one foot in the grave

Sometimes, I come across something fun in my research which I just have to share. The following is the official synopsis for the famous One Foot in the Grave episode “The Trial”. It is, frankly, difficult to imagine it being written by anyone other than David Renwick.

In comparison, the Radio Times capsule for the original broadcast of the episode on the 28th February 1993 is simply the following:

“Popular sitcom about a grumpy old man for whom nothing ever seems to go smoothly. Victor is called up for jury service and ends up as the man on trial.”

Which essentially only uses one line of the full synopsis.

That full synopsis is fun for a number of different reasons. Most obviously, it shows Renwick’s thought process for the episode: that Victor is both awaiting a real trial, and actually experiencing a mock trial. This does eventually become text in the episode – killing a woodlouse and being sentenced to death – but it’s all done fairly subtly. It being stated so obviously is its own joy.

But my favourite line in that extended synopsis is the following:

“Mrs Warboys flies back from Ireland to make a statement, but is refused a hearing on the grounds that she is too boring”

Which is, obviously, very funny indeed. But I was especially reminded of the line when reading of the sad death of Doreen Mantle the other day.

Because the thing Doreen did so brilliantly in One Foot in the Grave is taking what could have been an immensely irritating character who you were desperate to get rid of, and turned her into a delight to watch. To the point where, even when you’re watching Richard Wilson’s 30-minute tour de force monologue, Mrs Warboys is right there in your head anyway. And part of the reason “refused a hearing on the grounds that she is too boring” is funny is because it conjures up Mantle’s confused, tedious face.

Her performance manages to echo not only into an episode she isn’t actually in, but a text description of an episode she isn’t actually in. I’m not sure you can get any more captivating.

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one foot in the grave

To write one article about One Foot in the Grave recording dates which hinges on the items in the Meldrews’ kitchen cabinets may be regarded as a misfortune. To write two looks like carelessness.

Oh well, here we go again.

Let’s take a look at “The Broken Reflection” (TX: 16/2/92). That’s the one where Victor’s brother Alfred shows up, and David Renwick decides to break our goddamn hearts… again. Alfred Meldrew is played brilliantly by Richard Pearson, and in Richard Webber’s excellent book The Complete One Foot in the Grave, the following rather alarming anecdote about the recording is told:

“For eagle-eyed viewers, the sudden appearance of a small bandage on one of Pearson’s fingers in the scene where he was opening a parcel on the Meldrews’ kitchen table was the result of an earlier accident. During the recording, Pearson used a knife to open the package. ‘It was too sharp, which was a little naughty because all knives are supposed to be blunt on set,’ admits Susan Belbin. Pearson sliced his finger and the extent of the bleeding left the director no alternative but to stop the recording. ‘I had to get him to hospital, so we left the rest of his scenes that night because he needed stitches.’ He returned the following week and completed his scenes, hence the bandage. ‘He was so good about it and I felt sorry for him. It was a bad cut.'”

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one foot in the grave

Right, you can take your Alfred Hitchcock and Stan Lee cameos, and stick them right up your arse. We only do the important ones around here. So did you know that David Renwick appeared in One Foot in the Grave not once, not twice, but a total of seven times?

Let’s take a look. You may know one or two of these. You might even know all the ones listed on IMDB. But I believe that two of them are previously entirely unpublished. Including our very first example.

Series 2, Episode 4: Who Will Buy?

TX: 25th October 1990

Renwick’s first cameo in the series is an odd one. Indeed, you can barely hear him at all. The production paperwork confirms that the TV playing Poirot at the beginning of the show isn’t an actual clip from Poirot, but is… Angus Deayton and David Renwick.

This is a double in-joke, as at the time this episode aired, Renwick was a writer on Poirot, credited on four adaptations: “The Lost Mine” (TX: 21/1/90), “The Disappearance of Mr. Davenheim” (TX: 4/2/90), “Wasps’ Nest” (27/1/91), and “The Tragedy at Marsdon Manor” (3/2/91). And once you know that, “Who Will Buy?” becomes even more intertextual than usual for One Foot in the Grave.

Starting off gently… until you’re suddenly watching a scene between Owen Brennan and Janine Duvitski with the actual Poirot theme playing in the background.

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one foot in the grave

Shooting in front of an audience poses all kinds of unique problems for a sitcom.

Take the One Foot in the Grave episode “We Have Put Her Living in the Tomb” (TX: 11/10/90). That’s the show which burns one tortoise to death, and buries another one alive. But what we’re more interested in today is… the Meldrews’ living room wallpaper.

