Vince Powell

Vince Powell^[1] (6 August 1928 – 13 July 2009) was a British television creator and television screenwriter.

Early life

Powell was born as Vincent Joseph Smith to Roman Catholic parents in Miles Platting, Manchester. When he was five, his mother died; two years later, his father remarried. Powell was best known as a British sitcom creator and television writer, active at ITV from the mid-1960s. Powell started his career as an amateur comedian and was also a tailor.

Career

With his writing partner, Harry Driver (1931–1973), the duo was hired to write material for comedian Harry Worth in Manchester. Powell and Driver created and wrote 11 sitcoms for ITV in an eight-year period, including the successful shows Bless This House and Love Thy Neighbour, though other writers contributed scripts to both series. The latter programme, according to The Times, was "intended to debunk racial stereotypes but came to be widely condemned for doing exactly the opposite. ... Powell and Driver were not racists, they merely tried to poke fun at racial bigotry in an era before political correctness would have made such a show impossible."^[2]

Other popular series created and written by them for ITV include:

Script projects

• Pardon the Expression (1965-66), starring Arthur Lowe reprising the role of Leonard Swindley, thus spinning-off from Coronation Street.
• George and the Dragon (1966–68), starring Sid James and Peggy Mount as chauffeur and housekeeper to Colonel Maynard (John Le Mesurier)
• Never Mind the Quality, Feel the Width (1967–1971), set in the London rag trade, featuring an ethnically mis-matched pair of tailors, the Jewish Manny Cohen (John Bluthal) and the Irish-Catholic Patrick Kelly (Joe Lynch)
• Nearest and Dearest (1968-1973), set in a Pickle Factory in Colne, North-West of England, starring (Hylda Baker) and (Jimmy Jewel) as squabbling siblings Nellie and Eli Pledge, running the Pickle Factory business left by their late father. Powell and Driver left after the first series, though the show (then later penned by fresh new writers, such as Roy Bottomley and Tom Brennand) continued in their absence.
• Two in Clover (1969-70), starring Sid James and Victor Spinetti, as Clerks-turned-Farmers
• For the Love of Ada (1970–71), in which Irene Handl and Wilfred Pickles played romantically involved pensioners
• Bless This House (1971-76), starring Sid James and Diana Coupland, as Sid and Jean Abbott, along with Robin Stewart and Sally Geeson as their teenage son and daughter, living in Birch Avenue, Putney.
• Love Thy Neighbour (1972-1976), centered around a suburban white couple, with a black couple living as next-door neighbours in 1970s Twickenham nr London, during an era, in which Britain was coming to terms with the population of Black Immigrants. The series featured Jack Smethurst and Kate Williams as Eddie and Joan Booth, with Rudolph Walker and Nina Baden-Semper as Bill and Barbie Reynolds.
• Spring And Autumn (1973-1976), starring Jimmy Jewel as a retired widower, parting ways from Up North to live with his daughter and her husband in a high-rise block, Down South, let alone making friends with a pre-teen cockney lad.

Following Driver's sudden death, Powell went solo at scriptwriting and created later shows such as ...

• The Wackers (1975), set in mid-1970s Liverpool, starring Ken Jones and Sheila Fay, along with Joe Gladwin.
• Mind Your Language (1977–1979, 1986), starring Barry Evans (fresh from success, on the Doctor... series) as the English-Foreign Language teacher Mr Jeremy Brown, set in an adult education college of foreign characters in late-1970s London.
• Young At Heart (1977-1982),
• Bottle Boys (1984-85), starring Robin Askwith as Dave Deacon, a football-obsessed Milkman in mid-1980's Britain.

He also penned a number of scripts for the popular 1980s sitcom Never the Twain (1981–1991) starring Windsor Davies and Donald Sinden, also for Thames Television, writing all of the final episodes from 1989 to 1991. Plus he wrote 3 series (20 episodes) of the Radio 2 sitcom For Better Or For Worse, starring Gorden Kaye and Su Pollard, between 1993 and 1996.

Powell contributed material to the Cilla Black vehicles Blind Date (224 episodes) and Surprise, Surprise (130 episodes).^[3] He published his autobiography, From Rags to Gags, in 2008.

Death

Powell died aged 80 in Guildford, Surrey. His first marriage ended in divorce; as did his second marriage, to Judi Smith. His third marriage, to Geraldine Moore ended when he died. He had a son from his second marriage, and a son and daughter from his third.

References

External links

• Vince Powell at the Internet Movie Database