Hippies (TV series)

Hippies
Genre	Sitcom
Created by	Arthur Mathews Graham Linehan
Written by	Arthur Mathews
Directed by	Martin Dennis
Starring	Simon Pegg Julian Rhind-Tutt Sally Phillips Darren Boyd
Country of origin	United Kingdom
Original language(s)	English
No. of series	1
No. of episodes	6
Production
Running time	28-29 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	BBC 2
Picture format	PAL 16:9
Original run	12 November 1999 (1999-11-12) – 17 December 1999 (1999-12-17)

Hippies is a six-part British television comedy series broadcast from 12 November to 17 December 1999. It was created by Arthur Mathews and Graham Linehan, the writing partnership most famous for Father Ted, but the scripts were written by Mathews alone. It starred Simon Pegg, Sally Phillips, Julian Rhind-Tutt and Darren Boyd.

Synopsis

Hippies is set in 1969 in 'Swinging London' and is set around Ray Purbbs (Pegg), who is the editor of a counterculture magazine called Mouth (a parody of Oz, International Times, Frendz and other underground magazines of the time), which he produces in his flat in Notting Hill Gate. He is aided by Alex Picton-Dinch (Rhind-Tutt), Hugo Yemp (Boyd) and Jill Sprint (Phillips), Sprint is also Purbbs' girlfriend, or he thinks she is his girlfriend.

The series delved into late 1960s culture and involved the characters in various ridiculous situations in this setting.

Episodes

#	Title	Original air date
1.1	Protesting Hippies	12 November 1999
1.2	Hairy Hippies	19 November 1999
1.3	Sexy Hippies	26 November 1999
1.4	Hippy Dippy Hippies	3 December 1999
1.5	Muddy Hippies	10 December 1999
1.6	Disgusting Hippies	17 December 1999

Critical reaction

The series was Mathews and Linehan's immediate follow up to the hugely popular and highly successful, Father Ted. As such it received a significant amount of pre-release hype which viewers felt let down by after watching the first few episodes, as it did not meet their expectations. In general it was badly received by critics.

A second series was commissioned, but was never written after Mathews was put off by the negative critical reaction.

Hippies has never been repeated on any terrestrial BBC channels, although it has been repeated on Paramount Comedy 2 (now Comedy Central Extra), the now defunct UK Play, and Gold.

The series was released on Region 0 DVD in the UK in March 2008.

External links

• Hippies at BBC Programmes
• BBC comedy guide entry
• Article on Off The Telly
• Hippies at the Internet Movie Database