Cutting Edge (TV series)

Episodes

The series produced numerous episodes between 19 February 1990 and 26 October 2017. A 1994 episode about the England national football team's unsuccessful attempt to qualify for the 1994 World Cup received some of Channel 4's highest ratings. It covered manager Graham Taylor's harsh criticism by the tabloid press during 1992–93 and showed a stressed team camp; the documentary gave rise to Taylor's catchphrase "Do I not like that" and Phil Neal's comment "Can we not knock it, boss?" An episode on 8 May 2001 followed Brian Davis, a former advertising journalist and published author who had worked as an editor for Campaign before walking out due to manic depression, and who was then homeless, penniless and an alcoholic living on London's streets. A run in 2005 included episodes about elderly recipients of Asbos, "The Black Widow", "Gridlock" and "The House Clearers". On 29 June 2005, a documentary on Dena Thompson, who murdered her second husband and had a 20-year career of fraud, deception and bigamy, drew 4.5 million viewers (a 22% share). A 2007 documentary following students at the Royal National College for the Blind in Hereford won a Royal Television Society award for Channel Four and the Cutting Edge team in 2008. On 24 January 2008, an episode followed 16-year-old cystic fibrosis sufferer Alex Stobbs as he attempted to conduct Bach's Magnificat at Eton College; a second documentary in October 2009 called "Alex: A Passion for Life" examined his life as a music student at King's College, Cambridge. Other episodes covered climber Alain Robert on free climbs (15 April 2008), the disappearance of Madeleine McCann (7 May 2009), and the kidnapping of Jaycee Lee Dugard with interviews with people close to her when she was young (1 October 2009).