Rising Damp

Rigsby's shabby boarding house

Rising Damp is a British sitcom written by Eric Chappell and produced by Yorkshire Television for ITV. It centres on Rupert Rigsby, the miserly, seedy and hopelessly self-regarding landlord of a run-down Victorian townhouse, who rents grimy bedsits to a rotating cast of tenants. Leonard Rossiter stars as Rigsby, whose bigotry and snobbery are constantly punctured by his lodgers: the naive medical student Alan, the urbane Philip, who spins tall tales about being the son of an African chief, and the refined spinster Miss Jones, on whom Rigsby nurses a hopeless crush. Adapted from Chappell's stage play The Banana Box, it remains one of ITV's best-loved comedies.