Channel 5 celebrate the world of Last of the Summer Wine

Channel 5’s love of the Yorkshire region reaches the sitcom Last of the Summer Wine, set in Holmfirth.

The broadcaster celebrates ’30 years of laughs’ from the veteran comedy which began on BBC One in 1973. Starring Bill Owen (Coppers End, Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads, Emergency Ward 10), Peter Sallis (Doctor Who, Armchair Theatre, Wallace & Gromit) and Kathy Staff (Coronation Street, Crossroads, Castle Haven) as well as several other leads and co-stars over the years it followed the lives of retirement age gents who were still children at heart.

The men were fools and the women were hard as nails and the comedy from those two disagreeing sexes formed most of the plots, along with the childish dares and adventures Compo (Owen), Clegg (Sallis) and most popular sidekick Foggy (Brian Wilde, Porridge, Z Cars, The Dustbinmen) got themselves entangled in.

Written by Roy Clarke who has also given us Keeping Up Appearances and Open All Hours, the show at its peak commanded 18 million viewers and was, when it ended in 2010, still drawing a hugely respectable 4 million – double what EastEnders currently manage on an average evening. But it wasn’t cool, it wasn’t edgy, it was frankly an embarrassment to the BBC Comedy department – and that was wrong. As the BBC noted recently over 12 million pensioners currently live in the UK, but the Beeb offer very little for them with a mad obsession with ‘youth’.

Maybe, this is why Channel 5 is proving popular with the age range that has the most disposable cash to hand and are bringing in decent ratings to their older viewer aimed offerings.

Last of the Summer Wine itself was a production that provided work for many performers who would rarely have been seen on TV otherwise, other than a bit-part in Doctors or The Bill.

Veterans of comedies from the past formed the key cast of the show in its later years with names from Are You Being Served, On The Buses, George & Mildred and Keeping Up Appearances all featuring such as Frank Thornton, Trevor Bannister, Barbara Young, Russ Abbot, Brian Murphy, Burt Kwouk, Josephine Tewson, Christopher Beeny, Jean Fergusson and of course legendary Coronation Street actress Jean Alexander.

Following the death of Bill Owen in 1999 his son Tom joined the cast as Compo’s son and the show survived another eleven years, but it was never the same. Kathy Staff died in 2008 leaving another gap in the familiar faces. The final episode of Last of the Summer Wine aired on August 29th 2010. The BBC marked the end of the series with a special episode of Songs Of Praise from Holmfirth.

Since then most of the cast have sadly departed with Frank Thornton in 2013, Stephen Lewis in 2015, Jean Alexander in 2016, Peter Sallis and Jane Freeman in 2017, Jean Fergusson and Juliette Kaplan in 2019 and Robert Fyfe in 2021.

However, for over 30 years and almost 300 episodes, the gang gave laughs aplenty to its loyal fans, which Channel 5 will celebrate this evening. The series is also regularly repeated on UKTV channels ‘Gold’ and ‘Drama’.

Last of the Summer Wine: 30 Years of Laughs, Channel 5, 8.30 pm