Comedy Playhouse: Where It All Began

SYNOPSIS

As the Comedy Playhouse returns to BBC One for three new one-off sitcoms, this documentary looks back through the archive to some of the best-loved programmes born out of the original run. Launched in 1961 as a vehicle for Tony Hancock writers Ray Galton and Alan Simpson to explore new ideas, it soon allowed others playwrights on board, and over the next 13 years saw the pilot episodes of several long-running comedies, from Steptoe and Son and Till Death Us Do Part to The Liver Birds, Up Pompeii, Are You Being Served? and Last of the Summer Wine. With contributions from June Whitfield, Paul Merton, Hugh Dennis and Galton and Simpson.