Robin Hood (1953 TV series)

{{Short description|1953 TV series}}

{{distinguish|text=the better-known 1955-59 television series "The Adventures of Robin Hood"}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2016}}

{{Use British English|date=October 2016}}

{{Infobox television

| writer = Max Kester

| director = Joy Harington

| starring = {{Plain list|

• Patrick Troughton
• Wensley Pithey}}

| country = United Kingdom

| num_episodes = 6

| producer = Joy Harington

| first_aired = {{Start date|1953|03|17}}

| last_aired = {{End date|1953|04|21}}

}}Robin Hood is a 1953 six-episode British television series starring Patrick Troughton as Robin Hood and Wensley Pithey as Friar Tuck.{{Cite book |last=Smith |first=Neil |url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/841899099 |title=Robin Hood |date=2014 |others=Peter Dennis |isbn=978-1-4728-0125-8 |location=Cumnor Hill, Oxford, UK |oclc=841899099}} It was written by Max Kester, and produced and directed by Joy Harington for the BBC. The 1953 series was the first TV production of Robin Hood, although the 1955 series, The Adventures of Robin Hood, remains better known.{{Cite journal |last=Dahm |first=Murray |title=A Band of Merry Men |date=2018 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/48596801 |journal=Medieval Warfare |volume=8 |issue=5 |pages=54–57 |jstor=48596801 |issn=2211-5129}} A still photograph from the series showing Troughton as Robin Hood is seen in a 2014 episode of Doctor Who, the episode being titled Robot of Sherwood.

The 30-minute episodes were transmitted live, and only eight minutes from the second episode, The Abbot of St. Mary's, the earliest surviving footage of Troughton's television career, is believed to exist (as a 16mm telerecording). Troughton's son Michael mistakenly claimed in his father's biography that the full episode survived. Short clips of this material appeared in 2007 documentary, presented by Jonathan Ross, covering Robin Hood from its beginnings to the more recent BBC production (2006), and were also shown as an example of television production in the BBC documentary series Children's T.V. On Trial The 1950s. The surviving footage was also included on the 2020 DVD and Blu-Ray release of an animated reconstruction of the Doctor Who serial The Power of the Daleks, which also starred Patrick Troughton.