BBC developing new sitcom tipped to be ‘modern day’ Only Fools and Horses

ICONINSIDER — The BBC is developing a new sitcom tipped to be a “modern day” ‘Only Fools and Horses’.
The broadcaster has teamed up with writer Rhys Thomas – who is best know as the creator of ‘The Life of Rock with Brian Pern’ – for brand new show ‘Scaffs’, an abbreviation of Scaffolders, and has been compared to John Sullivan’s must-loved hit comedy series, which starred Sir David Jason and Nicholas Lyndhurst.
The director wanted to make show that is perfect for all the family and that represents “working class life” as he feels there is a lack of such programmes on screen.
He told RadioTimes.com: “The plan is a little bit ‘Only Fools and Horses’ but set now.
“There aren’t many things that really represent working class life on telly.
“That’s why I want to do it.
“It would be quite nice to make something that the whole family could watch that doesn’t have any swearing but isn’t naff.”
Meanwhile, Lyndhurst and Sir David previously said they were adamant an ‘Only Fools and Horses’ revival will “never happen.”
The 55-year-old actor portrayed goody two shoes Rodney Trotter in the long-running comedy and, although he thoroughly enjoyed working on the sitcom with Sir David Jason – who played his on-screen brother dodgy market trader Del Boy – the pair are certain there won’t be any more episodes because the writing genius John Sullivan – who tragically passed away in 2011 – is no longer around to pen more episodes.
He said: “We can’t do ‘Fools and Horses’ again as the writers are not there. It will never happen. It ended on a high.”
David agreed: “When we did ‘Fools and Horses’ we just had a writer who just wrote and that was his craft and he handed it onto us. We were very fortunate that we were doing a TV show that was written by such a talented man. Now everybody wants instant success, an instant winner and you can’t have an instant winner.”
‘Only Fools and Horses’ ran for seven series from 1981 until December 2003 and saw David’s alter-ego pulling out all the stops to become a millionaire “this time next year”.
There were 19 festive episodes, including 1996’s ‘Time on Our Hands’ – which pulled in a sitcom record 24.3 million viewers – and ‘Only Fools’ spawned two spin-off series.
Nicholas returned for the prequel Rock & Chips’ and starred as Rodney’s biological father Freddie “The Frog” Robdal, while Boycie and Marlene (John Challis and Sue Holderness) were revived in ‘The Green Green Grass’ about their life in the countryside.

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