The Campaign for Terrence Oblong - Associated London Scripts

Fuck writers. That was basically the policy of the BBC for much of its existence. Comedy writers were viewed with particular disdain by the upper echelons of the BBC, bemused that comedians couldn't simple recycle old musical hall gags.  

Eric Sykes was a victim of this attitude. In his autobiography he tells how BBC manager Leslie Grade hired him to write a show for visiting Hollywood star Jane Russell. Sykes duly wrote the script, the show was a success, but afterwards Grade told Sykes that he would only be paid half the agreed fee, as Jane Russell had asked for more money and he'd decided to placate her and find the extra money by cutting Sykes' fee. Sykes protested and demanded full payment, to which Grade replied "I'll see that you never work for the BBC again."

At the time Eric Sykes was the most successful comedy writing in Britain, having written the country's most popular radio shows Educating Archie and co-written the Goon Show, as well as writing for Frankie Howerd and writing and performing in the award-winning and popular Sykes. That the country's most successful TV and Radio scriptwriter could be treated like this is a clear indication of how badly less-famous writers must have been treated.

Sykes would play a key role role in changing this attitude. Along with fellow Goon-Show writer Spike Milligan, he had rented an office above a Grocer's shop in Uxbridge Road. There was free space in the office, which they offered to aspiring young writers Galton and Simpson, who brought with them their secretary Beryl Vertue. At Sykes' suggestion, the four of them formed a writers co-operative  with Frankie Howerd and Sykes and Howerd's then manager Stanley "Scruffy" Dale. Vertue would later became the firm's manager. 

Associated London Scripts grew, new writers, like Johnny Speight, were offered office space, ALS became a training camp for new writers. Milligan and Sykes would assign tasks to the new writers who in turn would take problems to their experienced colleagues. It did the work that the TV networks refused to do, it identified, (loosely) trained and employed the next generation of comedy writers. 

Performers such as Frankie Howerd would turn to ALS for a script. If Milligan and Sykes were busy the requested would be passed to Galton and Simpson, and when they too became busy the requests were passed on to the next new face. The BBC was left out of the equation entirely.  The BBC would otherwise impose writers on performers,and the BBC had a preference for giving jobs to the old boy's network, friends of friends who had no connection to the world of comedy and would usually rehack corny old music hall jokes, lacking the imagination and wit to create their own. Morecambe and Wise, who would go on to be the most popular and most watched comedy act in UK TV history, bombed in their first TV show as they trusted the BBC, who forced on them a script writer who presented them with  what was essentially a compilation of the worst jokes in the history of music hall. "It works on TV," the BBC assured them. It didn't. The show was a disaster and almost ended their careers. 

Associated London Scripts gave performers a way to avoid the BBC's in-house writers. Performers could take a completed script to the BBC assured of its quality. The list of comedians who would visit the greengrocers was a list of the best performers of the day; Tony Hancock, Tommy Cooper, Peter Sellers, Beryl Reid, Kenneth Williams, Terry Scott, Hattie Jacques, Clive Dunn, Charlie Drake, Bruce Forsyth, Ronnie Barker. Imagine that lot scrambling over the sacks of potatoes at the back of the shop. Even Benny Hill got involved, mainly to piss off Celticman should he ever read this piece. 

Perhaps the biggest (and most unlikely) success of the ALS stable was Terry Nation. Originally a failed comedian turned gag-writer, he was given an office and assigned script requests that came through ALS, including the post Galton & Simpson ITV series Hancock. In 1963 he was hired to adapt an HG Wells sci fi story for ITV, an episode was seen by the BBC's David Whitaker, who recruited Nation for a new science fiction series called Dr Who. Nation wrote the second Dr Who serial, The Daleks. The demonic metal monsters became an instant success and would become the series' most iconic and popular creations. Terry Nation would write a total of eleven Dr Who serials, over fifty episodes, and would go on to create a number of successful series, including Survivors and Blake's 7.

Another ALS Dr Who writer was Dennis Spooner, who would become script editor for Dr Who for several seasons during the Hartnell era. He would go on to write Thunderbirds and Stingray for Gerry Anderson and also created Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased).  

With ever increasing success ALS moved to larger premises in 9 Orme Court, near Hyde Park. The writers cooperative grew to include around thirty writers, with a support staff of twelve. The new crop of writers included Barry Took and Marty Feldman, who wrote Round the Horne for the radio and the Army Game for TV - both massive hits. They would later head up the writing teams for That Was The Week That Was and The Frost Report, and in so doing nurture a new generation of writers, including five future Pythons. 

ALS also acted as a writers union. The collective output of the group was so successful that the BBC never dared to act on its threat to ban Eric Sykes. The collective had another advantage, because Beryl Vertue managed all of the writers, and knew what they were each being paid, she was in a position to negotiate an increased fee for writers when a show became a hit. Slowly, writing for TV and radio became a profession you could actually make a living from. 

With the help of Beryl Vertue, who by this time was manager of ALS, the work of ALS spread into films and theatre. Then Vertue had an inspired money-making idea, selling basic format rights to TV series abroad. Thus the UK sitcom Steptoe and Son became the US sitcom Sandford and Son and Til Death Do Us Part became All in the Family. The latter ran for 7 seasons and over 200 episodes, topped the ratings for 6 successive years, and is fondly remembered as one of the great US sitcoms. There were also Swedish, Dutch and German versions of the two programmes. 

The scripts Associated London Scripts created remain among the best ever written. The Goon Show and Beyond our Ken remain top of lists of the public's all time favourite radio comedies over sixty years since they were created and Hancock, Til Death Do Us Part, Steptoe and Son are rightly regarded as classic series. The Daleks too live on, featuring regularly in the series after it was re-booted in 2005. 

Though the ALS collective only existed for twelve years, the impact remains to this day. Writers are no longer treated as the least important people in the room, comedy writing is now a serious business.  The BBC, in a 180 degree reversal, now actively encourages writers, it's online Writers Room proving resources, advice and submission opportunities for would-be script writers. Sometimes even Oblongs get approached by people claiming to be the Head of BBC Comedy and invited to send in a script (but it never leads anywhere).