My Old Man | |
---|---|
Genre | Sitcom |
Created by | Gerald Frow |
Written by | Gerald Frow |
Directed by | Paddy Russell |
Starring | |
Theme music composer | Chris Sandford |
Country of origin | England |
Original language | English |
No. of series | 2 |
No. of episodes | 13 |
Production | |
Producers | John Duncan (series 1) Paddy Russell (series 2) |
Editor | Tudor Lloyd |
Camera setup | Charles B. Wilson |
Running time | 30 minutes |
Production company | Yorkshire Television |
Original release | |
Network | ITV |
Release | 3 May 1974 – 23 April 1975 |
Related | |
Seven of One (1973) |
My Old Man is a sitcom starring Clive Dunn as retired and embittered engine driver Sam Cobbett. [1] ITV broadcast 13 episodes in two series during 1974 and 1975.
Set in London, Sam Cobbett is the last tenant to leave an old house on a council-condemned road. He goes to live with his daughter, her posh husband (Arthur), and their young teenage son (Ron), in a flat nearby.
The pilot was one of a series of seven one-offs in a BBC Two comedy anthology series called Seven of One (1973). The pilot starred Ronnie Barker as Sam Cobbett, with Graham Armitage and Ann Beach as Arthur and Doris, and was produced by Sydney Lotterby and Harold Snoad.
When the BBC failed to develop Gerald Frow's script into a series, Yorkshire Television stepped in, took over and introduced an entirely new cast with Clive Dunn in the lead part, whilst Ronnie Barker focused on his successful roles in Porridge and Open All Hours on the BBC.
The location of the main series remained unchanged from the pilot.
Series | Episodes | Originally aired | DVD release date | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Series premiere | Series finale | Region 1 | Region 2 | Region 4 | |||
1 | 7 | 3 May 1974 | 21 June 1974 | — | 2 August 2010 | — | |
2 | 6 | 19 March 1975 | 23 April 1975 | — | 23 January 2012 | — |
A British sitcom or a Britcom is a situational comedy programme produced for British television.
Sir David John White, known professionally by his stage name David Jason, is an English actor. He has played Derek "Del Boy" Trotter in the BBC sitcom Only Fools and Horses, Detective Inspector Jack Frost in A Touch of Frost, Granville in Open All Hours and Still Open All Hours, and Pop Larkin in The Darling Buds of May, as well as voicing several cartoon characters, including Mr. Toad in The Wind in the Willows, the BFG in the 1989 film, and the title characters of Danger Mouse and Count Duckula.
Ronald William George Barker was an English actor, comedian and writer. He was known for roles in British comedy television series such as Porridge, The Two Ronnies, and Open All Hours.
Eric Sykes was an English radio, stage, television and film writer, comedian, actor and director whose performing career spanned more than 50 years. He frequently wrote for and performed with many other leading comedy performers and writers of the period, including Tony Hancock, Spike Milligan, Tommy Cooper, Peter Sellers, John Antrobus and Johnny Speight. Sykes first came to prominence through his many radio credits as a writer and actor in the 1950s, which include collaboration on some scripts for The Goon Show. He became a TV star in his own right in the early 1960s when he appeared with Hattie Jacques in several popular BBC comedy television series.
Porridge is a British sitcom, starring Ronnie Barker and Richard Beckinsale, written by Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, and broadcast on BBC1 from 1974 to 1977. The programme ran for three series and two Christmas specials. A feature film of the same name based on the series was released in 1979.
Arthur Lowe was an English actor. His acting career spanned 37 years, including starring roles in numerous theatre and television productions. He played Captain Mainwaring in the British sitcom Dad's Army from 1968 until 1977, was nominated for seven BAFTAs and became one of the most recognised faces on UK television.
John Sessions, born John Marshall, was a British actor and comedian. He was known as a regular performer on comedy improvisation show Whose Line Is It Anyway?, as co-creator, co-writer and co-star of the sitcom Stella Street, as a panellist on QI, and as a character actor in numerous films, both in the UK and Hollywood.
