ON THE BUSES OFFICIAL FAN CLUB

Ronald Chesney

ON THE BUSES
HOLIDAY ON THE BUSES WEEKENDER 2023
Reg Varney/Stan
Bob Grant/Jack
Stephen Lewis/Blakey
Stephen Lewis chats about ON THE BUSES
Doris Hare/Mum
Anna Karen / Olive born 19th September 1936; died 2nd February 2022
Michael Robbins/Arthur
PAST ON THE BUSES EVENTS OVER THE YEARS
Quick Episdoes Guide
ON THE BUSES on TV
THE MOVIES
ON THE BUSES behind the scenes
Stephen Lewis visits Weymouth
Ronald Chesney
Ronnie Wolfe .
Ronnie Wolfe's Book Launch
Stuart Allen Producer/Director
Cicely Courtneidge
Doris Hare photo career page
Kate Williams/Nurse in Holiday
Andria Lawrence (Turnaround Betty)
Harry Fielder/ SUPPORTING ARTIST
Roger Ferris (Hon Member)
Hal Dyer/Shirley Robbins in memory
Terry Duggan
LINDA REGAN
Albert Moses
J P Trevor Honorary Member
Ron Savage Hon Member
OTB random Photo album.
The Clippies
The Series
SERIES 1
SERIES 2
SERIES 3
SERIES 4
SERIES 5
SERIES 6
SERIES 7
Guest Stars
Wendy Richard
HENRY McGEE
Wilfred Brambell/Bert in HOLIDAY
Michael Sheard depot manager
SUMMER WINE INTERVIEWON LOCATION WITH STEPHEN LEWIS
Reg Varney Exhibition
REG VARNEY's Career
MUTINY ON THE BUSES
On holiday GALLLERY
In the Depot GALLERY
Movie Posters
Movie locations
Movie location photo gallery
The Water Fall shop and tea room DYSERTH
Memories from Doris's Grandson
The Buses and Bus Depot
Geoff Unwin Honorary member
ON THE BUSES TVTIMES update 9th OCT
Magazine Covers
NEW Windmill Theatre NEW
Look In TV Comic
Overseas DVD video covers
Boreham Wood and Elstree Times
Famous Bus Man Tommy
NEW Bus Photos
Luxton Bus Company Complaints Department
2009 morning events page 2
'ON THE BUSES A NEW LIFE'
PONTINS PRESTATYN 1973
Celebration Event on 22nd May 2011

4th May 1920 - 12th April 2018 

Ronald Chesney was born in 1920. passed away peacefully at Kingston Hospital on the afternoon of 12th April 2018

 

ronnieonharmonica.jpg

Listen to Ronnie playing the Harmonica in 'Educating Archie', broadcast on 3rd October 1956

 He left school at 16 and became a professional harmonica player. During World War II he was declared unfit for active service after a serious illness, but entertained troops all over the world. Before going on to be a successful writer for Film, TV and Stage

 

Ronald Chesney BBC news

Obituary - Ronald Chesney Scotland

Ronald Chesney obituary The Guardian

Ronald Chesney - Another different Obituary The Guardian

After the war he began writing an appearing in radio shows for the BBC. This is where he meet his long term writing partner Ronald Wolfe. Their first TV success was The Rag Trade starring Reg Varney. In 1969 they had written a series that was to lead to great success.  This was called ON THE BUSES. This was also to lead to the biggest money making movie of 1972 again called ON THE BUSES a spin of from the hugely popular show. In 1973 both writers visited America and wrote a series for the American market called Lots of Luck It involve a character playing a lost and found attendant at a BUS DEPOT.Ronald Chesney is married with two children.
Ronald Chesney was and still is a world famous Harmonica player and past President of the National Harmonica Leauge (NHL).
He was one of the artists apperaing at the (NHL) Festival in October 2004

This article from the British Film Institute web site http://www.screenonline.org.uk/

It was the radio show Educating Archie (BBC, 1950-60), featuring the ventriloquist Peter Brough, which was responsible for bringing together the future writing partnership of Ronald Wolfe and Ronald Chesney. Chesney, with his 'talking harmonica' novelty act, had been performing on the show since its inception when, in 1955, comedian Wolfe joined the series as a scriptwriter.

When Educating Archie was first adapted for television, as a comedy special called Here's Archie (BBC, tx. 30/5/1956), Wolfe and Chesney retained their respective radio roles of writer and performer. However, with the subsequent television series, Educating Archie (ITV, 1958-59), Chesney, having abandoned performing, began to contribute to the writing, with either Wolfe or a young Marty Feldman. In 1959, all three also began to work together on the writing of the radio series.

