Gangsters

Gangsters is a British television series made by the BBC and shown from 1975 to 1978. Created by Philip Martin, and produced at the BBC's Pebble Mill Studios in Birmingham by David Rose, Gangsters began televisual life as an edition of Play for Today in 1975, followed by two series transmitted in 1976 and 1978. The series, set in the multi-cultural criminal community of Birmingham, has remained a cult favourite, memorable for its strong violence, multi-ethnic cast and highly stylised, post-modern approach to storytelling. Gangsters featured references to film noir, gangster films, westerns, Bollywood and kung fu movies, as well as increasingly surreal end-of-episode cliffhangers and a bizarre final scene where the characters not only “break the fourth wall” but walk off the set. The two series had quite different tones. The first was a gritty thriller whilst the second was more surreal, with more emphasis on the post-modern elements. The theme music was an instrumental performed by Greenslade; in the last series it was adapted into a version sung by Chris Farlowe.