''Button Moon'' is a British

children's television programme Children's television series (or children's television shows) are television programs designed for children, normally scheduled for broadcast during the morning and afternoon when children are awake. They can sometimes run during the early evenin ...

broadcast in the United Kingdom in the 1980s on the ITV network.

Thames Television Thames Television, commonly simplified to just Thames, was a Broadcast license, franchise holder for a region of the British ITV (TV network), ITV television network serving Greater London, London and surrounding areas from 30 July 1968 until th ...

produced each episode, which lasted ten minutes and featured the adventures of Mr. Spoon who, in each episode, travels to Button Moon in his homemade rocket ship. All the characters are based on kitchen utensils, as are many of the props. Once on Button Moon, which hangs in "blanket sky", they have an adventure, and look through Mr. Spoon's telescope at someone else such as ''

The Tortoise and the Hare "The Tortoise and the Hare" is one of Aesop's Fables and is numbered 226 in the Perry Index. The account of a race between unequal partners has attracted conflicting interpretations. The fable itself is a variant of a common folktale theme in wh ...

'', before heading back to their home on 'Junk Planet'. Episodes also include Mr. Spoon's wife Mrs. Spoon, their daughter, Tina Tea-Spoon and her friend Eggbert. The series ended in 1988 after 91 episodes.

Production

''Button Moon'' was originally conceived by Ian Allen as a stage show for Playboard Puppets in 1978. Two years later, Allen was approached by the producers of popular

children's series ''

Rainbow A rainbow is a meteorological phenomenon that is caused by reflection, refraction and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a spectrum of light appearing in the sky. It takes the form of a multicoloured circular arc. Rainbows ...

'', who were looking to introduce new recurring story features for the programme - a search that also resulted in ''

Cockleshell Bay Cockleshell Bay is a stop-motion children's television series which was shown at lunchtime on ITV during the early 1980s. It was made by Cosgrove Hall for its parent company, the ITV broadcaster Thames Television. Other children's programmes in ...

'' stories also being incorporated into episodes before being spun off into its own series - and were interested in incorporating stories revolving around the ''Button Moon'' premise as a recurring feature in the series. However, through these initial meetings, it was quickly felt that there was enough potential for ''Button Moon'' to instead be launched as its own TV series for Thames. Following a successful pilot - which would go on to be broadcast as the first regular episode - the first series of thirteen programmes was transmitted in 1980. A further six series of thirteen programmes followed, making a total of ninety-one different ''Button Moon'' adventures. The series was repeated on a yearly basis for Thames TV up until 1988. All 91 episodes have been shown on satellite channel

UK Gold Gold is a British pay television channel from the UKTV network that was launched in late 1992 as UK Gold before it was rebranded UKTV Gold in 2004. In 2008, it was split into current flagship channel Gold and miscellaneous channel, W, with clas ...

since spring 1993. Every episode was at least 10 minutes. Narration was by

Robin Parkinson Christopher Robin Parkinson (25 October 1929 – 7 May 2022) was an English actor known for his comedy roles. He was the second actor to portray Monsieur Ernest Leclerc in '' 'Allo 'Allo!'' (22 episodes: series 7 to 9), after the death of Der ...

. Puppeteers included Ian Allen, John Thirtle, Francis Wright,

Alistair Fullarton Alistair is a masculine given name. It is an Anglicised form of the Scottish Gaelic '' Alasdair''. The latter is most likely a Scottish Gaelic variant of the Norman French Alexandre or Latin Alexander, which was incorporated into English in the ...

Robin Stevens Robin Gordon Stevens (born 30 January 1960) is an English puppeteer, actor, director and writer for children's TV for nearly 30 years, and has done many successful programmes. These include ''Pob's Programme'', '' Corners'', ''Teletubbies'', ...

Sue Dacre Sue or SUE may refer to: Music * Sue Records, an American record label * ''Sue'' (album), an album by Frazier Chorus * " Sue (Or in a Season of Crime)", a song by David Bowie Places * Sue Islet (Queensland), one of the Torres Straits isl ...

Chris Leith Chris is a short form of various names including Christopher, Christian, Christina, Christine, and Christos. Chris is also used as a name in its own right, however it is not as common. People with the given name *Chris Abani (born 1966), Nig ...

, Judith Bucklow,

Ian Brown Ian George Brown (born 20 February 1963) is an English singer and multi-instrumentalist. He was the lead singer of the alternative rock band The Stone Roses from their formation in 1983. Following the split in 1996, he began a solo career, re ...

, Rhiann West,

Tony Holtham Tony may refer to: People and fictional characters * Tony (given name), including a list of people and fictional characters * Gregory Tony (born 1978), American law enforcement officer * Motu Tony (born 1981), New Zealand international rugby leagu ...

and others. The incidental music for the series was written by Peter Goslin. The show's theme tune was composed and performed by

Peter Davison Peter Malcolm Gordon Moffett (born 13 April 1951), known professionally as Peter Davison, is an English actor with many credits in television dramas and sitcoms. He made his television acting debut in 1975 and became famous in 1978 as Tristan ...

and

Sandra Dickinson Sandra Dickinson (née Searles) is an American-British actress. She trained at the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. She has often played characters who fell into the trope of a dumb blonde with a high-pitched voice. Early life ...