While Feldman was soon to depart to write with Barry Took, Wolfe and Chesney remained together to form an enduring writing partnership. For Sidney James they created the BBC radio series It's a Deal (BBC, 1961), before returning to television the same year with their first and, in the event, one of their most popular sitcoms, The Rag Trade (BBC, 1961-63).

Possibly influenced by the prevalent 'kitchen sink' strand in British cinema, the series was set in a working environment (at that time a novel setting for a sitcom) - a garment factory - and was centred on the relationship between management (in the form of Peter Jones) and workers, headed by the shop steward (Miriam Karlin). Much to the surprise of BBC managers, who were not convinced that the public would want to watch a sitcom situated within a work environment (perceived as being too 'everyday' to most viewers), the series became one of the corporation's biggest comedy successes of the period.

Wolfe and Chesney were to remain with the BBC throughout the 1960s, creating a further four comedy series for the corporation, including Meet The Wife (1963-66), a very popular domestic sitcom starring Freddie Frinton and Thora Hird.

Their only work away from the BBC before 1969 was their writing of the first six episodes (of 13) of the Australian series Barley Charlie (1964), another sitcom based around relationships in the workplace, with two sisters inheriting a run-down garage, complete with its one idle employee.

For their first ITV series, On the Buses (1969-73), Wolfe and Chesney turned again to the workplace, adopting a similar narrative structure to that of The Rag Trade, with bus drivers Stan (Reg Varney) and Jack (Bob Grant) constantly outwitting management, this time in the form of bus inspector 'Blakey' (Stephen Lewis). Crude and vulgar it may have been (with Stan and Jack an improbable pair of middle-aged sexual magnets to any passing female); it nevertheless drew large viewing figures, making the series the most popular sitcom Wolfe and Chesney ever wrote.

While many British sitcoms of the 1970s led to spin-off feature films, such was the popularity of On The Buses that it gave rise to three: On The Buses (d. Harry Booth, 1971), Mutiny on the Buses (d. Booth, 1972) and Holiday on the Buses (d. Bryan Izzard, 1973), all written and produced by Wolfe and Chesney.

Following On The Buses, the pair wrote seven more sitcoms over the next eight years for both the BBC and ITV, including Don't Drink the Water (ITV, 1974-75), a sequel to On the Buses, with 'Blakey' at centre stage as he retires to live in Spain; an ill-advised return to The Rag Trade (ITV, 1977-78), with Peter Jones and Miriam Karlin reprising their original roles; and their final effort, Take a Letter, Mr Jones (ITV, 1981), starring John Inman as an unlikely secretary to a high-flying female executive (Rula Lenska).

The popularity of their most successful works was not limited to Britain, with some of the duo's series being remade in a number of different countries, particularly the perennial The Rag Trade, an adaptation of which was still being produced in 2003 for South African television. Wolfe and Chesney themselves were credited with the screenplay of Fredrikssons Fabrikk (1994), the feature film spin-off of Norway's own television version of the garment factory comedy.

John Oliver

ronniecheasandme.jpg

Here is Ronnie and I at one of our fan club events. He was always happy to attend and chat to the fans. He was a very modest unassuming man who seemed at peace with himself, and I liked very much, He will be sadly missed but has left us all a great legacy with all of his work, including ON THE BUSES which is now being enjoyed by a whole new generation of fans. Thanks Ronnie DING DING!

R2BUS.jpg

Ronnie Wolfe on the left and Ronnie Chesney on the right back in Borehamwood for an ON THE BUSES fanclub event

ronniecheasandme.jpg

ronniecheasandme.jpg

   

SHOWS AS A PERFORMER

Entertaining the troops 1939-1945
Here's Archie UK 1956
Music for The Millions  1960 with Reg Varney and Shirley Bassey

AS A WRITER

Educating Archie UK 1958
The Rag Trade UK 1961
Meet The Wife UK 1963
The Bed-Sit Girl UK 1965
Sorry I'm Single UK 1967
According To Dora UK 1968
Wild, Wild Women UK 1968
On The Buses UK 1969
The Other Reg Varney UK 1970
Romany Jones UK 1972
Lottsa Luck USA 1973
Don't Drink The Water UK 1974
Yus My Dear UK 1976
The Boys And Mrs B UK 1977
The Rag Trade UK 1977
Watch This Space UK 1980
Take A Letter, Mr Jones... UK 1981
'Allo 'Allo! UK 1982
THE RAG TRADE (South Africa)