Just like radio, television broadcasting has come a long way in Singapore. There were plans to develop it as early as 1956, but they did not materialised until six years later.
It officially began in 1963 when Television Singapura was set up to offer an English-Malay Channel 5 and a Mandarin-Tamil Channel 8. A year later, advertisements were first telecasted between programs as a source of alternate income for the subsidised station.
In 1965, the year of Singapore’s independence, the television station was able to screen the most defining moment of our nation as Malaysian Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman announced the separation of Singapore and Malaysia.
Thousands in Singapore cramped into various community centres to watch former Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew on the national TV as he famously said with tears, “For me, it is a moment of anguish. All my life, my whole adult life, I have believed in merger and unity of the two territories.”
The new independent government of Singapore took control of both Television Singapura and Radio Singapura and combined them as Radio Television Singapura (RTS). A new station was built at Caldecott Hill at a cost of $3.6 million in 1966, and it has been the center of local media industry till today.
Another milestone was reached in 1974 when RTS started screening coloured telecasts, with the live World Cup Finals attracting overwhelming responses.
In order to grant RTS with great autonomy so it could expand its operation and improve its efficiency, the parliament passed a bill to turn RTS into a statutory board. In 1980, the Singapore Broadcasting Corporation (SBC) was born.
Several interesting children series were introduced in 1982 but the most memorable one was perhaps Little DD (小DD) which told a story of a robot and its friendship with six children.
Moving ahead, the eighties represented the golden era of local Chinese dramas. The first drama, Seletar Robbery (实里达大劫案) of 1982, was only made up of one episode. The 6-episode Army Series (新兵小传) launched in early 1983 left a deep impression to the local audience with its interesting plot about National Service (NS) life. The Flying Fish (小飞鱼) was introduced in August in conjunction with the National Day.
The Awakening (雾锁南洋) of 1984 was truly the first local blockbuster drama of Singapore. The storyline, which described the lifes of early Chinese immigrants, the resistance against Japanese Occupation and the difficulties of an independent Singapore, captured the imagination of countless Singaporeans. The drama and its sequels, as well as the soundtracks, became instant hits.
By the mid-to-late eighties, SBC was producing popular dramas with strong local flavours, such as Son of Pulau Tekong (亚答籽), The Coffee Shop (咖啡乌), Samsui Women (红头巾), Five Foot Way (五脚基), Teahouse in Chinatown (牛车水人家), The Last Applause (舞榭歌台) and Good Morning Sir! (早安老师).
Son of Pulau Tekong was the special one as it recorded the lifes of the natives and how they moved to mainland Singapore before the island was developed as a military base. NS personnel of yesteryear will not be unfamiliar with that transportation ship RPL (Ramp Powered Launch) which appears in the video below.
The various theme songs were also popular among the local viewers.
Local Chinese dramas reached its peak in the nineties with several blockbusters such as The Unbeatables (双天至尊), 1993, The Golden Pillow (金枕头), 1995, Tofu Street (豆腐街), 1996 and Stepping Out (出路), 1999. With the influence of foreign dramas from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan and Korea, the popularity of local dramas experienced a decline in the new millennium. The Little Nyonya (小娘惹) was one of the few recent ones that received rave reviews.
SBC went into privatisation in 1994 to become Television Corporation of Singapore (TCS). In a space of three years to 1997, TCS mass produced a total of 44 telemovies, where some of them such as Cupid Love (七月俏佳人), 1995, proved to be quite popular.
Among those who had watched SBC Channel 8 since its beginning, many would remember the various comedians that had ruled the mandarin channel. Each pair had their eras, with Wang Sha and Ye Feng (王沙野峰) being the earliest to humour the audience with their dialect jokes. Hua Liang and Zhao Jing (华亮兆锦) dominated the eighties while Jack Neo and Moses Lim helped sitcoms peak in the nineties.
Variety shows were also hugely popular on Channel 8, enjoying high viewership from Sharp Nite (声宝之夜), 1969 – 1981, Live from Studio One (缤纷83), 1983 – 1990, Perfect Match (金童玉女一线牵), 1985 – 1989, to the recent City Beat (城人新杂志) series.
Chen Shu Cheng (陈澍承), Zhou Ru Zhu (周如珠), Zhang Yong Quan (张永权), Wang Xiang Qing (王相钦) and Huang Yu Ling (黄毓玲) were the most popular hosts from the late eighties to early nineties. Chen Shu Cheng is an evergreen artiste who excels in both hosting and drama for decades.
Over to Channel 5, local English dramas were lagging behind their Mandarin counterparts as it was not until 1994 before the first drama, Masters of the Sea, was produced. Triple Nine followed but it was Growing Up that was the most popular among all, lasting a total of six seasons from 1996 to 2001.
Channel 5 was also the prime channel for then free-to-air English Division One and Italian Serie A football, and National Basketball Association (NBA) games. Delighted football and basketball fans were glued to their televisions, watching the likes of Ian Rush, Marco Van Basten and Magic Johnson.
When SBC began in 1984, it also launched Channel 12 catered for art and cultural program lovers. From the mid-nineties to the new millennium, the channel evolved into Malay channel Suria, Indian channel Vasantham and okto, the channel for global films, wildlife and arts documentaries.
When TCS was restructured to become MediaCorp TV in 2001, the Singapore Press Holdings joined in the media broadcasting industry with two free-to-air channels: Channel U and Channel i. However, the rivalry would last only three years as SPH MediaWorks merged with MediaCorp in 2004, a move that led to the cease of operation of Channel i.
MediaCorp will be moving to its new premise at one-north of Buona Vista in 2015, marking the end of its 50-year stay at Caldecott Hill.
Published: 13 August 2011
Updated: 14 October 2011
Keep it up! I really enjoy your site and these bits of information bring back so many fond memories for me.
Samsui Women!