TV: COMEDY PLAYHOUSE, 'PYGMALION SMITH' (1974)

Opening Caption

Comedy Playhouse was a long running fixture in the BBC’s light entertainment schedules, week by week featuring one-off situation-comedies by a variety of writers. While not billed as such, the point of the series was very much about road testing pilots for potential new series. Classics such as Till Death Do Us Part, All Gas & Gaiters and Steptoe and Son were born under the ‘Playhouse’ banner.

Leonard Rossiter as Pygmalion Smith

‘Pygmalion Smith’ was one such try-out. Written by Roy Clarke (‘Open All Hours’, ‘Rosie’, ‘Potter’ and ‘Keeping Up Appearances’) and starring Leonard Rossiter, the comedy concerns a frustrated seaside happy-snaps photographer who dreams of finding the ultimate bathing beauty - a diamond in the rough - and transforming her into a glamorous international model. In truth, that turns out to be a gutter at the local fish factory. Indeed, as the ‘Smith’ in the name of the character suggests, Rossiter’s character is very much a small-town dreamer, doomed never to come off his pier beat.

TP as Brewster opposite Leonard Rossiter

Where TP comes into the situation is as Rossiter’s best mate and foil, Brewster. It was ‘Comedy Playhouse’ producer Roger Race, a virtual hand maiden for the corporation’s comedy output, who persuaded TP to take on the role in a first-time foray into the world of situation comedy.

Television Centre

Taking his infamously wild boys with him to Race’s office at TV Centre, somewhere above the clamour, actor and producer talked over the role and knocked out a deal whereby he was assured that he’d have his own comedy moments within the script, and not just be a support feed to the lead. Plus there was also the carrot of the pilot being picked up for a series.

Studio Record

While there was some location filming, the main part of recording for ‘Pygmalion Smith’ was before a live audience at BBC Television Centre. As was the custom for many years sitcoms were recorded on Sundays, with a technical rehearsal in the day and the actual recording in the evening. This was because most comedy and variety stars had busy theatre careers in the West End with the Sunday being their only free day. This was why such shows often ended with the announcer would intoning over the credits ... ‘Arthur Bignose is currently appearing in …’. A stipulation placed on the BBC by theatre managers to which the artist was contracted.

Production Gallery

Now, although TP was no stranger to comedy roles, having undertaken plenty in his eight years at the Abbey, he did however find himself uncomfortable with the one-catch recording process that the sitcom medium worked to. A single record with the only possibility of retakes being for obvious script stumbles,  continuity or technical errors. Then there was the unpredictability of the studio audience.

The cast had been busy rehearsing in the week, but no one ever rehearsed the audience, so knowing how to play the house was a little like trying to catch a rugby ball with the sun in the eyes. There was little chance to gauge just how they planned to play the game, unlike theatre life where there'd be out-of-town try-outs and previews during which the performers could bed in.

Of course, TP survived the experience, and he certainly had no intention of turning down the opportunity of working with Leonard Rossiter whom he admired enormously. They shared a mutual respect for each other, both being men of the theatre. However, it would be more than twenty years before TP appeared in another sit-com (All In Good Faith with Richard Briers, 1987).

‘Pygmalion Smith’, alas, was not picked up for a series, that honour going to Roy Clarke’s other contribution in that Playhouse season, a certain comedy revolving around three old men knocking around the Yorkshire Dales called ‘Last of the Summer Wine’. He did however rework his script for a 1984 Playhouse, The Magnificent Evans, starring Ronnie Barker.

As for Leonard Rossiter, waiting just around the corner for him for was one of his finest comedy roles ever, the appalling Rigsby in Eric Chappell’s Rising Damp.