, who were married at the time. A live stage show toured England in the late 1980s and througout 1990s.

Litigation

The creator of the show successfully sued the manufacturer of lookalike memorabilia Mr Robert Redshaw of Kapow gifts, in 2013. This case was featured on an episode of '' The Sheriffs Are Coming'' on

BBC One BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's Flagship (broadcasting), flagship network and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News ...

Episode list

Series 1 (1980-1981)

Series 2 (1981-1982)

Series 3 (1983)

Series 4 (1985)

Series 5 (1986)

Series 6 (1987)

Series 7 (1988)

VHS and DVD releases

DVD

Button Moon - Boat Race was released on 6 July 2009 in the UK. It comprised 10 episodes. Button Moon - Talent Show was released in 2010 in the UK. It Comprised 3 episodes which are: Button Moon Talent Show, Dolly Teapot and The Fox and Hen. (Series 1): The Good Luck Bird; The Persian Market; Barn Dance; Music in the Air; Cinders and the Magic Beans (Other series): Button Hole Pond; Cows on Button Moon; Buttonhole Pond; Boat Race; and Buttonhole Pond (iTunes): Season 6 of ''Button Moon'' can now be purchased on iTunes UK.

Broadcast History

*In the United Kingdom, the series was first broadcast on ITV on terrestrial television. Years later it was repeated on satellite and cable television and was shown on various television networks including

The Children's Channel The Children's Channel, also known as TCC, was a British-based pan-European children's television channel in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, which was owned by Flextech in London, England, UK. It began broadcasting on the original Eutelsat ...

Nick Jr. Nick Jr. (known on-air as the Nick Jr. Channel) is an American pay television channel spun off from Nickelodeon's long-running programming block of the same name. It is run by Paramount Global through its networks division's Kids and Family Gr ...

and Nick Jr. Classics. *In New Zealand, the series was broadcast on

TVNZ 1 TVNZ 1 ( mi, Te Reo Tātaki Tahi) is the first national television channel owned and operated by the state-owned broadcaster Television New Zealand (TVNZ). It is the oldest television broadcaster in New Zealand, starting out from 1960 as indep ...

and

TVNZ 2 TVNZ 2 ( mi, Te Reo Tātaki Rua) is the second New Zealand television channel owned and operated by the state-owned broadcaster Television New Zealand (TVNZ). It targets a younger audience than its sister channel, TVNZ 1. TVNZ 2's line up cons ...

. *In Singapore, the series was broadcast on

Mediacorp Channel 5 Channel 5 (Chinese: 五頻道) is a free-to-air, English-language television channel in Singapore. Owned by state broadcaster Mediacorp, it broadcasts general entertainment, news, and sports programming. The channel's logo is a big white number ...

and

Mediacorp Channel 8 Channel 8 ( zh, 8頻道) is a Singaporean free-to-air television channel, airing in Mandarin Chinese. It was created by Television Singapura on 31 August 1963 with experimental broadcasts, before going official on 23 November that year. The ch ...

. *In Spain, the series was broadcast on

Telemundo Telemundo (; formerly NetSpan) is an American Spanish-language terrestrial television network owned by NBCUniversal Telemundo Enterprises, a division of NBCUniversal, which in turn is owned by Comcast. It provides content nationally with prog ...

. *In Germany, the series with its English voiceovers was broadcast on the

BFBS The British Forces Broadcasting Service (BFBS) provides radio and television programmes for His Majesty's Armed Forces, and their dependents worldwide. Editorial control is independent of the Ministry of Defence and the armed forces themselv ...

as well as its former network known as SSVC Television. It was also on SSVC Television and the BFBS in other countries including Falkland Islands, Cyprus, Gibraltar, Belize and Bosnia as well on satellite television in the United Kingdom which was the series' homeland. *In Zimbabwe, the series was broadcast on ZBC. *In Kenya, the series was broadcast on VOK (now KBC since 1989). *In Hong Kong, the series was broadcast on

TVB Television Broadcasts Limited (TVB) is a television broadcasting company based in Hong Kong SAR. The Company operates five free-to-air terrestrial television channels in Hong Kong, with TVB Jade as its main Cantonese language service, and TVB ...

. *In Iceland, the series was broadcast on

BBC Prime BBC Prime was the BBC's general entertainment TV channel in Europe, Middle East, Africa, South Asia and Asia Pacific from 30 January 1995 until 11 November 2009, when it was replaced by BBC Entertainment. Launch BBC Prime was launched a ...

with its original English language. The channel not only aired just works from the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

but also programmes from

's catalogue including the series.

References

External links

Button Moon
at Toonhound.com

*{{IMDb title, 0227882, Button Moon 1980s British children's television series 1980 British television series debuts 1988 British television series endings ITV children's television shows British children's adventure television series British television shows featuring puppetry Television series by FremantleMedia Kids & Family Television shows produced by Thames Television Television series set on fictional moons Space adventure television series English-language television shows