David Renwick
Encyclopedia
David Peter Renwick is an English
television
writer, best known for creation of the sitcom
One Foot in the Grave
and the mystery series Jonathan Creek
.
Before beginning his full-time comedy writing career, he worked as a journalist on his home town newspaper, the Luton News.
On beginning his comedy career, he initially worked in a team with writing partner Andrew Marshall
, the pair of them providing material to popular sketch shows such as The Two Ronnies
and Not the Nine O'Clock News
during the late 1970s and early 80s. One of the most celebrated sketches he wrote for the former was a parody of the BBC quiz programme Mastermind
, where a "Charlie Smithers" chose to answer questions on the specialist subject "Answering the question before last", adapted from his "Answering one question behind all the time" sketch from their The Burkiss Way
for BBC Radio 4
. Their short-lived LWT
series for ITV
, End of Part One
, was an attempt to transfer Burkiss-style humour to television. Later in the 1980s they also wrote for the sketch show Alexei Sayle's Stuff
and Spike Milligan
's There's a Lot of It About
.
In 1982 they penned the comedy drama serial Whoops Apocalypse
for LWT
, based on the insanity of international politics in the age of nuclear weapons, and four years later they adapted the screenplay (changing most of the characters and situations completely) into a feature film
version. In 1983 they wrote The Steam Video Company for Thames Television
, a short comedy series based on very silly parodies
of famous novel
s. This was followed in 1986 by Hot Metal
for LWT
, a six-part satire of the tabloid newspaper industry starring Robert Hardy
, Geoffrey Palmer
and John Gordon Sinclair
. The show was a critical success and returned for a further six episodes in 1988 with a revised cast of Robert Hardy
, Richard Wilson and Caroline Milmoe
.
Renwick began writing solo in 1990 when he created the sitcom One Foot in the Grave
, starring Richard Wilson, which was highly successful and went on to be a popular hit for the following decade. It also ran for four seasons as an American re-make entitled Cosby
, starring Bill Cosby
, although this is generally regarded as a poor adaptation of the original.
In 1997, Renwick devised the comedy-drama Jonathan Creek
, based around the crime-solving abilities of the eponymous designer of magic tricks, played by comedian Alan Davies
. As of 2009, twenty-seven episodes have been produced across four short-run series and four specials. The slow rate of production is partly due to Renwick's writing of the episodes, which he describes as being a painstaking process in which the intricacies of the plots take several months to work out.
He has also written for 'straight' television drama, contributing episodes to ITV
's famous adaptations
of Agatha Christie
's Hercule Poirot
mysteries, starring David Suchet
. Renwick's fondness for rationalist murder mysteries with supernatural overtones, later developed fully in Jonathan Creek
is evident in elements he added to the Poirot adaptations. In 1992, Renwick and co-writer Michael Baker received an Edgar Award
from the Mystery Writers of America
for the Poirot episode "The Lost Mine", which aired in the U.S. as part of the PBS
anthology series
Mystery!
.
Most recently, another comedy-drama Renwick has penned, entitled Love Soup
, starring Tamsin Greig
and Michael Landes
, premiered on BBC One
on 27 September 2005. Renwick, and his ex writing partner Marshall, had cameo roles in an episode of the series as members of a television sitcom scriptwriting team.
He was awarded the Writers Guild Ronnie Barker Award at the British Comedy Awards
2008.
Englan
Englan is a small village in the district of Wokha, in the Nagaland state of India. The name literally means The Path of the Sun. It is one of the main centers of the district and is an active center of the Lotha language and culture.-External links:*....
television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
writer, best known for creation of the sitcom
Situation comedy
A situation comedy, often shortened to sitcom, is a genre of comedy that features characters sharing the same common environment, such as a home or workplace, accompanied with jokes as part of the dialogue...
One Foot in the Grave
One Foot in the Grave
One Foot in the Grave is a BBC television sitcom series written by David Renwick. The show ran for six series, including seven Christmas specials, two Comic Relief specials, over an eleven year period, from early 1990 to late 2000...
and the mystery series Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches...
.
Before beginning his full-time comedy writing career, he worked as a journalist on his home town newspaper, the Luton News.
