E Street - UK Launch

UK Launch

In the UK, Sky Television bought the rights to the series in early 1992, some three years after its Australian debut and while the show was still a huge success on its home network. The entertainment channel Sky One had already screened long-running Aussie serials A Country Practice, The Young Doctors and The Sullivans in the 1980s and was screening Nine Network's flop 'adult' drama Chances the week E Street launched on Wednesdays and Thursdays at 9pm.

Sky Television aired E Street in a 30-minute format, stripped Mondays to Fridays at 6.30pm-7pm, with a repeat the following afternoon at 1pm. This format had also been used in the UK when broadcasting hour-long drama A Country Practice on ITV in the early 1990s. E Street launched on Sunday, 5 April 1992 and following the 2 hour pilot, Sky picked up the story from Episode 47 on Monday, 6 April, completely abandoning the opening 46 episodes that had achieved poor ratings in Australia.

Sky heavily publicised the launch of their new Australian soap, and promoted it with the taglines "Meet Your New Neighbours on E Street" and "Your New Neighbours are moving in", clearly using the popularity of the BBC's Neighbours to lure viewers. This slogan could be seen across the country on double decker buses, billboards and teen magazine advertisements. The actors Tony Martin (Bob), Alyssa-Jane Cook (Lisa), Marcus Graham (Wheels), Leslie Dayman (George), Cecily Polsen (Martha) and Vic Rooney (Ernie) all flew to Britain to appear in advertisements promoting the launch of the soap. The Sun newspaper ran competitions based on the show, with first prize being a holiday to Sydney, Australia; runners-up received satellite dishes so they could watch Sky - E Street had well-and-truly arrived in Britain. Indeed, during the first 12 months it aired in the UK, E Street became one of the highest rated programmes on Sky One averaging around 750,000-1 million viewers an episode. This was at a time when there was an available audience of only around 2.5 million, due to Sky only being available via the Astra satellite and selected cable areas.

During the hard-hitting storyline involving extreme character Sonny Bennett (Richard Huggett), he killed three characters in a shocking car-bomb explosion (episodes 170-171). In the UK, where E Street aired in an earlier timeslot, these episodes were broadcast on 23–24 March 1993 and were preceded by a warning to viewers that the episode contained scenes that some may find upsetting. The 12.30pm repeat the following day was dropped entirely and replaced by The Simpsons. Similarly, heavy cuts were made during the "Mr Bad" storyline, particularly the murders of Virginia Travis and Michael Sturgess which were edited for UK screenings.