1. worksheet 2
What is TV drama?
TV drama is a broad genre. At its simplest, it is fictionalised action in
narrative form. It is important to gain some basic understanding of
how and why TV drama splits into the different types broadcast today.
G List as many examples of TV drama as you can. (Use a website,
like the BBC’s, or a listings magazine to prompt you.)
G Find examples of TV dramas which appear to be both a TV drama
and something else, eg, a TV drama and a crime series like
Prime Suspect. What is the reason for this kind of combination?
G Name as many different kinds of TV drama as you can.
What you have been doing is uncovering the various subgenres
(genres within genres) of TV drama.
G Genre means ‘kind’ or ‘type’. (Think of
the way biologists refer to ‘genus’ to
describe a type of plant or animal
species.)
G A television genre thus refers to
programmes which can be categorised
by the things they have in common – the
conventions of a genre.
G Many genres break down into subgenres.
Crime drama is a TV drama which has
become a genre in its own right.
G TV drama has given rise to a number of
subgenres. What started out as drama on
television, single plays, quickly gave rise
to different kinds of drama: costume
dramas, children’s classic dramas, soap
operas, crime dramas, hospital dramas,
sci-fi dramas and historical adventures.
This took place in the 1950s as the BBC
was evolving and ITV first began
broadcasting. Why do you think this
happened? Why are there still so many
different kinds of TV drama? (See the
Is Prime Suspect a TV drama or a crime drama or both?
What is the significance of these differnt ways of Timeline for further clues and examples
©British Film Institute 2007
categorising TV drama? of the first ‘subgenres’.)
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