Chesney and Wolfe

Ronald Chesney Chesney, was born in London of French descent, the son of Marius, a silk trader, and Jeanne (née Basset). He left the French Lycée school in London at the age of 16, and began using his English name. Chesney initially learned piano, but decided instead a career as a chromatic harmonica player, performing professionally from the age of 17. Touring the ABC Cinema chain, he played on BBC Radio broadcasts from 1937, the first being Palace of Varieties. Declared unfit to serve in the Second World War because of the removal of a tuberculosis-infected kidney, He was President of the National Hohner Song Band League (later the National Harmonica League) from 1951. His parents ran a kosher restaurant in Whitechapel, which served performers from the variety theatre across the road. He was educated at the Central Foundation Boys' Grammar School in Islington. During the Second World War, he was an army radio operator, and after being demobbed he worked as a radio engineer for Marconi. In the early 1950s, he began to write for the Jewish comedian Max Bacon; after Bacon introduced him to the BBC, Wolfe contributed material for radio shows. Starlight Hour (1951), broadcast on the BBC Light Programme, was a series which featured Beryl Reid. Wolfe became Reid's regular writer, providing material for her characters, Brummie Marlene and the naughty schoolgirl, Monica. After Reid joined the cast of the radio comedy series Educating Archie, Wolfe joined the writing team for the series which Eric Sykes had created. The series featured ventriloquist Peter Brough and his dummy Archie Andrews. ==Chesney and Wolfe's projects==

Early collaborations Chesney's harmonica playing was featured as a musical interlude on Educating Archie; this led to his first meeting with Wolfe in 1955. It also starred Irene Handl. The first regular television work for Chesney and Wolfe, writing in partnership with Feldman, was in 1958 when ITV franchise holder Associated-Rediffusion made a television version of Educating Archie. He did, however, tutor Sylvia Syms for her harmonica-playing role in the film No Trees in the Street (1959). Sheila Hancock and Barbara Windsor were also in the cast, plus the diminutive Esma Cannon. Directed (and produced) by Dennis Main Wilson, Karlin wrote in her autobiography that Main Wilson had an "amazing capacity for picking the right people" for a cast. Rejected by Associated-Rediffusion, who thought factory workers would not watch it, the pitch was picked up by Frank Muir and Denis Norden who were then comedy advisers for BBC Television. The series had an audience of up to 20 million, and was more popular at the time than ''Dad's Army''. Doris Hare was his Mum (originally played by Cicely Courtneidge), Both Varney and Grant's characters were womanisers. As David Stubbs wrote for The Guardian in 2008, Grant and Varney were playing "two conspicuously middle-aged men" pursuing "an endless array of improbably available 'dolly birds'". The series, although a rating success, was nevertheless critically derided at the time of its first broadcast. It led to three film spin-offs, which Chesney and Wolfe both co-wrote and co-produced. The first of these was more successful at the British box office than the year's James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever (1971). It lasted four series, being the most successful in the ratings of their series after On the Buses. has a reputation, shared with Romany Jones, of being one of the worst-ever sitcoms. In 1977, following the BBC's rejection of a new pilot episode, The Rag Trade was revived by LWT for the ITV network, with Peter Jones and Miriam Karlin returning; it lasted for two series. Anna Karen was "transplanted" into the cast (as Anthony Hayward expressed it in 2011) to play her Olive character from On The Buses. and Take a Letter, Mr. Jones (Southern 1981), a role-reversal comedy created for John Inman, which also starred Rula Lenska. An episode of '''Allo 'Allo! (1989) and Fredrikssons Fabrik – The Movie'' (1994) were the partnership's last scripts. ==Later life==

From the 1980s, Wolfe taught comedy writing at London's City University in 1986 and 1988. His text book Writing Comedy first appeared in 1992. Chesney was no longer a regular harmonica player in his last years; he preferred to play jazz on his grand piano at home. He was survived by his wife Patricia, to whom he was married for 70 years, and their two children, Marianne and Michael. ==Television credits==

• ''Here's Archie'' (1956) BBC • Educating Archie (1958–59) Associated-Rediffusion/ITV • The Rag Trade (1961–1963, 1977–1978) BBC, LWT/ITV • Comedy Playhouse – "The Bed" (1963, pilot for Meet the Wife) BBC • Meet the Wife (1964–1966) BBC • Barley Charlie (1964) Nine Network, Australia • The Bed-Sit Girl (1965–66) BBC • ''Sorry I'm Single'' (1967) BBC • According To Dora (1968–69) BBC • Comedy Playhouse (Series 7) – "Wild, Wild Women" (1968, pilot) BBC • Wild, Wild Women (1969, series) BBC • On the Buses (1969–1973) LWT • The Other Reg Varney (1970, repeated as The Reg Varney Comedy Hour in 1972) LWT • Romany Jones (1972, pilot) Thames Television/ITV • Romany Jones (1973–75, series) LWT/ITV • ''Don't Drink the Water'' (1974–75) LWT/ITV • Yus, My Dear (1976) LWT/ITV • Comedy Special – "The Boys and Mrs B" (1977) BBC • Watch This Space (1980) BBC • Take a Letter, Mr. Jones (1981) Southern/ITV • '''Allo 'Allo!'' (1989, episode "Down the Drain", series 5) BBC ==Film credits==

• ''I've Gotta Horse'' (1965) • On the Buses (1971) • Mutiny on the Buses (1972) • Holiday on the Buses (1973) • Fredrikssons Fabrikk – The Movie (Norway 1994) ==References==