Still Game

''Still Game'' is a Scottish sitcom, produced by The Comedy Unit with BBC Scotland. It was created by Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill, who played the lead characters, Jack Jarvis, Esq and Victor McDade, two Glaswegian pensioners. The characters first appeared in the pair's previous TV sketch show ''Chewin' the Fat'', which aired in Scotland from January 1999 until December 2005.

Following its debut on 6 September 2002, 62 episodes of ''Still Game'' were aired, including Christmas and Hogmanay specials, in addition to almost 50 live shows. The first three series were broadcast only on BBC One Scotland, though five episodes selected from the first two series were later broadcast throughout the UK on BBC Two from January to February 2004. From the fourth series, ''Still Game'' was broadcast across the UK on BBC Two. With the seventh series in 2016, the programme began to be broadcast on BBC One.

It was announced on 13 July 2018 that a ninth and final series would be produced later in the year which would see the characters go into "comedy retirement". The last day of production was on 14 September 2018, and it started airing on 24 February 2019, being one of the first programmes to be shown on the brand new BBC Scotland channel.

History

''Still Game'' started as a stage play featuring three characters: Jack Jarvis, Victor McDade, and Winston Ingram. Due to a broken lift, the three men are stranded in Victor's flat and discuss a variety of subjects ranging from death to sex. The stage play toured Scotland, England, Ireland and Canada before returning to Glasgow, where the show was filmed at the Cottiers Theatre in 1999 and released on video on 22 November 1999. A DVD of the show was later released on 2 December 2002. It is available on YouTube, as of January 2022.

A small number of revisions accompanied ''Still Games transition from stage to television. Gavin Mitchell, who originally played Winston (and was replaced by Paul Riley for later performances), played the part of Boabby in the series. Characters mentioned in passing were later fleshed out into supporting characters.

In 1998, Jack and Victor appeared in a number of skits in a tongue-in-cheek documentary about Scottish pop music called ''Och Around the Clock''. In these, they are shown to be watching while sitting in Victor's flat. Their skits centred on the duo's disparaging comments about the performers.

The characters reappeared in Kiernan and Hemphill's sketch show ''Chewin' the Fat'', nearly every episode of which featured Jack, Victor, Tam and Winston, with minor differences from their counterparts in the series. By the time ''Still Game'' became a show in its own right Winston's physical appearance had changed significantly, but he was still played by Paul Riley. As the show evolved, supporting characters assumed greater prominence. Jack and Victor made their final appearance on ''Chewin' the Fat'' in the 2002 Hogmanay Special.

For the show's first three series, the broadcast of ''Still Game'' was limited to BBC One Scotland. The show was then moved to BBC Two for the fourth series and shown throughout the UK. On 28 December 2005, the first Christmas special was shown on BBC One, the first national broadcast of the show on the channel. A fifth series of the show started filming in February 2006 and was shown the following June on BBC Two. As of 2006, series three had not been shown nationally, and only five episodes from the first two series were shown on national BBC Two from 17 January to 14 February 2004. The second series was shown nationally from 10 July 2008. This meant it was listed as a new series in TV listings, even though it was not for Scottish viewers.

In the first three series, the episode titles were all Glaswegian dialect words that were related to the episode. Starting from series four, the episodes were titled using standard English, so that general audiences could understand them.

The events of ''Still Game'' take place in a floating timeline where the characters remain the same age from series to series. One of the most prominent examples of this is that Victor reveals that he is 74 years old in "Scran", an episode of the second series, but it is not until the fifth series ("Smoke on the Water") that he celebrates his 75th birthday.

The sixth series of ''Still Game'' ended on BBC Two on 23 August 2007. A Christmas special was aired on BBC One Scotland on 23 December and for the rest of the UK on BBC Two on 28 December. There was also a Hogmanay special called "Hootenanny" aired on BBC One Scotland, later aired to the rest of the UK on 2 January 2008.

Ford Kiernan, Greg Hemphill and Paul Riley's company Effingee Productions is thought to have split up after Riley walked away to go it alone after being refused more control over the future of the company by Kiernan. Hemphill stated that he didn't want a "boardroom battle". The split ultimately resulted in the indefinite hiatus of the series.

In 2012 actor and playwright Kenny Boyle acquired the rights to the original stage play of Still Game and toured the show, with a new cast, to The Tron theatre, FTH theatre, and The Ayr Gaiety Theatre. The original play hadn’t been staged for 14 years. Kiernan and Hemphill came to see the performances and consequently began considering reviving Still Game officially.

On 15 October 2013, the ''Daily Record'' ran a front-page story that the show would be returning. On 23 October 2013, Ford Kiernan and Greg Hemphill announced details of live shows entitled '' Still Game Live'' at The SSE Hydro in Glasgow at a press conference. They were scheduled to perform four shows beginning in September 2014, but due to high demand, it was extended to 16 and then 21 shows. On 24 October 2013 Kiernan confirmed in the ''Daily Record'' that Kenny Boyle’s tour of the original stage show had been one of the instigating factors for Still Game’s return.

The 21 shows at The Hydro ran from 19 September 2014 until 10 October 2014, played to 210,000 fans and made £6,000,000 in ticket sales. The show received mixed reviews.

In November 2014, a special sketch featuring Jack and Victor visiting the set of ''River City'' was made for Children in Need. The sketch also featured a cameo of a director played by Still Game director Michael Hines. On Hogmanay 2014, BBC Scotland showed a documentary celebrating the show titled ''Still Game: The Story So Far''. The programme featured interviews with the cast, celebrities who have appeared on the show and super fans, including a look at some favourite moments.

On 12 May 2016, the BBC
...