After Henry (TV series)

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This article is about the TV series. For other uses, see After Henry.

After Henry
Genre	Sitcom
Starring	Prunella Scales Joan Sanderson
Country of origin	United Kingdom
No. of episodes	38
Production
Running time	30 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	ITV
Original run	4 January 1988 – 24 August 1992
Links
IMDb profile

After Henry was a British sitcom starring Prunella Scales and Joan Sanderson that was broadcast on ITV from 1988 to 1992. It had started on BBC Radio 4 in 1985 and finished in 1989. It was written by Simon Brett. After Henry was made for the ITV network by Thames Television. It is not currently available on DVD

The BBC was reluctant to produce After Henry for television, so in 1988 after the third radio series Thames Television did so. The show was surprisingly popular, attracting over 14 million viewers. A second television series was shown during the same months as the fourth radio series with, in many cases, both radio and television episodes being broadcast on the same nights. The fourth television series was broadcast from July 1992, after the death of Joan Sanderson, who had died on 24 May.

1 Plot
2 Cast
3 Episode list
4 References

[edit] Plot

Sarah France is the 42-year-old widow of a GP, Henry. She lives in an often volatile family situation with her mother, Eleanor Prescott, and her daughter, eighteen-year-old Clare France, with both of whom she shares a house. After Henry's death, all three members of the family have to find a way to cope with each other as best they can.

Sarah often finds herself in the middle of things, usually figuratively, but always literally, given that she has her daughter living upstairs and her mother in the basement flat. Eleanor is ruthlessly cunning and takes every opportunity to get one over on Sarah. Anything told to Eleanor will spread by word of mouth throughout an extensive network of the elderly of the area, or the "geriatric mafia". Clare is trying to be independent of her mother, though often has to come running back in times of crisis.

The relationships between the three women change constantly through each episode. Sometimes mother and daughter ally against grandmother, sometimes mother and grandmother go against daughter, but usually grandmother and granddaughter gang up on the long-suffering Sarah, whose one haven is Bygone Books, the remarkably unsuccessful second-hand bookshop where she works for Russell, who dispenses in turn sympathy and wisdom. Most of the time, Russell sees the women's relationships second-hand through Sarah, although he isn't opposed to taking the occasional more active role when necessary. In turn, Sarah can see some of Russell's difficulties of living with a gay partner in 1980s London suburbia.

The adaptation for television allowed more to be seen of some of the more minor characters in the radio series, with appearances by some who had appeared only by reputation on the radio. These included Eleanor's bestfriend and rival Vera Poling, and Valerie Brown on the pension counter's sister Mary. In the television adaptation, Sarah also gained an on-off partner in Sam Greenland.

[edit] Cast

Prunella Scales - Sarah France
Joan Sanderson - Eleanor Prescott
Janine Wood - Clare France
Jonathan Newth - Russell Bryant
Peggy Ann Wood - Vera Poling
Anne Priestley - Mary (series 2)
Edward de Souza - Sam Greenland (series 2 and 3)

[edit] Episode list

Series	Episode	Title	First broadcast
1	1	The Older Man	4 January 1988
	2	Phone Calls	11 January 1988
	3	The Teapot	18 January 1988
	4	Security	25 January 1988
	5	Romantic Complications	1 February 1988
	6	The Birthday	8 February 1988
Special	1	A Quiet Christmas	26 December 1988
2	1	Intellectual Aspirations	10 January 1989
	2	Open Secrets	17 January 1989
	3	Memory Games	24 January 1989
	4	The Cold	31 January 1989
	5	Wedding Bells	7 February 1989
	6	Lines Of Communication	28 February 1989
	7	Gossip	7 March 1989
	8	Out On A Limb	14 March 1989
	9	Upstagers	21 March 1989
	10	Idle Speculation	28 March 1989
	11	Efficiency	4 April 1989
	12	Going Away	11 April 1989
Special	2	A Week Of Sundays	25 December 1989
3	1	Mr Right	23 January 1990
	2	Curiosity	30 January 1990
	3	Home Comforts	6 February 1990
	4	Relative Movement	13 February 1990
	5	The Dinner Party	20 February 1990
	6	Mr Fixit	27 February 1990
	7	Charity	6 March 1990
	8	The Mysterious Affair At Bygone Books	13 March 1990
	9	Party Politics	20 March 1990
	10	Unforeseen Circumstances	27 March 1990
	11	Family Album	3 April 1990
	12	Last Chances	17 April 1990
4	1	Dangerous Relatives	20 July 1992
	2	Poor Relations	27 July 1992
	3	A Fully Extended Family	3 August 1992
	4	Yes And No	10 August 1992
	5	The Married Man	17 August 1992
	6	The Other Married Man	24 August 1992