The Shuttleworths, 1993
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Comedian Graham Fellows had a top 10 hit in 1978 as Jilted John and then promptly disappeared. Years later he re-invents himself as John Shuttleworth, a Yamaha keyboard-playing Yorkshireman from Sheffield.
The Shuttleworths was the original BBC Radio series featuring: John Shuttleworth, his family and neighbours, all of which were played by the Comedian. There have been five series aired at various points between 1993 and 2010 totalling twenty nine episodes.
During it’s original run there were also eight specials. A further two Christmas Specials were broadcast in more recent years one in 2018 and one in 2019.
Each programme is improvised, recorded and edited by Fellows using multi-track recording. The early series were recorded in Fellows’ garden shed on a four-track cassette, and one series was recorded in a hotel bedroom. He now makes his programmes in his own digital recording studio.
Summary
In John’s fictional world, each fifteen-minute episode is a cassette tape recording made by John, featuring John’s commentary addressed directly to the listener and eavesdropping on John’s daily life.
Characters include his wife Mary, neighbour and agent Ken Worthington, their two teenage children Darren and Karen, and Mary’s friend Joan Chitty. Events are interspersed with his own bizarre bouncy keyboard ditties on such varied matters as Austin Ambassadors, garden centres and toast, all performed (usually badly) on his Yamaha Portasound electronic keyboard.
Clips
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Starring
All characters voiced by Graham Fellows.
Details
Channel: BBC Radio 4
Created and Written By: Graham Fellows
Original Transmission Dates: 11th October 1993 – 16th June 2010