Jigsaw (1)

Host

Adrian Hedley (all series)

Janet Ellis (1979-83)

Co-hosts

Character voices: John Leeson

David Cleveland and David Wyatt (Cid Sleuth section, 1979-81)

Tommy Boyd (1980-1)

"The 'O' Men": Sylvester McCoy and David Rappaport

"Dot": Julia Binsted (1983-4)

Paul Shearer (1984)

Howard Stableford (final series, 1984)

Wilf Lunn

Broadcast

16 July 1979 to 15 June 1984 (49 programmes in 6 series)

Synopsis

Viewer participation competition where the object each week to identify a six-letter word.

Each letter would be identified via a sketch of some variety, which nearly always included some brilliant miming by host Adrian Hedley. At the end of the programme, Mr Noseybonk (a man - Hedley in disguise, of course - wearing a really quite scary mask with a very, very long nose and a pair of ill-fitting trousers) would run around a park or some such location, with some jaunty background-music, looking at different objects - the first letters of these prominent objects being the answer to the write-in competition.

In the early series there would be a sketch involving inept detective "Cid Sleuth", and other characters included the O-Men (Sylvester McCoy and David Rappaport), Biggum the Scottish giant - all you ever saw of him was his sandals - and Pterry the pterodactyl. After Janet Ellis left to join Blue Peter, Julia Binsted provided a replacement of sorts as "Dot", a character who changed from a silver dot on the screen into a human and could manipulate the visual elements of the show.

Reprised to an extent with See it, Saw it.