Terry and June and other sitcoms in similar genre

[Charley1988]

I used to love this program and felt that this was the template for sitcoms if it's time and everything else was a variation on a theme - anyone remember the sitcom with Judi Dench playing opposite her real life husband - i think she sang the theme tune (before this became a joke in Littelt Britain) . Am I BU in being nostalgic for the days of this kind of TV - do you think these kind of progs would seem a bit dated now?

MrsGrindah its Keep it in the Family your thinking of for the illustrator with Robert Gillespie

That’s the one! Thanks

A couple of my favourites is George and Mildred and on the buses.

Porridge is a classic and I never get tired of it. Loved all of the stars in that and especially Peter Vaughan as Grouty.

Waiting for GOF with the fab Stephanie Cole...it also had Daniel Hill in as the manager of the home who is just brilliant in everything.

Onky Fools and Horses goes without saying as a brilliant series.

Butterflies.

Outside Edge (a bit later) about a local cricket team with the sublime Brenda Blethyn.

In Sickness and in Health was also good....the terrible Alf Garnett. But so well done....as Warren Mitchell said “poking fun at racists”.

I also loved Till Death us Do Part with Dandy Nicholls as his wife....turning her hearing aid off so she didn’t have to listen to him moaning.

Hancock's Half Hour, The Lovers, The Likely Lads, the Biederbecke Affair, Fawlty Towers, Blackadder, Ab Fab were all favourites. And yes we had a Teasmade. 😊 The children knew they could get up when it went off.

I've got loads of 70s/80s sitcom recordings on video or DVD and bring them out to watch regularly.

Fawlty Towers
To the manor born
The Good Life
George & Mildred
Man about the house
Bless This House
Aint alf ot Mum
Robin's Nest
Cuckoo Waltz
Dad's Army
Open all hours
Steptoe
Likely Lads

There are a few I really couldn't get on with (Sorry, I know people rave about them:):-

Porridge,
Some mothers
On the buses
Reginald Perrin
Citizen Smith
Liver birds
Hi De Hi
Are you being served
Butteflies
As time goes by (can't stand Judi Dench!)

Funny that some things just "click" and others don't.

As for more recent "sitcoms", sorry, just don't find modern comedians are actually funny at all - mostly just sarcastic and nasty and life's too short for that kind of thing.

Not sure if anyone has mentioned 'My wife next door'.
Thought it was very funny at the time - fear it might be awful now though .

I loved ever decreasing circles and still do!

I remember My Wife Next Door. A divorced couple who ended up living next doorto each other?

Hannah Gordon and John Alderton?

I had a teasmade
Was naff and a faff
Tiny little cups
No good for me

All Creatures Great and Small, although admittedly a book adaptation and set after WW2.
A Very Peculiar Practice was excellent.
Ever Decreasing Circles wonderful, Butterflies peerless.

The Good Life Christmas episode is watched in this house every year on Christmas Eve

Yes I remember my wife next door
Liked Hannah Gordon
Wonder what happened to her

Loved all creatures great and small
Have you been round the vets museum in thirsk
It’s excellent

Dowser Hannah Gordon has been in quite a few Radio Plays and also presented a watercolours painting program a while back

Oh the good life Barbara and Tom
So funny

@Gechwister4 I remember Shine On Harvey Moon, it was great. One episode still stands out to me, where there was a gay character and a campaign of bigotry and whispering against him in the community. Harvey was one of the ones who stuck up for him and it struck me then how unusual it still was to see that sort of enlightened attitude on mainstream tv!

Oh yes just good friends what was his name Vince?
He’d get hauled over the coals today

And Penny

Television was so much ‘nicer’ in the olden days. Humerous but not unkind.

Liked Hannah Gordon. Wonder what happened to her

She’s still acting. She played the vicar’s wife in the first Unforgotten.

I also liked Butterflies, but whoever said upthread that Wendy Craig meant gentle comedy must have forgotten the bit in Butterflies where she was on her own, bemoaning aloud about her boring life, and finished by shouting "I want to be raped!"

I'm surprised Butterflies is being included in this list, it took the home counties suburban sitcom and showed it wadn't all happy. Ria is treated like shit by her family and is bored in her role as housewife. Carla Lane wrote much more interesting stuff than the likes of T&J (Bread is hers as well isn't it).

Richard Wilson (like Ronnie Corbett) clearly has a middle class Edinburgh accent, everyone in Scotland doesn't have a working class Glasgow accent . See also: Steven Robertson (Shetland) or Karen Gillan (Inverness) or Annie Lennox (working class Aberdeen) or Tessa Jowell (privately educated Aberdeen).

Remember Sink or Swim with Peter Davison- that was good

No place like Home - crabtrees - Martin Clunes

We had a teasmaid and dad always bought me tea

I love watching May to December on YouTube

I think my all time favourite was the good life
Superbly acted

woodhill the first series of Sink or Swim is on YouTube - I watched all the episodes and it seems different to how I remembered it -a bit tamer