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Shelley (TV series)
British TV sitcom (1979–1992) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Shelley is a British sitcom made by Thames Television and originally broadcast on ITV from 12 July 1979 to 12 January 1984 and from 11 October 1988 to 1 September 1992. It stars Hywel Bennett as Dr James Shelley, 28 years old at the outset although 35 by the sixth series only four years later, and a sardonic, perpetually unemployed anti-establishment 'freelance layabout' with a doctoral degree. In the original run, Belinda Sinclair played Shelley's girlfriend Fran, and Josephine Tewson appeared regularly as his landlady, Edna Hawkins. The series was created by Peter Tilbury who also wrote the first three series. The scripts for subsequent episodes were by Andy Hamilton and Guy Jenkin, Colin Bostock-Smith, David Frith, Bernard McKenna and Barry Pilton. All 71 episodes were produced and directed by Anthony Parker.
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Series seven was titled on screen The Return of Shelley, and was broadcast in 1988. This time around, Shelley is (still) separated from Fran, and lives on his own, doing his best to avoid obtaining gainful employment. The series begins with Shelley returning to the UK from Kuwait after teaching English for several years, only to find that his calls to his old friends are now screened by answering machines and that yuppieness has taken root in his old neighbourhood. The final three series returned to the on-screen title of Shelley.
In the final series, Shelley is a lodger with Ted Bishop (David Ryall). Ted's house is the only one left in his street, the other residences having been demolished to make way for a leisure centre. Shelley moves in as lodger to help Ted with his fight against the developers who want to demolish the house Ted has lived in his whole life.
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Characters
- James Shelley
- Portrayed by Hywel Bennett
- Shelley (or Perce) is the protagonist. He is a terminal layabout who is usually unemployed. He is qualified with a Ph.D. in geography. For a brief time he worked as an advertising executive (only to leave over a point of principle). He was later hired by the Foreign Office, only to be made redundant before his starting date. Shelley is obdurate, argumentative, and awkward; he has a wry, sardonic wit. He espouses left wing socially liberal views, but he is often shown to have reactionary tendencies, and may be something of a hypocrite. Shelley is usually honest about his unemployment and poor work ethic, though occasionally he likes to obscure it by claiming he is 'paid by the government' or is 'in leisure'. He once described his occupation as 'a government artist' because 'I draw the dole'.
- Frances Shelley (née Smith)
- Portrayed by Belinda Sinclair
- Fran is Shelley's longsuffering girlfriend and, later, wife. She is an aspiring writer. Like Shelley, she is educated but unemployed. She is one of the few people who can counter Shelley's more fanciful and obtuse arguments. In the first series she becomes pregnant with Shelley's child; in the second, she publishes a book and marries Shelley; in the third, she gives birth to a daughter, Emma. The beginning of the fifth series reveals that she has left Shelley; she appears in only one episode, and ceases to be a central character.
- Edna Hawkins (Mrs H.)
- Portrayed by Josephine Tewson
- Mrs H. is a somewhat waspish and prim landlady who lets a West Hampstead bedsit to Shelley and Fran in series one and two. She has a son named Colin, and she refers often to Willy, an unseen husband whom she has apparently coerced into working days and nights. She is suspicious of Shelley, and she disapproves of his languid lifestyle. She shows little restraint in verbally attacking him, even though she may be left browbeaten by his eloquence. Her attitude toward Shelley softens over time, however.
- Paul England
- Portrayed by Warren Clarke
- Shelley's closest friend and best man (after being let down by the alcoholic Ned). Paul is a loyal friend to Shelley. Unlike Shelley, he is an industrious man with a successful career. Even so, some of his lifestyle choices betray moral failings (for instance, evidently he solicits prostitutes). Although coarser than Shelley, he doesn't attract the disdain from establishment figures that Shelley does, owing to his charm and self-restraint. He lets his flat to Shelley in series five.
- Mrs Radcliffe
- Portrayed by Madoline Thomas
- An elderly widow who rents a bedsit downstairs from Shelley and Fran. She seems to enjoy a cordial relationship with Shelley, but she believes Fran to be a 'doxy', and landlady Mrs H. to be a murderess who killed her first husband. She appears only in series two and three.
- Desmond
- Portrayed by Garfield Morgan
- A pompous warden in the flats to which Shelley moves in series five. He is envious of the educated Shelley, believing him to be typical of a privileged generation which has grown up in a society where education is attainable by the masses. He has an unrealistic appraisal of his own intelligence, and he fancies himself an amateur poet. He believes that his abilities could have been recognised had he enjoyed the educational privileges of Shelley.
- Isobel Shelley
- Portrayed by Sylvia Kay
- Shelley's mother, who is only 16 years older than her son. Like him, Isobel is outspoken and argumentative. Her political views border on communism, and she lives a fairly nonconformist lifestyle. She smokes cannabis, which she grows for herself throughout her flat (which makes Shelley worry that she'll be discovered and imprisoned). She berates Shelley as an 'evil little capitalist'. Despite her sharp tongue, she has a kinder side: re-mortgages her flat so that Shelley and Fran can buy a house.
Minor characters
- Cyril
- Portrayed by John Barron
- Shelley's pompous and ineffectual boss at the advertising firm Harper Mackintosh. Cyril is an old-fashioned, self-important. He is detached from the realities of both the company he runs and of contemporary life. (Compare the character CJ, whom Barron previously portrayed in The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin.)
- Ramond "Ned" Kelly
- Portrayed by David Pugh
- Ned is Shelley's first choice for best man, even though Fran dislikes him intensely. Ned is an irresponsible alcoholic who is often involved in pub brawls. He is aware that he is slowly drinking himself to death. Although he only appears in one episode, he is mentioned several times thereafter, and is addressed on the telephone.
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List of episodes
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Series 1 (1979–80)
The ITV technicians' strike of 1979 delayed transmission of the last three episodes of series one (episodes 5–7). Because of the delay, ITV instead transmitted the three episodes eight months later, immediately before series two.
Series 2 (1980)
For the three weeks leading up to the premiere of series two, ITV transmitted the three episodes from series one whose release had been delayed by the technician strike.
Christmas Special (1980)
Series 3 (1980–81)
Series 4 (1982)
Series 5 (1982)
Series 6 (1983–84)
Series 7 (1988)
For this series only, it was titled The Return of Shelley.
Series 8 (1989–90)
Series 9 (1990)
New Year Special (1991)
Series 10 (1992)
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Video releases
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Network Distributing released the first six series on Region 2 DVD-Video between 2007 and 2012. Although a technician strike in 1979 delayed the transmission of three episodes of series one by several months, the Complete Series 1 DVD set contains all seven of the series one episodes, including the three that were delayed. Similarly, the Complete Series 2 set contains only the six episodes that belong to series two—even though ITV transmitted the delayed episodes directly before the series two episodes.
On 20 November 2017, Network released a six-disc set comprising the first six series, and a second DVD set comprising series 7–10.
Novelisation
New English Library published a novelisation of the first series as a mass-market paperback in 1980. The novel, called Shelley, was adapted by Colin Bostock-Smith.[1][2]
References
External links
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