site by RobinHoodSEO aka spiney

Richard Greene stars as Robin Hood, a nobleman forced into the life of an outlaw, dwelling in Sherwood Forest with a band of men who right the wrongs committed by the rich and powerful against the poor and defenseless. Robin Hood's enemy in the series is the Sheriff of Nottingham (Alan Wheatley) who, with his cohorts, schemes to capture the outlaw by any means possible. Maid Marian, a young noblewoman and Robin Hood's lover, keeps him informed of the Sheriff of Nottingham's whereabouts and intentions. Episodes are punctuated with manly deeds of derring-do, tense escapes and pursuits, princely tournaments, the thundering hoofbeats of powerful steeds, the clattering of flashing swords, and the whizzing of fatally-placed arrows.

The series was commissioned by Lew Grade and made by Sapphire Films Ltd for ITC Entertainment.  Grade had the programmes shot on 35mm film with one eye on the lucrative US markets.

Most of the action was filmed in the studio, with one large fake oak tree and lots of foliage standing in for Sherwood Forest, with a lot of the props on wheels to enable quick set changes, these unique production methods being introduced by art director Peter Proud.  There was some location filming, mainly involving horse-riding doubles and stuntmen, and without dialogue recording.  

American producer Hannah Weinstein brought in blacklisted US writers under assumed names (but more on that in a later edition of the magazine); a fact that seemed to ensure a high quality of scripts and continuity of story lines.

There was a constant stream of guest actors, including Donald Pleasance, Ian Hunter, up and coming actors/actresses such as Harry H Corbett, Thora Hird, Joan Sims and even Nicholas Parsons!  However, some of the series regulars were to also make guest appearances in other roles, Victor Woolf (Derwent) and Paul Eddington to name just two.

First transmitted in the UK on Sunday, 25th September 1955 with the very first episode 'The Coming of Robin Hood' - not forgetting that at that time not every region in the UK had a transmitter, and the main broadcasters, ATV and Granada, did not necessarily show the same episode.  However, that apart, the series was shown repeatedly in the early 1960's to another generation of children.