TV Pop Diaries
Pop Music on British Television 1955 - 1999

Ex-pirate DJ Dave Cash had briefly co-hosted Top Of The Pops in 1968, but despite the occasional TV appearance he never really became the television personality that his old radio partner Kenny Everett had become.

The NME in December 1969 ran a short report that Cash would be going to New York in the summer of 1970 to shoot his own thirteen part TV series. Guest stars will appear in each hour long show, with a budget of $140,000 per show. Record Mirror also reported Dave's enthusiasm for the show "It's a groovy show and will be going out in America during the summer, probably on ABC. It's going to cost something about 140,000 dollars a week to shoot. We're making 13 shows to start with and the first one one will probably have the Beatles and the Stones. But it won't be a 'Top Of The Pops' type show in that it won't deal with the new chart entries or current hits so much. I went to New York earlier this month to sort the TV show out and everyone was very enthusiastic about it. I don't know whether it will be shown in Britain or not though."

The New York show came to nothing, so he decided to take the matter into his own hands. The Dave Cash Comedy Hour was made as a pilot in 1972 and featured actresses Hilary Pritchard (previously seen in Braden's Week), Tricia Gently and The Golden Shot's Anne Aston as support acts while Chris Andrews and The Spectrum were the musical guests. A twenty minute film reel appeared on eBay in September 2020 which credits an appearance by Sammy Davis Jr and an interview with then Rolling Stone Mick Taylor. However, the seller dates the reel to 1969 rather than the previously thought 1972. To confuse matters further Sammy Davis Jr appears to have been in Britain for TV show recordings on both dates.

The pilot found no takers, so after a re-think the idea of The Dave Cash Radio Programme came about. It appears to have been a co-production between HTV and NBC, the title caption on the eBay reel says "program", the American spelling. The re-vamped version had Cash present the show from a mock radio station, a bit like All Systems Freeman. Eventually Cash would present the show from different locations, one week he would be presenting the show on board a plane, while another came from the Beaulieu Motor Museum. Hilary Pritchard was kept on from the pilot to play his secretary. The pop clips he introduced were also shot on location across the west country. Dana, Lulu and The Moody Blues would be filmed for the first shows. The Melody Maker reported on the show in December 1971 stating it was a "situation comedy about a disc jockey."

According to the Internet Movie Database twenty-six shows had been prepared, but only thirteen were shown. It was sold throughout Europe, and it's possible that they showed more editions than we saw here in the UK, while Record Mirror reported in May 1972 that the show had also been sold to America.

Many other ITV stations would pick up the show, but it was never fully networked, and certainly not at the same time with many stations not showing it until October 1972. Deciding that maybe TV wasn't suited to his talents he returned to Radio One in late 1972. He told DeeJay magazine in 1973 "... I thought I'd try my hand at television and we did 26 programmes for HTV - 'The Dave Cash Radio Programme', which I had a lot of fun doing, but which was really far out of my media - in fact it was really work for me - by the time Friday night came each week I finally collapsed in a heap. I was also writing the series as well as performing in it I nearly ended up with a nervous breakdown."

The Dickie/Richard W Jackman referred to as co-producer and co-director was none other than Cash himself.

After the show finished many of these clips were later made available in the 8mm home movie format and later on DVD under the Music Unlimited banner, with a credit for HTV Films.

THE DAVE CASH RADIO PROGRAMME

HTV

17th May 1972 - 9th August 1972