Mrs Dale's Diary

Mrs Dale's Diary was the first significant BBC radio serial drama. It was first broadcast on the BBC Light Programme on 5 January 1948, and subsequently transferred to the newly formed Radio 2 in 1967, where it ran until 25 April 1969. A new episode was broadcast each weekday afternoon, with a repeat the following morning.

The main scriptwriter for many years was Jonqil Antony, and her first collaborator (under a pseudonym) was Ted Willis, later to originate equally well-known characters for Dixon of Dock Green.

The lead character, Mrs Dale, was played by Ellis Powell until she was sacked in controversial circumstances in 1963 and replaced by Jessie Matthews. An innovative characteristic of the programme was that a brief introductory narrative in each episode was spoken by Mrs Dale as if she were writing her diary.

Format

The serial centred around Mrs Mary Dale, a doctor's wife, husband Jim, and the comings and goings of a middle-class society. The Dales lived at Virginia Lodge in the fictional London Metro-land-style suburb of Parkwood Hill. They moved there from the real area of Kenton, which straddles the border between the London boroughs of Brent and Harrow. Later in the series, to modernise the programme and its setting, the producers relocated the family in the fictional new town of Exton New Town.

Mrs Dale's mother was Mrs Freeman, whom Jim always called, rather gravely, "mother-in-law". The family had one daughter, Gwen, and a son, Bob. Bob, who worked in the motor trade, was married to Jenny; they had twins. Gwen was widowed after her husband David was killed in a water-skiing accident in the Bahamas where he was holidaying with his rich mistress. Mary Dale's sister Sally (which she always pronounced "Selly") lived in Chelsea and moved in exotic circles. The Dales and their friends (and Captain, Mrs Freeman's cat, apparently named after her late husband's rank when he fell in the First World War) got along in almost perfect harmony. It was all respectable, comfortable and middle-class, although one of the characters, an artist named Jago Peters (played by a young Derek Nimmo), once tried to use a neighbour's Scandinavian au pair as a nude model.

Treatment of homosexuality

The programme is thought to be the first British mainstream drama which depicted a character known to be homosexual sympathetically in a leading part – Sally's husband. It was a brave move to feature a gay man, especially when homosexuality was still illegal in the United Kingdom.^[1] Clearly the programme's makers considered the time was right for the subject to be featured.^[2] Richard Fulton, however, was an odd character to use, in several ways. Not least is that (though apparently based on the homosexual writer Patrick White) Richard's history in the serial was heterosexual. He was in fact a character who had developed a lot, having been presented in the early days as a monster of petulance.

Changes to the format

In February 1962, the serial was renamed The Dales. The linking narratives by Mrs Dale were dropped. The reason was that the BBC were conscious that the series was considered by the media to be twee and hopelessly old fashioned. The changes included a new theme tune composed by Ron Grainer (he was behind the futuristic theme tune for Doctor Who. "Dance in the Twilight" from Eric Coates' Springtime Suite also served as a signature tune for a time.

Scandal

In 1963 Ellis Powell was dropped from the role of Mary Dale. She was bitter and said a lot to the press. The state of her health probably affected the situation as she died soon afterwards.

The following year, Frank Marcus's play The Killing of Sister George opened in London, starring - as did the later film - Beryl Reid. The story featured an actress who loses her part in a long-running serial, and clearly has connections with the controversy over Ellis Powell. "Sister George", however, was not replaced - her character was killed off, a far more common situation for an actor.

The new Mrs Dale was Jessie Matthews. Lord Olivier, who adored The Dales (he was a fan of British soap opera per se, and expressed a desire to appear in Coronation Street, a wish never fulfilled) referred to Jessie Matthews being cast as Mrs Dale as "The most wonderful example of mis-casting in the history of the profession".^{[citation needed]}

The Dales

In its last years, The Dales became more sensational. Mrs Dale became a councillor, a position she had to relinquish when she caused a man's death by careless driving. A heart attack forced Dr Dale to retire from practice. Perhaps the most famous storyline was Jenny getting measles; listeners wrote in thousands complaining that she had already had measles in 1949.

When it became The Dales, the show did try to copy The Archers, which was originally a medium to disseminate information to the agricultural community, and to give an insight into rural affairs to the public. Thus medical stories became the order in The Dales. In this manner, The Dales became in the mid 1960s much like the BBC One soap opera Doctors, the plots revolving around medical conditions and problems. When the series ran a story about the importance of women having regular cervical smear tests and checking their breasts for lumps, the junior health minister praised the programme, saying it had encouraged thousands of women to see their doctor.

The serial ran for 5,431 episodes, culminating with the engagement of Mrs Dale's daughter Gwen to a famous TV professor on April 25, 1969. On news of its demise, Liberal MP Peter Bessell attempted to introduce a reprieve for the series in Parliament. The BBC Sound Archive hold only five complete episodes of Mrs Dale's Diary, and seven complete episodes of The Dales.^{[citation needed]}

Spin-offs

Over the years it ran there were a number of books written around the characters, several authored in whole or part by Jonquil Antony, the most important scriptwriter at the beginning and for many years. In 1970, the year after the programme finished, she took back her former characters after a fashion, publishing Dear Dr Dale, a novel set after the end of the serial.

