The Liver Birds sequence for series one also exists but in poor quality. The first series was stopped after four episodes because Polly James' hectic schedule—working every evening on "Anne of Green Gables" in the West End, then rehearsing all day for the TV show—was proving too much. By the time James was available again, Pauline Collins had moved to LWT's "Upstairs, Downstairs". The producer Sydney Lotterby remembered having worked with Nerys Hughes on "The Likely Lads" and, wrongly believing the Welsh actress was from Liverpool, asked her to read for a part in "The Liver Birds". (Neither actress really had a Liverpool
Nerys Hughes Hobbs Bursary. One of Hughes's early dramatic roles was in Ken Loach's television series titled "Diary of a Young Man" in 1964. She is best known for the role of Sandra Hutchinson in the enormously successful BBC TV series "The Liver Birds" which ran from 1969 to 1978 with a brief revival in 1996. Her main co-stars were Mollie Sugden and Polly James. She later played the eponymous lead in "The District Nurse", a series which was written for her, and won the Variety Club Television Actress of the Year Award. The series was released on DVD in 2006. She