Ghost Squad (TV series)

This article is about the 1960s series. For the 2005 series, see The Ghost Squad.

Ghost Squad
Also known asGS5
Created by
  • John Gosling
  • Anthony Kearey
Starring
ComposerPhilip Green
Country of originUnited Kingdom
No. of series3
No. of episodes52 (13 missing)
Production
Running time50 minutes
Production companyITC Entertainment for ATV
Original release
NetworkITV
Release9 September 1961 (1961-09-09) –
16 May 1964 (1964-05-16)
Infobox instructions (only shown in preview)

Ghost Squad, known as GS5 for its third series, was a crime drama series that ran between 1961 and 1964, about an elite division of Scotland Yard. In each episode the Ghost Squad would investigate cases that fell outside the scope of normal police work.[1] Despite the show and characters being fictional, an actual division did exist within the Metropolitan Police at the time.[2]

Inspiration for the series was taken from a book of the same title written by John Gosling, a retired police officer and former member of the real-life squad it is based on.[2] This squad operated only in London, but the members of the fictional team travel all over Europe, sometimes to fictitious countries. As was common practice at the time, most of the foreign settings are depicted by combining stock footage with scenes shot on sets, in this case at Independent Artists Studios at Beaconsfield and Associated British Elstree Studios. The music for the show was by Philip Green.

The show was produced by ITC Entertainment with Rank Organisation TV and ATV. It was the first ITC show filmed to fit the one-hour time-slot (with two advertisement breaks), setting the trend for the majority of ITC's output. Another common ITC trait was to feature an American actor, in this case Michael Quinn, in a leading role, in the hope of increasing the chances of international sales. In the second series Neil Hallett sometimes replaced Quinn and in the third series Quinn was entirely replaced by the Australian actor Ray Barrett. Ray Austin, stunt director for the entire series, played Billy Clay in the third series (he went on to become a TV director in Hollywood and the UK).

  1. ^ "Ghost Squad". Network. Retrieved 21 April 2008.
  2. ^ a b Laurence Marcus (30 January 2001). "Ghost Squad". Television Heaven. Archived from the original on 23 April 2008. Retrieved 21 April 2008.