To mark the rescreening of Our Friends in the North, as part of the BBC's centenary celebrations, Christopher Eccleston looks back on Peter Flannery's acclaimed 1996 drama. Following the lives of four friends from Newcastle over a period of three decades, the series struck a chord with the nation's viewers and turned its young cast into household names.

In this introduction to the series, Eccleston shares behind-the-scenes stories of how the drama was made and assesses the impact it had on audiences, himself and his fellow cast members.