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Creator’s kids look back on time with Dad’s Army legends
THE legendary cast of Dad’s Army have been regular guests in millions of living rooms over the decades. But for one family, Captain Mainwaring and his men were literally sitting on their sofa most weekends.
The much-loved sitcom has been the subject of much reminiscing this week following the death of Ian Lavender, who played mummy’s boy Private Pike in the long-running series, and who poignantly was the last of the main characters to pass away.
But for Nick and Penny Croft, the son and daughter of Dad’s Army writer David Croft, the memories are even closer – and the feeling that Ian’s death at the age of 77 sadly marks the end of an era even stronger.
The siblings were in their early teens when their dad’s World War II sitcom, which he wrote with Jimmy Perry, became a massive success on the BBC.
And while they would sit down with the rest of the nation to watch the show every Friday night, they also got to know the cast, who would often come round for dinner parties and barbecues.
The production was such a family affair the kids would even go into the BBC studios to watch the episodes being filmed, and got to see the making of some of TV history’s most famous and funniest moments.
Penny, now a TV writer and producer herself, also became a lifelong friend of Ian, and was with him just two days before he died. She says the actor knew his time was coming and focussed on remembering the good times.
“We talked about my parents, and we reminisced about shows and other things that he’d done,” Penny recalled.
“He’d been very ill for a long time and he was happy to go. In the days before he died both his sons were with him, and his best friend Rick Wakeman also spent time with him.
“He got to be with everyone he loved and he was in a good place.”
She added: “He was well aware what it would mean for Dad’s Army.
“I remember when Frank Williams [Rev Timothy Farthing] died two years ago, we went for a coffee and he said: ‘Oh, God, Penn, it’s only me now.’
Penny first met Ian when the Dad’s Army cast came round to their
house. Ian, then aged 22, was closer to their ages so would spend time with them.
Nick, who was 15 when Dad’s Army first aired, remembers: “He had more in common with us, so would want to sit with us, or would come and look us out whenever they were round. He was always very cheeky and very amusing.
“Not that he ever felt left out by the others. They looked after him like one of their children. But people like Arthur [Lowe], John [Laurie] and Arnold [Ridley] had already lived very colourful lives and they all loved to tell stories, and Ian was more often put in the position of listening.
“That’s why he came looking for us. He’d say, ‘I can only hear these stories so many times,’ and come out and ask what we were up to, bring us a Coke or something. He was a very kind man.” Penny, who was 13 at that time, recalled: “Ian was the only person I felt any affinity with, because for me all the others were just old men wandering around the house. “So we’d talk about teenage things like pop music, because he was just a kid like us. “We grew up together, and I even ended up living close to him, we were close friends for 50 years, right until the end.”
Nick, 70, a singer-songwriter whose new album, Beyond Why? was released yesterday, says Ian was one of the few actors who wasn’t like their Dad’s Army characters. He recalled: “They were all lovely people. John Laurie liked to sort of entrance you, he loved to tell you stories. Arthur Lowe was a bit pompous and standoffish, it was his character but he was also like that.
“He invited us all on to his yacht on the Thames, he wore his Admiral’s hat and bossed everyone around.
“John [Le Mesurier] was someone I liked to talk to. He was very keen on jazz and used to be found in Ronnie Scott’s place at night.
“Perhaps the member of the cast we were closest to, after Ian, was Clive Dunn. We both had houses in the Algarve and we’d always meet up there.”
Private Frank Pike was frequently a target for the derision of Captain George Mainwaring, with the nowfamous putdown, “stupid boy”.
Nick laughed: “You could never say Ian was a stupid boy, he was actually quite astute. He was a very good actu
ally and knew how to get into the part.”
Penny says she watched almost all the Dad’s Army episodes being filmed, as well as most of the other sitcoms her dad went on to write, including Are You Being Served?, It Ain’t Half Hot Mum, Hi-de-Hi! And ’Allo ’Allo.
And she was there for what has been called one of British TV’s greatest comedy moments, and one Ian is most remembered for – when Mainwaring urges Pike not to give his name to a German officer with the line: “Don’t tell him, Pike!”
Penny said: “That was brilliant, and so English in its delivery.
“I remember that once they had done it there was just general hysteria from everyone.
“But that was quite common. Quite often they had to stop and do it again because everyone was laughing.
“And you can see if you look closely that they often are biting the inside of their lips not to laugh.
“They all really got on and it was a nice thing to be around. There was a lot of banter and p***-taking, but they all genuinely liked each other.”
Even after Dad’s Army, their father’s continued TV success meant Nick and Penny – along with their younger sisters Jane and Beckie, and younger brothers John, Richard and Tim – continued to be surrounded by sitcom legends. Nick’s date to his 18th birthday party was future East-Enders star Wendy Richards, then playing Miss Brahms in Are You Being Served?
Other frequent visitors to their house included Only Fools and Horses’ David Jason and Terry Scott from Terry and June.
Penny, now in her 60s, said: “It was a cool way to grow up, the house was a hub of weird old comics, who would often test their lines on us to see if we found them funny. I was also very close to John Inman, from Are You Being Served? and actually introduced him to his husband. “I once had to go on the dole, and the guy in the dole office was a gay man who I got on well with, and we went for a drink afterwards. And I said, ‘You have to meet my friend John’. And that’s how John and Ron first got together.” Simon Cadell, the late actor who played Jeffrey Fairbrother in Hi-de-Hi!, also became part of their family after he married David’s daughter Beckie. For David, who died aged 89 in 2011, Dad’s Army remained his biggest success, winning him a BAFTA award in 1971 and named Britain’s fourth best sitcom in a BBC vote in 2004.
But Penny says it wasn’t the sitcom her dad was most proud of.
She says: “He once said to me that he thought his best work was You Rang, M’Lord.
“It’s a comedy about class, and if you watch it now, it’s incredibly insightful. In his heart that was his greatest success.”
■ Nick Croft’s debut album Beyond Why? is available now.