1:15pm Saturday 28th August 2010
TOMORROW, the last bottle of summer wine will be uncorked as we say a fond farewell to a national institution.
Since it first aired in January 1973, Roy Clarke’s sit-com has turned the likes of Foggy, Clegg and Compo – along with the harridan Nora Batty – into household names and from the start, millions have tuned in for their weekly glass of vintage comedy.
Last Of The Summer Wine premiered as an episode of Comedy Playhouse and the adventures of three bungling, elderly oddballs went on to became the world’s longest-running sit-com. At times drawing audiences of 19 million, it seemed immortal.
Until, that is, the BBC decided to pull the plug. Two months ago, the corporation announced it had shelved plans for a further series and the current one would be the last.
Barnsley poet Ian McMillan thinks it is probably about time. Ian, who will pay tribute to the comedy classic on BBC Radio 4 tomorrow afternoon, says: “I think over it lost some of its subtlety. A bit like us in middle age really, it sort of hardened into a version of itself.
“For me the language was always the glory. Roy Clarke sat in that windmill near Doncaster and he came up with some amazing lines; about really deep things and love and despair.
“Compo sliding down a hill on a slide was never what it was all about and with all the changes it’s become a bit like a brush with a new head and a new pole; you begin to wonder if it’s still the real summer wine?
“So it’s probably time to pack up now before the programme gets stale. Then we can remember the good times fondly.”
Despite cast changes, the central theme remained of three old men from Yorkshire who have never quite grown up and who stay young by reminiscing about their youth, while attempting feats not normally associated with pensioners.
It was old-fashioned, slapstick comedy coupled with unlikely romances, and that has been key to its enduring appeal.
The programme also made Holmfirth a tourist magnet, as hordes descended on the West Riding mill town in search of Nora’s house, or the street where she hitched her wrinkled stockings before literally brushing off Compo and his amorous advances.
Then there are the tours of Sid’s café, where plans were hatched and wheezes formulated, which more often than not involved runaway jalopies made from rickety old prams, as the hapless eccentrics careered down yet another hill before landing head first in a hayrick.
But it wasn’t always like that. In the first series, Compo and Clegg were joined by the authoritarian and snobbish Blamire, played by Michael Bates of It Ain’t Half Hot Mum fame. It was an altogether less frantic affair, set in the public library, where the old boys would mull over issues that only ever seem to concern people who have too much time on their hands.
When Bates left in 1976, the now familiar format evolved as Brian Wilde hung up his prison keys for the last time, left Porridge and joined as Foggy, the quirky war hero – who turned out not to be.
With Wilde aboard, the gentle comedy changed tack. The men, who steadfastly refused to grow up, sauntered round town getting up to mischief and passing the time of day with equally eccentric fellow townspeople.
And the cast grew to include a variety of supporting characters, each of whom contributed their own subplots and often became unwittingly involved in the trio’s pranks.
After the death in 1999 of Bill Owen, who played Compo, his shoes were filled at times by his real-life son, Tom. And with an ageing cast, new blood filled the lead roles for the 30th series, with Russ Abbot as Hobbo, a former milkman who fancies himself as a secret agent, Burt Kwouk as electrical repairman Entwistle, and Brian Murphy as Alvin.
The only remaining member of the original gang is Peter Sallis as Clegg, who now plays a supporting role alongside the new actors.
And when Sallis went to receive his OBE at Buckingham Palace, he learned that one of the shows biggest fans is the Queen. As she put the medal on his chest, Her Majesty told him, “I love Last Of The Summer Wine.”
So tomorrow there won’t be a dry eye in many households, including the Royal one, when the closing harmonica refrain lilts in the background as Clegg decants the last lines in the last episode of a national treasure.
• Broadcaster and poet Ian McMillan will pay homage to television’s longest running situation comedy, Last Of The Summer Wine on tomorrow at 1.30pm on BBC Radio 4.
• We asked people in York what they thought about the series coming to an end.
Daniel Wilder, 19, from Haxby was busy on the VisitYork stand in St Helen’s Square. He used to watch Last Of The Summer Wine but stopped because he says it’s not the same as it used to be. “I think it’s become part of British culture and something we will never get back. For me, Nora Batty was brilliant, completely nuts and I loved everything about her. But I don’t watch it now; I think it’s time for the programme to go.”
However, Daniel says he will be tuning in tomorrow to say a fond farewell, as will Nan and Marshall Kirkland. “I think it’s a shame its going,” says Nan, 63. “It’s a gentle, innocent programme and all we ever seem to get on TV now is rubbish like Big Brother.”
Marshall, 65, agrees: “All the good shows are finished now. This was a programme that took us back, it was good, clean family entertainment and now it will just make way for more rubbish. They’ll repeat it, just like they do with Only Fools and Horses, and I think the BBC has made a big mistake.”
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