Rising Damp
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Image:Rising Damp Screenshot.jpg
Rising Damp was a UK television sitcom produced by Yorkshire Television for ITV, first broadcast from 1974 to 1978. It was adapted by its writer Eric Chappell from a well-received stage play, The Banana Box (retained as the working title early in the series[1]).
It starred Leonard Rossiter, Frances de la Tour and Richard Beckinsale. Rossiter played Rigsby (originally Rooksby in the stage play), a miserly, seedy landlord of a run-down town house who rented rooms out. Beckinsale played Alan, a long-haired, naive medical student who occupied the top room; and de la Tour was Miss Ruth Jones, a fey, whimsical spinster who rented a ground floor room and with whom Rigsby was in love.
In the pilot episode, a new tenant moved in. He was Philip Smith, played by Don Warrington, who claimed to be the son of an African chief. As a black man, he brought out the fears and suspicions of the bigoted Rigsby, who had been unaware that his new tenant was black because of the upper class English accent with which he spoke in telephone conversations. Nevertheless, the landlord soon accepted his new tenant and was later only wary of him because Miss Jones was attracted to him. Of these four principal actors, only Beckinsale was a new recruit - the others had all played their roles in the stage play.
Other tenants occasionally lived at the house but never became permanent residents; often they would appear in just one episode. The series is in the British comedy tradition of having failure as a key underlying theme, each of the characters having lives of quiet desperation.
The series was the highest-ranking ITV sitcom on the 100 Best Sitcoms poll run in 2004 by the BBC, and Rigsby is considered one of British comedy's great characters. Image:TVTimesRisingDamp.jpg Beckinsale left the series in 1977 due to theatre commitments, and was 'replaced' by occasional other tenants. A feature film was made in 1980, consisting of a messy plot which recycled scripts from the series and a certain amount of viewer (and actor) discomfort because Beckinsale's early death the year before had left a sizeable gap. His place, though not his actual character, was taken by actor Christopher Strauli. The film's theme song is not especially memorable, but does feature lyrics by Chappell. Released as a 7" single, it featured dialogue between Rigsby and Miss Jones on the B-side.
ITV1 are now airing repeats of Rising Damp, weekdays at 4.30pm.
In the movie, Philip is revealed not to be a chief's son after all, and to be from Croydon rather than Africa.
As of 2005 the series is still frequently repeated on UK terrestrial and satellite channels (though sometimes with noticeable cuts) and the complete series has been released on Region 2 DVD. Unfortunately for fans, many episodes only exist in the form of copies with grainy pictures and badly distorted sound, the original master tapes apparently having been wiped. Labour MP Tom Pendry also won a libel action against the programme when it portrayed a Labour candidate with the same surname in an unflattering light; his name is crudely edited out of the broadcast version when it is repeated.
Meaning of the title
Most British houses built before 1960 used two brick walls, one outer and one inner, separated by an air gap. In the perpetually wet British climate, water infiltration into the house is a constant problem, particularly in houses without basements or crawl spaces beneath them. The result of water penetrating the inner wall is visible as a darker patch on the plaster lining of the inner wall, usually starting at floor level on the ground floor and rising up from there, hence the term. In extreme cases, salt leached out of the wall forms crystals on the surface of the plaster as the water evaporates. Needless to say, the appearance of rising damp everywhere in a house is a symptom of neglect, age, decrepitude etc.
Miscellaneous
Rigsby’s cat is named Vienna.