Ronald Balfour Corbett was a Scottish actor, broadcaster and comedian. He had a long association with Ronnie Barker in the BBC television comedy sketch show The Two Ronnies. He achieved prominence in David Frost's 1960s satirical comedy programme The Frost Report and subsequently starred in sitcoms such as No – That's Me Over Here!, Now Look Here, and Sorry!
The Two Ronnies is a British television comedy sketch show starring Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett. It was created by Bill Cotton and aired on BBC1 from 10 April 1971 to 25 December 1987. The usual format included sketches, solo sections, serial stories and musical finales.
Chesney and Wolfe, were a British television comedy screenwriting duo consisting of Ronald Chesney and Ronald Wolfe. They were best known for their sitcoms The Rag Trade, Meet the Wife (1963–1966), On the Buses (1969–1973) and Romany Jones (1972–1975). When their partnership began in the mid-1950s, Chesney was already known to the public as a harmonica player.
Richard Arthur Beckinsale was an English actor. He played Lennie Godber in the BBC sitcom Porridge and Alan Moore in the ITV sitcom Rising Damp. He is the father of actresses Samantha and Kate Beckinsale.
Clive Walter Swift was an English actor and songwriter. A classically trained actor, his stage work included performances with the Royal Shakespeare Company, but he was best known to television viewers for his role as Richard Bucket in the BBC sitcom Keeping Up Appearances. He played many other television and film roles.
Comedy Playhouse is a long-running British anthology series of one-off unrelated sitcoms that aired for 128 episodes from 1961 to 1975. Many episodes later graduated to their own series, including Steptoe and Son, Meet the Wife, Till Death Us Do Part, All Gas and Gaiters, Up Pompeii!, Not in Front of the Children, Me Mammy, That's Your Funeral, The Liver Birds, Are You Being Served? and particularly Last of the Summer Wine, which is the world's longest running sitcom, having run from January 1973 to August 2010. In all, 27 sitcoms started from a pilot in the Comedy Playhouse strand.
Armchair Theatre is a British television drama anthology series of single plays that ran on the ITV network from 1956 to 1974. It was originally produced by ABC Weekend TV. Its successor Thames Television took over from mid-1968.
Seven of One, stylised as 7 of 1, is a British sitcom anthology series that aired on BBC2 in 1973. Starring Ronnie Barker, Seven of One is a series of seven separate 30-minute episodes that would serve as possible pilots for sitcoms. Originally it was to be called Six of One, which Barker planned to follow up with another series called And Half a Dozen of the Other. This was a BBC equivalent of a similar showcase for London Weekend Television called Six Dates with Barker created in 1971.
Six Dates with Barker is a series of six one-off, half-hour situation comedies showcasing the talents of Ronnie Barker. All were broadcast by London Weekend Television early in 1971.
Faces of Jim was a black-and-white British comedy television series starring Jimmy Edwards, June Whitfield and Ronnie Barker, with each episode being an individual half-hour sitcom. The first series aired as The Seven Faces of Jim, the second as Six More Faces of Jim and the third series as More Faces of Jim. All the episodes were written by Frank Muir and Denis Norden.
Bea Ballard is a British television executive producer. She is chief executive of 10 Star Entertainment, a production company set up in 2009 with investment from Fremantle. She is the daughter of novelist J. G. Ballard.
Dad's Army is a British television sitcom about the United Kingdom's Home Guard during the Second World War. It was written by Jimmy Perry and David Croft, and originally broadcast on BBC1 from 31 July 1968 to 13 November 1977. It ran for nine series and 80 episodes in total; a feature film released in 1971, a stage show and a radio version based on the television scripts were also produced. The series regularly gained audiences of 18 million viewers and is still shown internationally.
Clive Robert Bertram Dunn was an English actor. Although he was only 48 and one of the youngest cast members, he was cast in a role many years his senior, as the elderly Lance Corporal Jones in the BBC sitcom Dad's Army, which ran for nine series and 80 episodes between 1968 and 1977.