Ian La Frenais

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Template:Short description Template:EngvarB Template:Use dmy dates Template:BLP sources Template:Infobox writer Ian La Frenais (born 7 January 1937) is an English writer best known for his creative partnership with Dick Clement. They are most famous for television series including The Likely Lads, Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads?, Porridge and its sequel Going Straight, Lovejoy and Auf Wiedersehen, Pet.

Early life

La Frenais was born in Monkseaton, Northumberland; his father was an accountant. As a child at Park Primary School in Whitley Bay, La Frenais enjoyed art and writing. He then attended Dame Allan's Boys School in Newcastle upon Tyne, and completed his National Service in the British Army.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> After working as a salesman for a tobacco company, he began composing songs for a weekly satirical programme on Tyne Tees Television and then moved to London where he worked for a market research company.<ref name=Porridge>Template:Cite book</ref>

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,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and by the end of the decade they had also written three feature films: The Jokers,<ref name="auto1">Template:Cite web</ref> Otley (directed by Clement) and Hannibal Brooks.

In the early 1970s, they worked on two other features: Villain,<ref name="auto1"/> 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,<ref name="auto">Template:Cite web</ref> Thick as Thieves and Going Straight. There were big-screen versions of both The Likely Lads and Porridge,<ref name="auto"/> 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 California, where they wrote On the Rocks, an American version of Porridge,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and The Prisoner of Zenda, a feature film starring Peter Sellers.

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;<ref name="auto1"/> 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 HBO's Emmy-winning show Tracey Takes On... for four years in the 1990s. Their films around this time include The Commitments, which won both the Evening StandardTemplate:'s Peter Sellers Award for Comedy and a BAFTA Award for Best Adapted Screenplay, Excess Baggage and Still Crazy. In addition, they did uncredited rewrites on The Rock (starring Sean Connery) for Jerry Bruckheimer and director Michael Bay.

More recent television includes Archangel (starring Daniel Craig) and The Rotters' Club,<ref name="auto1"/> 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,<ref name="auto1"/> Across the Universe<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and The Bank Job.<ref name="auto1"/>

Two new television series written by them were broadcast in 2017: an updated version of Porridge, starring Kevin Bishop, for the BBC,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and the Rose D'Or award-winning Henry IX for UKTV Gold, starring Charles Edwards.Template:Citation needed They have written the books for two stage musicals in development, Juke Box Hero and Victoria's Secret.

They have also featured in documentaries - Porridge: Inside Out on Gold TV in 2014 & Comedy Classics: Porridge on Channel 5 in 2022

In 2019 he and Clement published their autobiography: More Than Likely: A Memoir (published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson) and La Frenais is currently writing a novel.

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.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> He is a patron of the Whitley Bay Film Festival.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Writing credits (with Dick Clement)

References

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