continually repeated before The Den daily until 30 September 1996, when it was replaced by The Morbegs before officially ending on November 26, 1998.

Plot

The show was presented by Bosco, a small red-haired puppet, supposedly a five-year-old child with bright red cheeks and a real squeaky voice. Bosco and the other presenters usually spoke English, but to help young children learn Irish Bosco often peppered English speech with Irish phrases, much like the way Dora the Explorer often speaks Spanish. Bosco lived in a brightly painted wooden box, only ever wandering far from it to go on excursions to such places as Dublin Zoo or the HB Ice Cream factory. The show also had a number of other segments.
There are various short animations, usually stop-motion, as part of the show. The Plonsters were plasticine critters, which are continually engaged in fights or schemes against each other. Faherty's Garden, created by David Byrne, starred the eponymous Faherty a dog, plagued by an amateur crow magician in a series of shorts featuring stop-motion models. Freddy the Fox features a host of characters each with distinctive traits, such as Fiachra the Frog, Gregory Grainog and Sile Seilide. There was also a cartoon featuring a rather strange potato family, The McSpuds, that live in a supermarket owned by Mr McGinty. At night, the potato children, Sheila and Seamus, run amok. The Tongue Twister Twins were also regularly featured. These animations were created by Jim Quin from Thurles, County Tipperary.
The show featured arts and crafts segments which were called make and do, in the style of the BBC's children's programme Blue Peter. Another prominent part of the show was story-time and each show featured a song.

Cast

The roster of presenters included
Paul Burton,
David Byrne,
Peter Fitzgerald,
Mary Garrioch,
Susie Kennedy,
Gert Kerrigan,
Marcus O'Higgins,
Marian Richardson,
Jonathan Ryan,
Frank Twomey,
Philip Tyler,
and
Gráinne Uí Mhaitiú.

Production

Production staff

Each episode had an on-location section of footage, this was introduced as "The Magic Door". The presenter would step through a chroma keyed door beyond which the footage would be shown. This section opened with the following rhyme:
Another song frequently featured was:

In other media