Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit (TV serial)

Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is a 1990 BBC television drama miniseries, directed by Beeban Kidron. Jeanette Winterson wrote the screenplay, adapting her semi-autobiographical first novel of the same name (published 1985). The BBC produced and screened three episodes, running to a total of 2 hours and 45 minutes. The series was released on DVD in 2005.

The series won the BAFTA award for Best Drama Series or Serial.

Storyline
Charlotte Coleman starred as Jess, a girl growing up in a Pentecostal evangelical household in Accrington, Lancashire, England in the 1970s, who comes to understand that she is a lesbian. The allegorical fairytales that are woven into the novel do not appear on the screen. Miss Jewsbury's love-making with the underage Jess, which appears in the novel, was also excluded. Even with these cuts, the series caused controversy when shown due to the remaining lesbian sex scenes and its portrayal of the Elim Pentecostal ‘‘faith’’.

Cast

 * Jess - Charlotte Coleman
 * Small Jess - Emily Aston
 * Jess's mother - Geraldine McEwan
 * Pastor Finch - Kenneth Cranham
 * William - Peter Gordon
 * Cissy - Barbara Hicks
 * Elsie - Margery Withers
 * May - Elizabeth Spriggs
 * Mrs Green - Freda Dowie
 * Miss Jewsbury - Celia Imrie
 * Jess's real mum - Sophie Thursfield
 * Mrs Arkwright - Pam Ferris
 * Mrs Virtue - Katy Murphy
 * Mrs Vole - Sharon Bower
 * Doctor - David Thewlis
 * Gypsy - Kay Clayton
 * Church Pianist - Tamar Swade
 * Melanie - Cathryn Bradshaw
 * Graham - Richard Henders
 * Katy - Tania Rodrigues
 * Nurse - Suzanne Hall

Awards
The series won the BAFTA award for Best Drama Series or Serial.

In 1991, via the PBS network, the series won the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding TV Movie or Limited Series.

In 2010, The Guardian ranked the miniseries at number 8 in their list of "The Top 50 TV Dramas of All Time".