The first in a series mapping the history of some of the nation's favourite comedy shows journeys through forty years of television and explores the connections between The Frost Report, The Likely Lads, Up Pompeii and Porridge. From the moment it hit our screens, Porridge was hailed as a sitcom classic. But if the BBC had followed Ronnie Barker's instinct, they would have made a series called I'll Fly You for a Quid instead. Interviews with Ronnie Barker, cast members, writers Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais, and director/producer Sydney Lotterby uncover the inside story of how the series was conceived and commissioned. Once the gates of Slade Prison are locked for the final time, this programme follows creators and stars of Porridge to Open All Hours, 'Allo, 'Allo, Eldorado, Fraggle Rock and all the way to Hollywood.

Would Are You Being Served? have been a global success if its creators, David Croft and Jeremy Lloyd, had done as they were told? Interviews with the Croft and Lloyd, Mollie Sugden, Frank Thornton, John Inman, Wendy Richard and other members of the cast tell the extraordinary story of how Joanna Lumley and a job at Simpson's of Piccadilly inspired a programme which is still much-loved all around the world. And in unravelling the tangled tale of Grace Brothers, we travel through a whole era of David Croft-inspired comedy, from Hugh and I and Dad's Army in the sixties to 'Allo 'Allo! and Oh, Doctor Beeching! in the nineties.

Simon Nye's debut as a sitcom writer became a huge hit, but without its original star and on BBC1. Creators and cast reflect on this epoch-defining success story.

Not only did the hugely successful series come within a whisker of not being made, but the BBC wanted to pull the show after initially poor ratings. Last in the series.