Brideshead Revisited (TV series)
1981 British television serial

Brideshead Revisited is a 1981 British television serial created by Derek Granger based on Evelyn Waugh's novel of the same name. Starring Jeremy Irons and Anthony Andrews, it was produced by Granada Television for broadcast by the ITV network. The serial is considered one of the 100 best TV shows of all time by Time magazine.
The serial is an adaptation of the 1945 novel Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh. It follows, from the 1920s to the early 1940s, the life and romances of Charles Ryder, with special focus on his friendship with Lord Sebastian Flyte and his family of wealthy and titled English Catholics, who live in Brideshead Castle, a palatial Baroque mansion in Wiltshire in the South West of England and shot at Castle Howard, in Henderskelfe. The screenplay was written by the series' producer Derek Granger and others, as the credited, original one written by John Mortimer was not used. Charles Sturridge said that 95% of the dialogue was from Waugh's novel. The 11-episode serial premiered on ITV in the UK on 12 October 1981; on CBC Television in Canada on 19 October 1981; and as part of the Great Performances series on PBS in the US on 18 January 1982.
In 2000, the serial was tenth on the list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes compiled by the British Film Institute, based on a poll of industry professionals. Significant elements of it were directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg, who handled the initial phases of the production, before Charles Sturridge carried on with the series.
The public source identifies “Brideshead Revisited (TV series)” as 1981 British television serial. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Brideshead, Revisited and series.
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Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1481423. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1981, 1945, 1982 and 2000.
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This entry incorporates text from “Brideshead Revisited (TV series)” 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.