Michael Grade Management & Representation. Among the artists whom Grade represented were Morecambe and Wise (he successfully negotiated the duo's defection from ATV to BBC2 in 1968) and Larry Grayson. Grade entered the television industry in 1973 when he joined London Weekend Television (LWT) as Deputy Controller of Programmes (Entertainment). During this time he bought the scripts of an Afro-American sitcom "Good Times" which had an all-black cast. Adapted as "The Fosters" (1976–77), it became the first British sitcom to have an entirely black cast. At LWT, Grade worked with both John Birt and Greg Dyke. After he became Director of Programmes
The Sitcom Trials Canal Cafe Theatre, Finborough Theatre, Soho Theatre, Ealing Studios, The Green Room Club, and the Hen and Chickens Theatre. "The Sitcom Trials" debuted at the Gilded Balloon venue at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2001, with a show starring Miranda Hart, returning in 2002 & 2004. The first TV series was a Carlton production for ITV/HTV, broadcast live from Bristol over eight weeks in 2003. The first Hollywood "Sitcom Trials" took place in 2005. In 2008 the Sitcom Trials won the Fringe Report Award for Best Encourager of New Talent. In 2013 and 2016 The Sitcom Trials returned to the Gilded