Seasons
Spending a weekend at Lord Hawkcombe's country house, Brian Stead is offered the use of Hawkcombe's Hebridean island as a test site for a new Mogul rocket fuel. Peter Thornton visits the island and finds a hippie colony living there by informal arrangement with the bailiff, who are determined to fight for their home. Meanwhile Stead is much taken with Hawkcombe's sister, Lady Diana Embersham.
A pay claim at a Mogul petrochemical plant divides the company's leadership. Brian Stead wants to settle quickly, while James Langley sees a chance to try out his fresh thinking on industrial relations. When Langley is called away after his wife is badly hurt in a car accident, Willy Izard steps in, and Stead's opposition hardens.
Mogul's gas pipeline across New Zealand's North Island halts at the edge of Maori land regarded as tapu, or sacred. The chief, a former Mogul toolpusher, has given his consent, but many of his people resent it, and after an explosion wrecks the pipeline, work comes to a halt. Peter Thornton is caught in the middle of the dispute, which also divides the chief and his daughter Kiri, and James Langley flies in to assist.
Brian Stead and James Langley try to enjoy a quiet weekend with their families while thrashing out a problem in Bahrain. Stead learns that his daughter and her RAF husband, Tom Hart, may soon move to the United States with the grandchildren, while Langley and his wife Britte wait anxiously to hear whether an adoption society will approve them as parents.
Willy Izard and his wife Joan, recovering from a breakdown, head for a campsite in the south of France hoping a simple life will help mend their marriage. Their holiday is soon disturbed, first by Mallin, a lonely man in the neighbouring tent recently deserted by his wife, and then by the arrival of James Langley and Peter Thornton for a confidential meeting about a Middle East agreement.
Mogul and its French partner, Huile France, are drilling in Corsica, but trouble in Algeria leads the French to seek changes to the agreement that would leave Mogul with more work and more risk. Peter Thornton and Willy Izard take on the talks with Huile France and soon begin to suspect that their partners are not dealing with them honestly.
Willy Izard, now Mogul's finance director, faces a severe test when Brian Stead and James Langley both demand large sums for new projects at very short notice. The episode follows Izard into the realities of corporate finance as he works to find the money from bankers and investors without compromising Mogul's position.
Island politician Bonaparte Paroa offers Mogul the chance to drill off his home in French Polynesia and offers a promising seismic survey, but when Peter Thornton arrives he finds Paroa in prison, albeit in great comfort. Thornton suspects the politician is using Mogul in his campaign for independence from France, while in Paris James Langley discovers that the French government is trying to use Mogul against Paroa.
James Langley asks Willy Izard to lead the European oil companies' delegation at talks in Mexico City, where Zenith dominates the Latin American market and refuses to negotiate. As the intrigue mounts, Peter Thornton brings word that Zenith is quietly negotiating a private arrangement with another member of the group, and Izard turns for help to an old flame, Lita Perez, who has influential friends.
Peter Thornton is aboard the aircraft carrier Ark Royal for trials of Mogul's latest aviation fuel when a Mogul supertanker not far away is sunk by an explosion. The Royal Navy mounts a rescue search from the carrier, and Thornton finds the new fuel being tested under far more dangerous conditions than anyone had planned.
Because of a computer mistake, it appears that a Mogul subsidiary has found vast nickel deposits in Australia's Gibson Desert, and the shares react. Willy Izard flies out to protect Mogul's financial reputation, with Peter Thornton checking the geology in case the nickel is real and ambitious new recruit Paddy Hedgewood sent along simply to keep her at a distance. In the desert they meet an old miner who claims the land is his.
Mogul finds what appears to be a single large oilfield beneath the Bay of Biscay, straddling French and Spanish waters. On the road to San Sebastián, James Langley and Peter Thornton are ambushed, and Langley is taken to a hideout in the Pyrenees by Basque nationalists, who will free him only if Mogul recognises Basque claims to the oil and negotiates with the exiled Basque government.
Mogul has committed £60 million to drilling at two sites in Peru, and when Ica yields oil the company wants to drop Lake Titicaca and renegotiate, but the Peruvian government proves difficult. At Ica, Peter Thornton clashes with archaeologist Maria Santiago, who objects to his plan to route a pipeline along an ancient Indian watercourse, and when Willy Izard leaves, James Langley takes over the talks.
James Langley takes up his new appointment as deputy chairman, and his feud with Brian Stead over how to bring the Norwegian oil ashore continues. Willy Izard, at odds with Stead, considers resigning. Meanwhile Peter Thornton takes on Kirsten Hansen, who lost her brother in the rig accident, as his assistant in London, and events in the North Sea could change the balance of the argument.
A big oil discovery in Norwegian waters sets off a fierce battle inside Mogul. Brian Stead wants to pipe the oil to Britain, but chairman Sir Charles Bliss and James Langley, the English head of Mogul Scandinavia, favour bringing it into Europe through Langley's territory by tanker. Peter Thornton goes to assess Langley's scheme, and Stead finds he dislikes both the man and his ideas.
Description
The Troubleshooters is a British television series made by the BBC between 1965 and 1972, created by John Elliot. During its run, the series made the transition from black and white to colour transmissions.
The series was based around an international oil company – the "Mogul" of the title. The first series was mostly concerned with the internal politics within the Mogul organisation, with episodes revolving around industrial espionage, internal fraud and negligence almost leading to an accident on a North Sea oil rig.
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Genres
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CastGeoffrey KeenRay BarrettPhilip LathamJohn Carson
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Channel
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Premiere DateJuly 07, 1965
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Rating7.3 (3)
