Vince Powell
| Vince Powell | |
|---|---|
| Born | Vincent Joseph Smith 6 August 1928 Miles Platting, Manchester, England, United Kingdom |
| Died | 13 July 2009 (aged 80) Guildford, Surrey, England, United Kingdom |
| Occupation | Scriptwriter |
| Nationality | British |
| Period | 1960–1996 |
| Genre | Television |
| Notable works |
Here's Harry (1960–1965) George and the Dragon (1966–1968) Never Mind the Quality Feel the Width (1967–1971) Best of Enemies (1968–1969) Nearest and Dearest (1968–1973) Two in Clover (1969–1970) For the Love of Ada (1970–1971) Bless This House (1971–1976) Love Thy Neighbour (1972–1976) Spring and Autumn (1972–1976) The Wackers (1975) Rule Britannia! (1975) My Son Reuben (1975) Odd Man Out (1977) Mind Your Language (1977–1979, 1986) Young at Heart (1980–1982) Never the Twain (1981–1991) Bottle Boys (1984–1985) Slinger's Day (1986–1987) Cilla's Celebration (1993) For Better Or For Worse (Radio 2, 1993–1996) |
Here's Harry (1960–1965)
Vince Powell (6 August 1928 – 13 July 2009) was a British television creator and television screenwriter.
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.
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."
Other popular series created and written by them for ITV include:
Following Driver's sudden death, Powell went solo at scriptwriting and created later shows such as ...
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.
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