Rising Damp

On paper, it shouldn’t work. The show is set in a seedy boarding house run by a bigoted, sexually frustrated, resentful man who looks like he rarely washes or changes clothes. His wife has left him, and he is a fantasist who makes up stories of heroic wartime deeds. He treats his boarders with contempt, apart from the one he’s hopelessly in love with – college administrator Ruth, played by Frances de la Tour, later known to millions from the Harry Potter films.