Last of the Summer Wine series 1


The first series of Last of the Summer Wine originally aired on BBC1 between 4 January 1973 and 17 December 1973. All episodes were written by Roy Clarke, and produced and directed by James Gilbert.
The pilot episode, alternatively known as "The Last of the Summer Wine" and "Of Funerals and Fish", originally premiered on the BBC's Comedy Playhouse on 4 January 1973. "The Last of the Summer Wine" was the first episode of that show's thirteenth series. The pilot received a positive enough reaction that the BBC ordered a full series of episodes, premiering on 12 November 1973.

Outline

The trio in this series consisted of:
ActorRole
Michael BatesBlamire
Bill OwenCompo
Peter SallisClegg

First appearances

  • Compo Simmonite
  • Norman Clegg
  • Cyril Blamire
  • Sid
  • Ivy
  • Nora Batty

Episodes


;Pilot
No.TitleOriginal airdateDisc
1 Comedy Playhouse: "Of Funerals and Fish"
4 January 19734

;Regular Series
No.No. in
series		Original title
Alternative title 		Original airdateProd. codeDisc



1Comedy Playhouse episode number.

DVD release

The first and second series were released by Universal Playback as a combined box set in September 2002. The pilot episode is not included and some episodes have been altered from their original broadcast, prompting criticism from the show's fan base; however, a re-release of the box set in 2011 had the altered episodes restored to original episodes, but the pilot was still not included. The pilot episode was released on the final boxset series 31 & 32 as an extra on disc four on 15 August 2016.