Jack Rosenthal »

Sue Vice is Professor of English Literature at the University of Sheffield.

This is the first-ever critical work on Jack Rosenthal, the highly regarded British television dramatist. His career began with Coronation Street in the 1960s and he became famous for his popular sitcoms, including The Lovers and The Dustbinmen. During what is often known as the "golden age" of British television drama, Rosenthal wrote such plays as The Knowledge, The Chain, Spend, Spend, Spend and P’tang, Yang, Kipperbang, as well as the pilot for the series London’s Burning. This study offers a close analysis of all Rosenthal’s best-known works, drawing on archival material as well as interviews with his collaborators, including Jonathan Lynn and Don Black.

This book will be of interest to students and researchers in Television, Film and Cultural Studies, contemporary drama and Jewish Studies, as well as admirers of Rosenthal's work.

Introduction 1

1 The beginnings 14

Coronation Street (1961-69)

2 Little England 33

Your Name's Not God, It's Edgar (1968)

Another Sunday and Sweet FA (1972)

There'll Almost Always be an England (1974)

Mr Ellis Versus the People (1974)

3 Men at work 58

The Dustbinmen (1969-70)

The Knowledge (1979)

London's Burning (1986)

4 Love stories 84

The Lovers (1970)

Sadie, It's Cold Outside (1975)

Wide-Eyed and Legless (1993)

5 Structure and plot 112

Spend, Spend, Spend (1977)

The Chain (1984)

Moving Story (1994)

Bag Lady (1989)

6 Television satire in 1976 and 2005 134

Ready When You Are, Mr McGill

7 Versions of autobiography 147

P'tang, Yang, Kipperbang (1982)

Bye, Bye, Baby (1992)

Eskimo Day (1996)

Cold Enough for Snow (1997)

8 Anglo-Jewish plays 165

The Evacuees (1975)

Bar Mitzvah Boy (1976)

Appendix List of Television Programmes

Select Bibliography

Index