On beginning his comedy career, he initially worked in a team with writing partner Andrew Marshall
Andrew Marshall (writer)
Andrew Marshall is an English comedy screenwriter, most noted for the domestic sitcom 2point4 children. He was also the inspiration for Marvin the Paranoid Android in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy...
, the pair of them providing material to popular sketch shows such as The Two Ronnies
The Two Ronnies
The Two Ronnies is a British sketch show that aired on BBC1 from 1971 to 1987. It featured the double act of Ronnie Barker and Ronnie Corbett, the "Two Ronnies" of the title.-Origins:...
and Not the Nine O'Clock News
Not the Nine O'Clock News
Not the Nine O'Clock News is a television comedy sketch show which was broadcast on BBC 2 from 1979 to 1982.Originally shown as a comedy "alternative" to the BBC Nine O'Clock News on BBC 1, it featured satirical sketches on current news stories and popular culture, as well as parody songs, comedy...
during the late 1970s and early 80s. One of the most celebrated sketches he wrote for the former was a parody of the BBC quiz programme Mastermind
Mastermind (TV series)
Mastermind is a British quiz show, well known for its challenging questions, intimidating setting and air of seriousness.Devised by Bill Wright, the basic format of Mastermind has never changed — four and in later contests five contestants face two rounds, one on a specialised subject of the...
, where a "Charlie Smithers" chose to answer questions on the specialist subject "Answering the question before last", adapted from his "Answering one question behind all the time" sketch from their The Burkiss Way
The Burkiss Way
The Burkiss Way was a BBC Radio 4 sketch comedy series broadcast from August 1976 to November 1980. It was written by Andrew Marshall and David Renwick, with additional material in early episodes by John Mason, Colin Bostock-Smith, Douglas Adams, John Lloyd and others. The show starred Denise...
for BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4
BBC Radio 4 is a British domestic radio station, operated and owned by the BBC, that broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history. It replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. The station controller is currently Gwyneth Williams, and the...
. Their short-lived LWT
London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television was the name of the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties including south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire, Warwickshire, east Dorset and...
series for ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
, End of Part One
End of Part One
End of Part One was a British television comedy sketch show written by David Renwick and Andrew Marshall and produced by Simon Brett, it was made by London Weekend Television. It ran for two series on ITV, from 1979 to 1980 and was an attempt at a TV version of The Burkiss Way...
, was an attempt to transfer Burkiss-style humour to television. Later in the 1980s they also wrote for the sketch show Alexei Sayle's Stuff
Alexei Sayle's Stuff
Alexei Sayle's Stuff is a comedy sketch show which ran on BBC2 for a total of 18 episodes over 3 series from 1988 to 1991.-Cast:Alexei Sayle's Stuff stars stand-up comedian Alexei Sayle, with a recurring cast including Angus Deayton, Mark Williams, Arabella Weir, Tony Millan, Jan Ravens, Owen...
and Spike Milligan
Spike Milligan
Terence Alan Patrick Seán "Spike" Milligan Hon. KBE was a comedian, writer, musician, poet, playwright, soldier and actor. His early life was spent in India, where he was born, but the majority of his working life was spent in the United Kingdom. He became an Irish citizen in 1962 after the...
's There's a Lot of It About
Q (TV series)
Q... was a surreal television comedy sketch show from Spike Milligan which ran from 1969 to 1982 on BBC2. There were six series in all, the first five numbered from Q5 to Q9, and a final series titled There's a Lot of It About...
.
In 1982 they penned the comedy drama serial Whoops Apocalypse
Whoops Apocalypse
Whoops Apocalypse is a six-part 1982 television sitcom by Andrew Marshall and David Renwick, made by London Weekend Television for ITV. Marshall and Renwick later reworked the concept as a 1986 movie from ITC Entertainment, with almost completely different characters and plot, although one or two...
for LWT
London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television was the name of the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties including south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire, Warwickshire, east Dorset and...
, based on the insanity of international politics in the age of nuclear weapons, and four years later they adapted the screenplay (changing most of the characters and situations completely) into a feature film
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
version. In 1983 they wrote The Steam Video Company for Thames Television
Thames Television
Thames Television was a licensee of the British ITV television network, covering London and parts of the surrounding counties on weekdays from 30 July 1968 until 31 December 1992....