In the same year Charles Simon, who had played Dr Dale in the Jessie Matthews years, did his own continuation of the story, going on tour in At Home With The Dales. This show has its place in theatre history as the first professional venture of Cameron Mackintosh, now renowned for large-scale musicals. The Dales play was written by Charles Henry, who was soon discovered to be the versatile and experienced Charles Simon. It is a workmanlike comedy that takes a few liberties with established characters, but deserved a better fate than to die on the road.^{[original research?]} Later dates in the tour were cancelled because the audience did not seem to be there. "It would have been different if Jessie had done the tour" Charles Simon remarked to another actor a few months later. But he was the only member of the radio cast to make the transition.

The play was published, but has seldom been revived. In 1972 it received an amateur production at Rugby Theatre with Bridget Watson as Mrs Dale and Harry Roberts as her husband the doctor. The only professional revival seems to have been in 1997 at the Kenneth More Studio Theatre in Ilford, when Angela Ellis and Roger Braban played the senior Dales.

Catchphrase

The phrase seized on by caricaturists as typical of Mrs Dale's narrative was "I'm rather worried about Jim..." Indeed, the phrase was a staple of many comedy programmes, radio and television, in the early Sixties aiming to poke fun at safe, staid and undemanding middle-class lifestyles. The last line of the last episode was "I shall always worry about Jim..."

Parodies

Mrs Wilson's Diary

Main article: Mrs Wilson's Diary

Mrs Dale's Diary was the basis of Mrs Wilson's Diary in the fortnightly satirical magazine Private Eye. The writers (primarily John Wells) presented Mrs Wilson as seeing herself as comfortably middle class, in contrast to the working class pretensions as opposed to middle class actuality of her husband, for example the Wincarnis (a brand of tonic wine) and the worsted suits with two pairs of trousers (Wilson was from Huddersfield, a town famous for the manufacture of worsted cloth).

Goon Show

The show was mentioned in the following episodes of The Goon Show:

• Nineteen Eighty-Five, (s05 ep15- January 5, 1955), in which mention is made of Mrs Dale's Real Diary:

Seagoon: I want to read it. What's it called?

Bluebottle: It's called Mrs Dale's Real Diary.

Seagoon: Mrs Dale's...?? Heavens -- would the BBC stop at nothing? So this was how they kept the masses from thinking.

Bluebottle: Eheehee! Look at this page! Eheehee! It's a Three-D picture of Mrs Dale in her nightshirt being chased by Richard Dimbleby... Eheehee! Eheeheehee! Eheeheeoooooughhhh... pauses to wipe drool off chin.

It was also one of the recordings used for torture in the BBC Listening Room, that episode's parody of Room 101.

• The History of Pliny the Elder (s07 ep25- March 28, 1957):

Seagoon: Fear not! We shall fight them up hill and down Mrs Dale!

• In The Man Who Tried To Destroy London's Monuments, (s04 ep02- October 9, 1953), Eccles regains consciousness and is told he is in Mrs Dale's Diary.

Round The Horne

• The programme was often a 'target' (albeit an affectionate one) on the BBC Radio comedy Round The Horne, referred to as "Mrs Dire's Dreary" with the part of Mrs Dire being played by Kenneth Williams

External links

• Nostalgic look at Mrs Dale's Diary

References

1. ^ "Mrs. Dale's Diary". http://www.whirligig-tv.co.uk/radio/mrsdalesdiary.htm. Retrieved 11 February 2010. "I do remember Mrs. Dale's brother-in-law confiding in her that he was homosexual (shriek);" 
2. ^ Smurthwaite, Nick (19 February 2007). "Radio - Light programme". The Stage. http://www.thestage.co.uk/features/feature.php/15995/radio-light-programme. Retrieved 11 February 2010. "In The Archive Hour’s Out on Air, Richard Cole traced the history of homosexuality on BBC radio, from the love-that-dare-not-speak-its-name days of Mrs Dale’s Diary in the fifties to Radio 1’s Loud and Proud." 

Published References Include

• Mrs Dale's Diary: Gwen's Love Story (No writer given) Pub:Chambers, 1951
• BBC Year Book For 1952 Pub: British Broadcasting Corporation 1951
• Mrs Dale At Home Jonquil Antony Pub: Macdonald, London, 1952
• Mrs Dale Jonquil Antony & Robert Turley Pub: The World's Work 1958
• The Dales of Parkwood Hill Jonquil Antony & Robert Turley Pub: The World's Work 1959
• Mrs Dale's Friendship Book Jonquil Antony Pub: Arlington Books 1961
• The Dales Rex Edwards Pub: British Broadcasting Corporation 1969
• Dear Dr Dale Jonquil Antony Pub: Corgi 1970
• Pulling Faces For A Living James Dale Pub: Victor Gollancz 1970
• At Home With The Dales Charles Simon Pub: Samuel French 1971
• Evening All: Fifty Years Over A Hot Typewriter Ted Willis Pub: Macmillan 1991
• Broadcasting It Keith Howes Pub: Cassell 1993