Only When I Laugh (1979-1982) - Season 3 Episodes and Ratings

A TV crew arrive to shadow Thorpe for a day. He has primed Norman to give a glowing report but Norman keeps fluffing his lines, leaving Glover is only too keen to take over.

Extreme right-wing MP Sir Julian Briggs is admitted to the ward, angering socialist Figgis, though Thorpe is anxious to get him on side as the hospital faces closure.

When new doctor Amy Glossop starts on the ward, Thorpe is initially hostile due to her gender, though both Glover and Norman have fallen in love with her.

Believing that Glover is lonely, Figgis writes an anonymous letter in character as Glover to agony aunt Clare Butterfield, who is annoyed by the writer's arrogance. However, Glover has answered an ad and is expecting a visit from the free-thinking Leonora.

Norman witnesses an accident outside the hospital gates involving Thorpe and young speed freak Ronnie, though it is the doctor who would appear to be in the wrong when his breath sample proves positive. Figgis and Glover stage a mock trial to get Norman to divulge the truth.

Norman has been keeping a diary and Figgis and Glover are anxious to see what he's written about them. On stealing the diary, they find that most of the entries are fantasies in which Norman is the brave patient soothing everybody else's nerves, as well as inventing a romance between himself and the notoriously icy Nurse Bradley.

Figgis takes exception to the hospital radio run by nurse Victoria and, when she accidentally leaves her recording equipment, spices things up by taping and broadcasting one of Thorpe's tirades.

On Christmas Eve, the ward gets a new patient, eight year old elected mute Danny, a known arsonist whose parents are abroad. Figgis dresses up as Santa Claus to steal presents for him from the children's ward but is rumbled and has to escape, getting the benefits of kisses from nurses who mistake him for the hospital's other Santa.