Because here is the state of their living room at the beginning of the episode:

Here is the state of their living room when they return from picking up the tortoise:

And here is the state of their living room by the end of the episode:

The question: how do you record that middle scene with all the wallpaper ripped down in front of an audience, when you have other scenes to shoot on that set? Sure, there’s time during the recording session to redress the set a little. But there’s surely not time to pull off all that wallpaper, let alone put it all back on again.

The answer is: you don’t record the scene in front of that particular audience. But it’s how they don’t which is interesting.

Let’s look at the main studio recording dates for Series 2 of One Foot in the Grave, as detailed in the production paperwork:

Episode	RX	TX
In Luton Airport No-One Can Hear You Scream	4/8/90	4/10/90
We Have Put Her Living in the Tomb	8/9/90	11/10/90
Dramatic Fever	11/8/90	18/10/90
Who Will Buy?	18/8/90	25/10/90
Love and Death	25/8/90	8/11/90
Timeless Time	1/9/90	15/11/90

In general, the series was shot in the order it was transmitted in; the only difference is that the sixth episode recorded – yes, “We Have Put Her Living in the Tomb” itself – was moved up to the second broadcast.

The dates listed in the above table are for the main studio records, done in front of an audience at TV Centre. But these weren’t the only dates material for the series was recorded on. The most obvious example is the location film sequences, which were shot between the 1st – 20th July. But the paperwork also details some of the studio pre-records, done without the audience present. “Love and Death”, for instance, had an entire pre-record day on the the 24th, the day before the main studio recording.

So what about our scene with the wallpaper ripped down? The paperwork gives the following details:

Pre-recording 1.9.90 (Sc. 3) – H.105087/H.105373
Afternoon Pre-recording 8.9.90 – H.194931H/H.194141
Both edited onto H.192160 for insert into main studio.¹

The second line is fairly standard; it tells us that there was at least one scene pre-recorded in the afternoon, before the main studio record of the episode. (Sadly, it doesn’t say which scene or scenes.) The third line tells us that all the pre-record material was edited onto one tape for playing in during the main audience record.

But the first line is the one which interests us. This tells us there was material shot on the 1st September; the week before the main record of “We Have Put Her Living in the Tomb”. And it indicates that it was Scene 3 which was pre-recorded. I don’t have access to a camera script of the episode, but the scene with the wallpaper ripped down is in fact the third scene in the transmitted programme.

And what else was recorded on the 1st September? A certain, famous episode called “Timeless Time” (TX: 15/11/90). An episode set entirely in Victor and Margaret’s bedroom.

All of a sudden, what the production was doing clicks into place. If you have to record a scene where the living room set looks entirely different, why not record it on a day where you’re not recording anything else in that set? Recording it in the same session as an episode set entirely in the Meldrew’s bedroom is perfect. And so production decisions taken in the last half of 1990 slide quietly, but satisfyingly, into place within my head.

A bit too satisfyingly, actually. Off for a lie down. Excuse me.

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1. For those not familiar with this kind of paperwork, those H numbers are the tape numbers that the material was recorded on. ↩

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one foot in the grave

I blame David Renwick entirely for this one.

Let me explain. Series 5 of One Foot in the Grave starts with one of the best episodes they ever made: “The Man Who Blew Away”. First broadcast on Christmas Day 1994, the unfortunate fate of Mr. Foskett surely has to be one of the grimmest things ever radiated to the nation under the guise of festive fun and frolics.

But Mr. Foskett – and Brian Murphy’s brilliant performance – isn’t what concerns us today. Instead, we want to focus on the opening scene in the kitchen between Victor and Margaret, where Victor rants about people being bad at comedy. A scene which plays out in my own kitchen daily, of course.

Now, the DVD release of Series 5 contains a commentary for “The Man Who Blew Away” from David Renwick and Richard Wilson. And among all his examinations about the nature of comedy, Renwick has this to say on the opening scene of the episode:

RENWICK: Another thing I remember here was: didn’t we have to do a retake of half this scene? I think for the eagle-eyed one of those china chickens goes missing from the corner of the shelf unit there in the kitchen between takes… I’ve got a feeling we had to redo some of it, something to do with the framing of the camera. There’s a little jug there just behind his right shoulder… and I’ve got a feeling in some of the shots there’s a chicken. (laughs)

And indeed, this is entirely correct. Just before the scene ends, a chicken magically appears in the cabinet as Margaret walks past it:

But there is one thing which Renwick fails to mention about this scene, because he’s not a complete loony about this kind of thing. Unfortunately, I am. So: can we figure out exactly when this scene was reshot?

Spoiler: yes.

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one foot in the grave