, a short comedy series based on very silly parodies
Parody
A parody , in current usage, is an imitative work created to mock, comment on, or trivialise an original work, its subject, author, style, or some other target, by means of humorous, satiric or ironic imitation...
of famous novel
Novel
A novel is a book of long narrative in literary prose. The genre has historical roots both in the fields of the medieval and early modern romance and in the tradition of the novella. The latter supplied the present generic term in the late 18th century....
s. This was followed in 1986 by Hot Metal
Hot Metal
-External links:* at BBC Online Comedy Guide...
for LWT
London Weekend Television
London Weekend Television was the name of the ITV network franchise holder for Greater London and the Home Counties including south Suffolk, middle and east Hampshire, Oxfordshire, south Bedfordshire, south Northamptonshire, parts of Herefordshire & Worcestershire, Warwickshire, east Dorset and...
, a six-part satire of the tabloid newspaper industry starring Robert Hardy
Robert Hardy
Timothy Sydney Robert Hardy, CBE, FSA is an English actor with a long career in the theatre, film and television. He is also an acknowledged expert on the longbow.-Early life:...
, Geoffrey Palmer
Geoffrey Palmer (actor)
Geoffrey Dyson Palmer, OBE is an English actor, best known for his roles in sitcoms such as Butterflies and As Time Goes By.-Career:...
and John Gordon Sinclair
John Gordon Sinclair
John Gordon Sinclair is a Scottish actor most famous for playing Gregory in Gregory's Girl. He was born as Gordon John but took the stage name 'John Gordon Sinclair' because Equity already had a Gordon John registered....
. The show was a critical success and returned for a further six episodes in 1988 with a revised cast of Robert Hardy
Robert Hardy
Timothy Sydney Robert Hardy, CBE, FSA is an English actor with a long career in the theatre, film and television. He is also an acknowledged expert on the longbow.-Early life:...
, Richard Wilson and Caroline Milmoe
Caroline Milmoe
Caroline Milmoe is an English stage, film and television actress best known for playing Julie in the first two series of Carla Lane's Liverpool-based BBC sit-com Bread and Lisa Duckworth in ITV's long-running soap opera Coronation Street.-Career:Milmoe attended Manchester's Contact Youth Theatre...
.
Renwick began writing solo in 1990 when he created the sitcom One Foot in the Grave
One Foot in the Grave
One Foot in the Grave is a BBC television sitcom series written by David Renwick. The show ran for six series, including seven Christmas specials, two Comic Relief specials, over an eleven year period, from early 1990 to late 2000...
, starring Richard Wilson, which was highly successful and went on to be a popular hit for the following decade. It also ran for four seasons as an American re-make entitled Cosby
Cosby
Cosby is a situation comedy television series broadcast on CBS from September 16, 1996 to April 28, 2000, loosely based on the British sitcom One Foot in the Grave. The program starred Bill Cosby, Phylicia Rashād...
, starring Bill Cosby
Bill Cosby
William Henry "Bill" Cosby, Jr. is an American comedian, actor, author, television producer, educator, musician and activist. A veteran stand-up performer, he got his start at various clubs, then landed a starring role in the 1960s action show, I Spy. He later starred in his own series, the...
, although this is generally regarded as a poor adaptation of the original.
In 1997, Renwick devised the comedy-drama Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches...
, based around the crime-solving abilities of the eponymous designer of magic tricks, played by comedian Alan Davies
Alan Davies
Alan Davies is an English comedian, writer and actor best known for starring in the TV mystery series Jonathan Creek and as the permanent panellist on the TV panel show QI.- Early life :...
. As of 2009, twenty-seven episodes have been produced across four short-run series and four specials. The slow rate of production is partly due to Renwick's writing of the episodes, which he describes as being a painstaking process in which the intricacies of the plots take several months to work out.
