Hancock's Half Hour

Name: Hancock's Half Hour
Genre: Comedy
Rating: 8.4
Cast: John Le Mesurier, Hattie Jacques, Mario Fabrizi, Dennis Chinnery, Paddi Edwards

Hancock's Half Hour (1956-1961)

Seasons: 7, episodes: 63

Episode runtime: 30 min

Average rating: 8.4/10 651

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All about the series

Video 0

Photo 5

Actors and characters

Photo 5

Premiere

1956-07-06

Last episode

1961-06-30

Status

Ended

Country

United Kingdom

Network

BBC One

Production

BBC

Genre

Comedy

Website

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02zn066

Creators

Ray Galton, Alan Simpson

Actors

John Le Mesurier, Hattie Jacques, Mario Fabrizi, Dennis Chinnery, Paddi Edwards, Raymond Huntley, Hugh Lloyd, Gwenda Ewen, William Mervyn, Brian Oulton
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Alan Simpson, Ray Galton

Producer

Operator

Composer

Editing

All team (3)

Short description

Hancock's Half Hour is a BBC television comedy series of the 1950s and 60s written by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson. The series starred Tony Hancock with Sid James. The final series, renamed simply Hancock, starred Hancock alone. Comedian Tony Hancock starred in the show, playing an exaggerated and much poorer version of his own character and lifestyle, Anthony Aloysius St John Hancock, a down-at-heel comedian living at the dilapidated 23 Railway Cuttings in East Cheam. The series was influential in the development of the situation comedy, with its move away from radio variety towards a focus on character development.

Seasons

Season	Episodes	Release date	Rating
Season 1 Broadcast between 6th July 1956 and 14th September 1956, this series comprised 6 episodes all of which were broadcast live with no recordings of the transmissions being made by the BBC. Consequently, none of these episodes survive. The series was broadcast fortnightly on Fridays at 2130 (except n…	6	1956-07-06	—
Season 2 Broadcast between 1st April 1957 and 10th June 1957, this series comprised 6 episodes all of which were broadcast live. The BBC did record the first episode of this series for training purposes and this is the only episode of this series that survives. The series was broadcast fortnightly on Mond…	6	1957-04-01	—
Season 3 Broadcast between 30th September 1957 and 23rd December 1957 this series comprised 12 episodes all of which were broadcast live of which episodes 5, 9, 10, 11 and 12 survive in the BBC Archives. The series was broadcast weekly on Mondays at 2002. There were no repeats during the run.	12	1957-09-30	—
Season 4 Broadcast between 26th December 1958 and 27th March 1959, this series comprised 13 episodes of which the first 4 were recorded and the remainder were broadcast live. Episodes 1, 3, 4, 11 and 12 survive in the BBC Archives whilst off-air audio recordings exist of episodes 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10. …	13	1958-12-26	—
Season 5 Broadcast between 25th September 1959 and 27th November 1959, this series comprised 10 episodes and all survive in the BBC Archive. The series was broadcast weekly on Fridays at 2030 except episode 3 which was broadcast at 2045. There were no repeats during the run.	10	1959-09-25	—
Season 6 Broadcast between 4th March 1960 and 6th May 1960, this series comprised 10 episodes and all survive in the BBC Archive. The series was broadcast weekly on Fridays at 2030 except episodes 8 - 10 on Fridays 1930. There were no repeats during the run.	10	1960-03-04	—
Season 7 Re-branded as simply 'Hancock', this series was broadcast between 26th May 1961 and 30th June 1961. The series comprised 6 episodes all of which survive in the BBC Archive. The series was broadcast weekly on Fridays at 2000 and each episode ran for 25 minutes rather than the half hour running ti…	6	1961-05-26	—