Ian La Frenais
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Ian La Frenais Dame Allan's Boys School, Newcastle upon Tyne | |
---|---|
Period | 1964–present |
Genre | Television |
Spouse |
Doris Vartan (m. 1984) |
Relatives | Gladys and Cyril La Frenais (parents)[1] |
Ian La Frenais
Early life
La Frenais was born in
Writing partnership with Dick Clement
Ian La Frenais and Dick Clement have enjoyed a long and successful career embracing films, television and theatre. Their partnership began in the mid-1960s with the hit television show The Likely Lads,[4] and by the end of the decade they had also written three feature films: The Jokers,[5] Otley (directed by Clement) and Hannibal Brooks.
In the early 1970s, they worked on two other features: Villain,[5] starring Richard Burton, and Catch Me a Spy (again directed by Clement), starring Kirk Douglas. In this same period, they created their award-winning TV series Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?; this was followed by Porridge,[6] Thick as Thieves and Going Straight. There were big-screen versions of both The Likely Lads and Porridge,[6] and a 'rockumentary', To Russia With Elton, in 1979.
Earlier that decade they had adapted Keith Waterhouse's Billy Liar into the stage musical Billy, starring Michael Crawford, which ran at London's Drury Lane Theatre for two-and-a-half years.
By the late 1970s, they were living in
In the 1980s, their work included most of the TV series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet, which was voted ITV's Favourite TV Programme of all Time in a Radio Times readers' poll to celebrate the network's 60th anniversary, and uncredited writing work on the James Bond film Never Say Never Again. La Frenais produced the films Bullshot (1983) and Water (1985), both directed by Clement;[5] they also substantially wrote the latter. In 1987, they wrote and produced Vice Versa.
In the US, he and Clement were writers and supervising producers on
More recent television includes Archangel (starring Daniel Craig) and The Rotters' Club,[5] which they adapted from best-sellers by Robert Harris and Jonathan Coe respectively. Their most recent film credits include Goal! The Dream Begins, the animated film Flushed Away,[5] Across the Universe[8] and The Bank Job.[5]
Two new television series written by them were broadcast in 2017: an updated version of
Other credits
In addition to his long-running collaborations with Clement, La Frenais has created, co-created, written and/or contributed to many other TV series, including The Two Ronnies, several episodes of the BBC's Comedy Playhouse, The Other 'Arf (1980–81), the long-running series Lovejoy and the hit 1990s BBC detective series Spender (co-written with actor and singer Jimmy Nail).
Like Clement, La Frenais was made an OBE in the Queen's 2007 Birthday Honours list.
Personal life
Since 1984, Ian La Frenais has been married to artist Doris Vartan, the mother of actor Michael Vartan.
La Frenais supports the football club Newcastle United.[10][11] He is a patron of the Whitley Bay Film Festival.[12]
Writing credits (with Dick Clement)
- The Likely Lads (TV, 1964–66)
- Not Only... But Also (TV, 1965)
- The Further Adventures of Lucky Jim (TV, 1967)
- Mr. Aitch (TV, 1967)
- Vacant Lot (TV, 1967)
- Otley (1968)
- Hannibal Brooks (1968)
- Villain (1971)
- To Catch a Spy (1972)
- The Two Ronnies (TV, 1972)
- Seven of One (TV, 1973)
- Ha-Tarnegol (1973, with Haim Hefer)
- Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (TV, 1973–74)
- Thick as Thieves (TV, 1974)
- Porridge (TV, 1974–77)
- On the Rocks(TV, 1975–76)
- Going Straight (TV, 1978)
- The Prisoner of Zenda (1979)
- Porridge (1979, US: Doing Time)
- The New Adventures of Lucky Jim (TV, 1982)
- Never Say Never Again (1983, with Lorenzo Semple Jr., uncredited)
- Auf Wiedersehen, Pet (TV, 1983–2004)
- Sunset Limousine (TV, 1983, with Wayne Kline)
- Water (1985, with Bill Persky)
- Lovejoy (TV, 1985–94)
- Vice Versa (1988)
- The Commitments (1991, with Roddy Doyle)
- Tracey Ullman: A Class Act (TV, 1992)
- The Old Boy Network (TV, 1992)
- Tracey Ullman Takes on New York (TV, 1993)
- Full Stretch (TV, 1993)
- Tracey Takes On... (TV, 1996–99)
- Excess Baggage (1997, with Max D. Adams)
- Still Crazy (1998)
- Archangel (TV, 2005)
- The Rotters' Club (TV, 2005)
- Goal! (2005, with Mike Jefferies and Adrian Butchart, US: Goal! The Dream Begins)
- Flushed Away (2006, with Christopher Lloyd, Joe Keenan and William Davies)
- Across the Universe (2007)
- The Bank Job (2008)
- Killing Bono (2011, with Ben Bond)
- Spies of Warsaw (TV, 2013)
- Porridge (TV, 2016–2017)
- Henry IX (TV, 2017)
- My Generation (2017)
References
- ^ a b "Ian La Frenais Biography (1937-)". www.filmreference.com.
- ISBN 978-1844573349.
- ISBN 0-7472-3294-6.
- ^ "The Likely Lads". www.bbc.co.uk.
- ^ a b c d e f "Celebrating Clement & La Frenais: Screen Writers". Den of Geek. 20 March 2008.
- ^ a b "BFI Screenonline: La Frenais, Ian (1936-) and Clement, Dick (1937-) Biography". www.screenonline.org.uk.
- ^ "Still the likely lads | Screen | The Observer". www.theguardian.com.
- ^ "Creative minds behind big musicals aim to hit high note with Jukebox Hero". calgaryherald.
- ^ "Porridge - an interview with writers Dick Clement and Ian la Frenais". 2 October 2017.
- ^ "Footballers' lives". 23 September 2005.
- ^ "How Ian la Frenais was caught up in one of his own plots - thanks to Matty Longstaff". 19 October 2019.
- ^ "Tommy presented by Whitley Bay Film Festival, with special guest Roger Daltrey (18+)". www.playhousewhitleybay.co.uk.