Old people on television are as rare as hen's teeth... unless they're playing it for laughs. Steve Pratt discovers a drama that's a welcome exception to the rule.

SOMETHING unexpected is being shown in peaktime on ITV1 tomorrow. No, not a drama that doesn't star Martin Clunes or Caroline Quentin, current king and queen of the commercial channel. And not another property or makeover show, or even a property makeover programme.

This offering provides a sighting of something rarer than a Siberian leopard - old people. What's more, the elderly are treated as human beings not as comedy grannies or dying elderly relatives.

Star Brenda Blethyn is a mere youngster of 58 but her three co-stars are all past pensionable age. She plays a woman who's left by her husband (Kevin Whatley) to care for his three elderly relatives, played by Rosemary Harris, 76, Anna Massey, 67, and Peter Sallis, 83. The writer Jarrow-born Alan Plater, who adapted Belonging from Stevie Davies's novel The Web Of Belonging, is no spring chicken himself at 69.

They are glad to be grey but TV executives aren't so keen to show wrinklies in leading roles. At least ITV has a valid excuse. They figure young people don't want to watch shows starring oldies and that robs them of a potential rich audience for advertisements. And it's no good showing commercials aimed at old people as they don't have a lot of disposable income to spend. Only ads for stair lifts and pension plans are acceptable.

ITV's Controller of Drama Nick Elliott believes there is an audience of over-50s eager for well-written, well-acted pieces like Belonging. Not everybody wants police and medical dramas.

Plater reckons the "yoof" audience is a myth, as they're all out clubbing or surfing the net. He admits that "Belonging isn't Bullitt in terms of action" but does consist of what all good TV drama consists of, be it soaps, cop shows or two-hour films like this - "people in a room talking to each other".

Elderly men or women rarely get to present programmes. Parkinson, a chatty 69, is an exception. There are shows tailored to children, teenagers, parents, gardeners and property owners. Television has embraced gays and lesbians in drama and reality TV, but old people remain outsiders. Most viewers like their old people kept in the corner away from the main action. They don't want to see or hear what they get up to. When C4's now-defunct soap Brookside dared to show two not-so-young people romping in bed together, there were complaints from offended viewers.

The elderly must be kept in their place. They must stay in the background, dribbling or shaking as patients in an old people's home while their relatives anguish how their lives are going to be upset by the illnesses.

Or they can be the butt of jokes about dotty grannies (the marvellous Liz Smith is particularly good as these) or the leading lady's over-protective mother. Anne Reid fussed as the mum of Caroline Quentin in Life Begins and of Sarah Lancashire in Rose And Maloney, not long after shocking cinema audiences by stripping off in her late 60s for sex scenes in the film The Mother, playing a widow who falls for a hunky younger man.

Stay long enough in a soap and the writers take them seriously. Look at Dot Branning's recent woes in BBC1 EastEnders. She's long been considered a bit eccentric with her chain-smoking and habit of quoting the Bible. Now she's been allowed to be human in a storyline that's followed her discovery that she's suffering from cancer, and actress June Brown has risen to the challenge.

Coronation Street's older residents tend to be played for laughs, whether it's Betty and her hotpot, Rita's verbal sparring with Norris, or Blanche's constant interfering in the Barlow household.

Not that Weatherfield doesn't allow old people to appear from time to time. Bernard Cribbins appeared as a wealthy man upon whom greedy Tracy Barlow set her sights. Next week, ex-Avengers star Honor Blackman appears as randy Rula Romanoff, an old friend from Rita's showbiz days. But as Rula makes a play for Norris, we must assume the romance will be played for laughs not reality.

Comedy is where you're most likely to find old people. They even get their own series, as in Last Of The Summer Wine, which began in 1973 and can claim to be the world's longest-running sitcom. If the BBC tried to pension it off, there would be an outcry. Of the original trio of loveable, mischievous pensioners only Peter Sallis is still in the series.

A retirement home was a source for humour in You're Only Young Twice with Peggy Mount and Pat Coombs. Another OAPs home was the setting for Waiting For God, with Stephanie Cole and Graham Crowden as a stroppy geriatric duo.

In For The Love Of Ada, romance began at the graveside for Irene Handl's Ada Cresswell as she buried her husband. She began a gentle love affair with a senior citizen gravedigger, played by Wilfred Pickles of radio's Have a Go fame. The 70-year-olds eventually married. A feature film spin-off was made, along with an American version of the series.

It's unlikely Belonging will start a trend and be followed by a rash of old people's dramas. It's the exception to the rule. Don't expect an over-60s version of Coupling or Two Pints Of Lager And A Packet Of Crisps, although perhaps next year's Big Brother should be forced to include a pensioner or two among the housemates. Now that would be interesting.

Published: 11/09/2004