First Among Equals: Story, Cast and Series Facts

Story and premise

As in the novel, the series follows the careers and personal lives of four fictional British politicians from 1964 to 1991, with each vying to become Prime Minister. Several situations in the novel are drawn from Archer's own early political career in the British House of Commons. While the novel depitcts the fictional characters interacting with actual political figures from the UK and elsewhere, this adaptation uses different names for the real-life politicians.

The title of both the novel and the serial is a literal translation of the Latin term primus inter pares, a term used to refer to either the most senior member of a group of equals or to refer to someone who claims to be just one member of a group of equals when in reality he or she completely dominates said group. This phrase is used to describe the official constitutional status of the British Prime Minister within his Cabinet.

Series details

• Title: First Among Equals
• Format: Scripted
• Language: English
• Genres: Drama
• Premiere date: 1986-09-30
• Final broadcast date listed: 1986-12-02
• Status in TVmaze: Ended
• Network listed by TVmaze: ITV1
• Network country: United Kingdom
• Typical episode runtime: 60 minutes
• TVMaze ID: 50962

Cast and credited roles

• James Faulkner — Simon Kerslake
• Jeremy Child — Charles Gurney Seymour
• Tom Wilkinson — Raymond Gould
• David Robb — Andrew Fraser

Seasons in the TVmaze catalogue

• Season 1: premiered 1986-09-30; final listed air date 1986-12-02; episode order: 10.

Source and licence

Adapted from First Among Equals on TVmaze. The synopsis is reproduced as plain text; catalogue facts, cast and season records are selected and reformatted. This adapted text is available under CC BY-SA 4.0, following the TVmaze API licence. Network and web-channel credits identify the service listed in this source; they do not establish current streaming availability.