A Way of Winning

Morloch discovers that Leroy used to run track and encourages him to try out for an athletic scholarship at Braddock college. Lydia is totally against the idea the the harder she fights to keep Leroy in School the more she pushes him into the idea of applying for the scholarship.

 Meanwhile Doris goes undercover dressed as a pensioner in order to gain an insight into old people for an acting assignment but things get out of hand when she starts to fall in love with the pensioner she befriends. 

Finally an episode that includes the entire cast! Although most of them don't actually have very much to do as the story concentrates on Doris, Leroy and Lydia. Still it's nice to see David and Bruno back on the show.

The episode is good although I'm not keen on all the running scenes as it feels like they are just filler. The whole Leroy story is okay but we have never heard anything about him being an athlete before and the whole story feels a little contrived. Leroy only goes for the trial because Lydia says he can't but as soon as he doesn't win the race he's not interested any more and only wants to go back to the school and they never mention running again. Surely if the scholarship was that good a chance he'd want to try again.

There are some great scenes between Morloch and Lydia and no matter what Lydia says everyone seems to be able to counter her points with a better argument which makes her more and more frustrated. Even Sherwood disagrees with her. I do love the beginning where Morloch interrupts the dancers and Lydia's angry with him saying it better be important. Morloch starts off all aggressive "Would I dare interrupt a rehearsal if it was important" then sees Lydia's angry face and quickly changes his tone and backs down a little.

The best part of the episode is Doris falling in love (again) with Bert. It is just like Doris to come up with some crazy scheme to dress up as an older person to help her portray that character in a play. Her findings that old and young people have exactly the same feelings is really touching and the scenes with Bert are beautifully played. Lew Ayres is such a sweet, gentleman that he really draws the audience in with his performance. It is really sad that he has to get hurt thinking his friend has died. The first time I watched this story I didn't really consider how cruel things end up being for Bert and makes me question is having a friend die really a better option than being told the truth that it all started off as an exercise to find out about older people. Their final scene together which leads into Doris' performance in drama class is really good and brings me to tears.

There is also lots of fun with Doris dressing up before she meets Bert when she's talking to Bruno, "usually I don't go out with younger men"! Then when Danny is complaining about her being in a bad mood she treads on his foot and shoves him.

Although that same scene includes Danny claiming he has to baby sit his brother. Big continuity error as 2 episodes later he doesn’t have a brother. Maybe he’s making up an excuse here as he doesn’t want to be hanging out with his friends or knowing how the shows time line changes all the time, maybe Danny's brother dies between episodes!! 

I love the song "That Dream" and it's a shame that the song is actually cut in half and that we don't get a full rendition of the song at the end. All they need to do is edit some of the running and they can fit it in. I would have much preferred that.

As Debbie doesn't really have any songs in this series it would have been nice if she had been singing the song that plays when Lydia is dancing for Leroy.

I love that they reprise Val singing "Turn To Me" it fits in so perfectly into the storyline. 

Original  air date in U.S.A 26th February 1984

Original  air date  in U.K. 25th May 1984,  Repeated on The Children's Channel  Autumn 1992

Original air date in The Netherlands  05th June 1984

Original air date in Italy 10th August  1986

Original air date in Belgium  21st June 1988      

Original  air date in France 31st December 1988