He has also written for 'straight' television drama, contributing episodes to ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
's famous adaptations
Agatha Christie's Poirot
Agatha Christie's Poirot is a British television drama that has aired on ITV since 1989. It stars David Suchet as Agatha Christie's fictional detective Hercule Poirot. It was originally made by LWT and is now made by ITV Studios...
of Agatha Christie
Agatha Christie
Dame Agatha Christie DBE was a British crime writer of novels, short stories, and plays. She also wrote romances under the name Mary Westmacott, but she is best remembered for her 66 detective novels and 14 short story collections , and her successful West End plays.According to...
's Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot
Hercule Poirot is a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie. Along with Miss Marple, Poirot is one of Christie's most famous and long-lived characters, appearing in 33 novels and 51 short stories published between 1920 and 1975 and set in the same era.Poirot has been portrayed on...
mysteries, starring David Suchet
David Suchet
David Suchet, CBE, is an English actor, known for his work on British television. He is recognised for his RTS- and BPG award-winning performance as Augustus Melmotte in the 2001 British TV mini-drama The Way We Live Now, alongside Matthew Macfadyen and Paloma Baeza, and a 1991 British Academy...
. Renwick's fondness for rationalist murder mysteries with supernatural overtones, later developed fully in Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek
Jonathan Creek is a British mystery series produced by the BBC and written by David Renwick. Primarily a crime drama, the show is also peppered with broadly comic touches...
is evident in elements he added to the Poirot adaptations. In 1992, Renwick and co-writer Michael Baker received an Edgar Award
Edgar Award
The Edgar Allan Poe Awards , named after Edgar Allan Poe, are presented every year by the Mystery Writers of America...
from the Mystery Writers of America
Mystery Writers of America
Mystery Writers of America is an organization for mystery writers, based in New York.The organization was founded in 1945 by Clayton Rawson, Anthony Boucher, Lawrence Treat, and Brett Halliday....
for the Poirot episode "The Lost Mine", which aired in the U.S. as part of the PBS
Public Broadcasting Service
The Public Broadcasting Service is an American non-profit public broadcasting television network with 354 member TV stations in the United States which hold collective ownership. Its headquarters is in Arlington, Virginia....
anthology series
Anthology television series
An anthology series is a radio or television series that presents a different story and a different set of characters in each episode. These usually have a different cast each week, but several series in the past, such as Four Star Playhouse, employed a permanent troupe of character actors who...
Mystery!
Mystery!
Mystery! is an episodic television series that debuted in 1980 in the USA. It airs on PBS and is produced by WGBH...
.
Most recently, another comedy-drama Renwick has penned, entitled Love Soup
Love Soup
Love Soup is a British television comedy-drama produced by the BBC and first screened on BBC One in the autumn of 2005. It stars Tamsin Greig as Alice Chenery and Michael Landes as Gil Raymond . The series is written by David Renwick of One Foot in the Grave fame, and was produced by Verity Lambert...
, starring Tamsin Greig
Tamsin Greig
Tamsin Greig is an English actress principally known for two Channel 4 television comedy parts: Fran Katzenjammer in Black Books and Dr. Caroline Todd in Green Wing...
and Michael Landes
Michael Landes
Michael Christopher Landes is an American actor. He is known for his roles of Jimmy Olsen in the first season of Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, Detective Nicholas O'Malley in Special Unit 2, Officer Thomas Burke in Final Destination 2, and David Conlon in The Wedding Bells.-Lois...
, premiered on BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
on 27 September 2005. Renwick, and his ex writing partner Marshall, had cameo roles in an episode of the series as members of a television sitcom scriptwriting team.
He was awarded the Writers Guild Ronnie Barker Award at the British Comedy Awards
British Comedy Awards
The British Comedy Awards is an annual awards ceremony in the United Kingdom celebrating notable comedians and entertainment performances of the previous year.-History:...
2008.
External links
- David Renwick at the Internet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie Database is an online database of information related to movies, television shows, actors, production crew personnel, video games and fictional characters featured in visual entertainment media. It is one of the most popular online entertainment destinations, with over 100 million...
. - David Renwick interview at bbc.co.ukBbc.co.ukBBC Online is the brand name and home for the BBC's UK online service. It is a large network of websites including such high profile sites as BBC News and Sport, the on-demand video and radio services co-branded BBC iPlayer, the pre-school site Cbeebies, and learning services such as Bitesize...
.