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Increased BBC Children's department budgets in the early 1970s lead to a
live-action adjunct of storytelling slot Jackanory (1965-96). Jackanory
Playhouse (1972-85) majored in traditional folk and fairy tales, but one notable
modern exception was 'Lizzie Dripping and the Orphans' (tx. 15/12/1972),
specially-commissioned from children's novelist Helen Cresswell.
Cresswell's 'Lizzie Dripping' is a thoughtful, slightly introverted
12-year-old girl living in the quiet English village of Little Hemlock. Really
named Penelope Arbuckle, she is known by all as Lizzie, a colloquial nickname in
the rural Midlands for daydreaming little girls. Cresswell first heard the name
over her garden fence, from a neighbour despairing of her daughter.
Playing Lizzie was Tina Heath, an experienced 19-year-old; some sources
suggest the good-looking young actress dressed down and lied about her age to
win the junior role. Such 'playing down' had, however, been something of a
tradition in British children's TV since the 1950s.
The 'pilot' lacked one core element introduced in the first episode of the
series proper - a witch Lizzie meets in a church graveyard. The reality of this
ostensibly imaginary friend was moot - the witch seems always to be around when
Lizzie gives vent to her mischievous side, suggesting a submerged alter-ego.
Much use was made of voiceover: Hannah Gordon narrated the pilot, while
longstanding Jackanory reader Ann Morrish introduced first series episodes in
character as Lizzie's schoolteacher. Lizzie aired her perceptive, internalised
views of adult foibles via voiceover - Heath delivered more dialogue in
post-dubbing sessions than in performance. Voiceover is a device sometimes
frowned upon but executive producer Anna Home believed its use here was a
justified "creative and positive" one. Morrish's narration was dropped for
sequel Lizzie Dripping Again, but Heath's own commentary remained.
Lizzie's absent-minded adventures were simple and good natured, slight even,
but evoked a childhood of carefree, endless summers, a style falling out of
favour after the success of the tough, contemporary Grange Hill (BBC,
1978-2004). Cresswell's local area, the conservation village of Eakring,
Nottinghamshire, provided an idyllic rural backdrop untouched by the modern
world.
The series departed with Lizzie saying a wistful goodbye to her witch, a
metaphor for her growing up. Heath (who became a Blue Peter presenter in 1979)
reprised Lizzie in 1987 for a BBC talking book. Cresswell wrote one new Lizzie
tale for Jackanory's 21st Anniversary in 1991, begetting five further adventures
the following year, read onscreen by Patricia Routledge.
Alistair McGown
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1. Miss Platt's Introduction (2:32) 
