Rumpole of the Bailey is a television series created and written by British writer John Mortimer, QC and starring Leo McKern as Horace Rumpole, an aging London barrister who defends any and all clients. It has been spun off into a series of short stories (and one novel, adapting a Rumpole telemovie), and two radio series.

Rumpole loves the courtroom. Despite attempts by his friends and family to get him to move on to a more respectable position for his age, he only enjoys the simple pleasure of defending his clients at The Old Bailey, London's criminal court. He often quotes Wordsworth and secretly calls his wife Hilda "She Who Must Be Obeyed". The stories combine Rumpole's humor with mystery and drama.

Rumpole's first television appearance was on December 3 1975 in a BBC One Play for Today with Leo McKern in the title role. The BBC was not interested in developing the play into a series, but in 1978 it transferred to ITV as an hour-long Thames Television production with McKern returning to the role and Peggy Thorpe-Bates as Hilda. Hilda was later played by Marion Mathes. Other regular cast members included :

• Patricia Hodge as Phillida Erskine-Brown, "the Portia of our Chambers";
• Peter Bowles as Guthrie Featherstone, the former Head of Chambers who later becomes a Judge, with usually hilarious results;
• Julian Curry as Claude Erskine-Brown, Phillida's husband, "opera buff and hopeless cross-examiner",
• and Richard Murdoch as Uncle Tom, "the oldest member of chambers, who has not had a brief as long as any of us can remember".

Each season (seven in all, plus a television movie) was accompanied by a book adaptation, also written by John Mortimer. Although the television series ended on December 3 1992, exactly 17 years after the broadcast of the pilot episode, the books have continued, now containing original stories.

Rumpole: The Splendours and Miseries of an Old Bailey Hack was broadcast by BBC Radio 4 in 1980. Maurice Denham starred as Rumpole and Hilda was played by Margot Boyd. Thirteen episodes were made of adaptations of the pilot episode and the stories from the first two seasons.

In the autumn of 2003 BBC Radio 4 broadcast four new 45-minute Rumpole plays by Mortimer, starring Timothy West as Rumpole and his wife Prunella Scales as Hilda.

External links

• Horace Rumpole (http://www.thrillingdetective.com/eyes/rumpole.html) at The Thrilling Detective Website (includes comprehensive list of television episodes and books)