Suicide, bullying, anorexia, even heroin addiction; nothing was off-limits for cult children’s TV show Grange Hill.

But when the programme launched in 1978, few teachers would have dared raise these topics in class.

These days, teachers are far more likely to broach contentious themes with pupils - and this is in no small part thanks to Grange Hill‘s gritty storylines, a former cast member believes.

“It really was groundbreaking,” said Linda Magistris, an original cast member who played the part of bullied schoolgirl Susi McMahon. 

Susi McMahon:

Ms Magistris said: “There were people being thrown into toilets, being bullied...the drugs storyline. There was cancer, anorexia, bulimia - it just went on and on. All those real issues that children of that age are going through and weren’t being spoken about.”

As well as having a memorably jaunty theme tune, the programme was noteworthy for depicting a London comprehensive with teenagers who said “flippin ‘eck”,  carried knives and sniffed glue.

Despite being truer to life that most other portrayals of school life at the time, some of the show’s more shocking plots made front-page news in the 1970s and ‘80s. Some children - including those who now hold senior roles in the Tes newsroom - were banned from watching it altogether.

‘Breaking down barriers between teachers and pupils’

Ms Magistris remembers teachers saying that the TV programme had prompted staffroom discussions, and had encouraged them to think about what their own pupils might be going through.

“I remember people were talking about it. I remember teachers saying, ‘I hadn’t really thought about this but maybe we should start discussing this with pupils.’”

Linda Magistris now:

For many viewers, the show was as much about the teachers - the likes of Mrs McClusky and Mr Bronson - as the children. And describing the sometimes close relationships between school staff and pupils helped to break down traditional teacher-student barriers in real-life schools, Ms Magistris said.

“Whereas before, it was ‘them and us’, I think a lot of confidences were built up with those teachers, and that hadn’t been shown before,” she said.

“So I think having that rapport with someone you can trust at school had never really been highlighted before. That’s really key, because if you’re struggling maybe at home with trying to discuss those really personal issues with parents, to know you’ve got someone at school to do it, that again was brought out in Grange Hill.

“So I’m hoping that those teachers thought, ‘Well, hang on a minute, this has given us license to bring out those conversations that maybe will help people.’”

Ms Magistris, who is now a presenter on the QVC shopping channel, is still in touch with her former cast members including Todd Carty, who played heartthrob Peter “Tucker” Jenkins. 

Many years after leaving Grange Hill, she bumped into Graham Theakston, a former director of the show who became her long-term partner. But he died of cancer three years ago.

A 40 Years of Grange Hill event is being held tomorrow and all proceeds will go to the Good Grief Trust, a charity that Linda Magistris set up after Graham’s death.