Sitcom Yes Minister detailed the misadventures of Tory MP Jim Hacker who was kept in his place by his permanent under secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby. When the show returned in 1986 Hacker was now Prime Minister and the title changed to Yes Prime Minister.
Set in the corridors of power in London’s Whitehall and Westminister, this comedy surrounds The Right Honorable James Hacker MP, the newly-appointed Cabinet Minister for Administrative Affairs who soon finds many of his ideas for reform openly opposed by the civil servants whose job it is to implement them. One in particular is his Permanent Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby (Nigel Hawthorne). Their respective struggles to gain and maintain the levers of power form the basis of the series.
See also Classic TV Revisited: Yes Minister.
production details
UK | BBC Two / 21×30 minutes and 1×60 minutes / Broadcast 25 February 1980 – 23 December 1982
Writers: Anthony Jay, Jonathan Lynn
Producers: Stuart Allen, Sydney Lotterby, Peter Whitmore
Titles: Gerald Scarfe
Music: Ronnie Hazlehurst
cast
Paul Eddington as Jim Hacker
Nigel Hawthorne as Humphrey Appleby
Derek Fowlds as Bernard Woolley
Diana Hoddinott as Annie Hacker