Leader: A truly British comedy genius

WE’RE all doomed now,” Dad’s Army character Private Frazer would probably have observed in customary stricken tones on hearing of the death of the producer and joint guiding hand, with writer Jimmy Perry, behind the much-loved sitcom featuring the stout defenders of Walmington-on-Sea.

He is undeniably one of British comedy’s greatest sons, the talent behind half a dozen successful comedy shows. It is true It Ain’t Half Hot, Mum, featuring an army concert party in India, and Are You Being Served, featuring the preposterously camp Mr Humphries, belong in a less politically sensitive era. But Allo, Allo was a remarkable feat of rendering comic the, in reality, highly unamusing work of the Resistance in occupied France, and Hi-de-Hi is the best memorial there is to the now-extinct holiday camp experience.

Dad’s Army was undoubtedly his finest creation, running for a remarkable nine years and 80 episodes. The characters epitomised essential Britishness – middle-class pomposity, upper-class diffidence, Scottish dourness, working-class chippiness, bureaucratic officiousness, and much more.

Individually each was defective, collectively they sparked superb comedy.

What is his name? Don’t tell them, Croft.