Give Us a Clue
television series
Give Us a Clue is a British televised game show version of charades, which was broadcast on ITV from 1979 to 1992. The original host was Michael Aspel from 1979 to 1984, followed by Michael Parkinson from 1984 to 1992. The show featured two teams, one captained by Lionel Blair and the other by Una Stubbs. Later editions of the programme had Liza Goddard as captain of the women's team. Norman Vaughan stood in for Blair for four episodes in the second series, and Joyce Blair stood in for Stubbs for the 1981 Royal Wedding special.
Originally, each team consisted of the captain, two fellow celebrities and one non-celebrity, but the non-celebrity participants were soon dropped, another celebrity being added in their place. In the second episode of Series 2 (broadcast on 5 November 1979), the non-celebrity contestant, London fashion designer Leslie Dean, read the wrong side of the card handed to him and as a result started miming his own name rather than the specified film. In his autobiography, Lionel Blair stated that it was this incident that led to the dropping of non-celebrity participants.
A revived version was broadcast by BBC One in 1997 over 30 episodes, hosted by Tim Clark. Teams were captained by Christopher Blake and Julie Peasgood, and the show introduced a lateral thinking puzzle (which the host could "give clues to").
The public source identifies “Give Us a Clue” as television series. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Give, Clue and television.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Give Us a Clue”, the useful work is to connect “television series” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 10, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5565779. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1979, 1992, 1984 and 1981.
Later fame can flatten the distinction between original context, subsequent adaptation and institutional collecting history. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Separate the work, its editions or performances, and its later reception. Catalogue records, publication histories and object files often preserve different parts of that story.
- Identifying works and editions
- Tracing reception history
- Finding collection records
The original object or edition, catalogue raisonné, performance record, rights file and holding institution.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Give Us a Clue”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Give Us a Clue primary sources, Give Us a Clue archive and Give research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Give Us a Clue”?
- How did later circulation or interpretation alter the work’s reception?
- Where is authorship, date or provenance documented?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Give Us a Clue” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.