Perry And Croft: Made In Britain
- TV documentary
- BBC Two
- 2014
- 4 episodes (1 series)
Documentary series looking at the sitcoms of Jimmy Perry and David Croft, and how they reflected and were influenced by British history and culture. Features Jimmy Perry and David Croft.
Press clippings
Appropriately enough, the theme in the final documentary in the series looking at the work of Dad's Army and It Ain't Half Hot Mum creators Jimmy Perry and David Croft is how the duo's writing was so often concerned with the end of an era. This meant they wrote about old ideas as these faded, and as new British identities emerged. It's a notion replete with possibilities: Captain Mainwaring as an arch conservative yet also representing the rise of grammar school boys in the era of Heath and Wilson, anyone?
Jonathan Wright, The Guardian, 13th December 2014The series charting the careers of Jimmy Perry and David Croft, the duo behind sitcoms Dad's Army, Are You Being Served? and more, considers what their work tells us about attitudes towards love and sex in Britain in the 20th century. This is, when you consider Sergeant Wilson's relationship with Mavis Pike, at least in part a story of how the British are adept at making things perfectly well understood yet left unsaid. It's a story about class, too, expressed in the way Hi-de-Hi! yellowcoat Gladys Pugh yearns for a bit of posh.
Jonathan Wright, The Guardian, 29th November 2014New show celebrates Dad's Army writers Perry & Croft
Dad's Army, It Ain't Half Hot Mum, Hi-De-Hi! and You Rang, M'Lord? were all written by just two men. A new BBC show celebrates their lives.
Richard Webber, The Daily Express, 3rd May 2014