This book explores the collaborative sitcoms of two of British television's most well-known comedy writers. Written over a period of twenty-five years, the four series Dad's Army, It Ain't Half Hot, Mum, Hi-de-Hil and You Rang M'Lord? have endured as much-loved and often-repeated classics. The book explores the themes of Perry and Croft's writing in terms of their own biography, and as articulations of British cultural and televisual history.
Focusing on issues central to the concept of identity in British culture, class, gender, sexuality and race, and analysing individual episodes and scenes in the four series, Jimmy Perry and David Croft evaluates the contributions made by these two writers to the genre of situation comedy, and locates the programmes in the immediate contexts of their production. Including new interview material from David Croft, this book will be invaluable to students and lecturers of television studies and cultural studies.
About the Author
A native of North Yorkshire, England, Dr. Simon Morgan-Russell earned his B.A. (Hons.) in English and American Literature from the University of Kent at Canterbury, in England, in 1989, and his M.A. and Ph.D. in English from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pa., in 1992 and 1994, respectively. He joined the faculty of Bowling Green State University’s English Department in 1994, and was promoted to associate professor with tenure in 2000 and to professor in 2007.
Dr. Morgan-Russell’s fields of specialization in English include Renaissance and Restoration drama and contemporary British television and film. He has published essays or articles in all of these areas, and in 2004 published a book, Jimmy Perry & David Croft, which discusses the evolution of the British situation comedy across the careers of two writers between the 1960s and the 1990s.
