Only Fools and Hairpieces for David Jason

Only Fools and Horses legend David Jason shows off his dodgy toupée yesterday during filming of new BBC1 comedy The Royal Bodyguard.

David Jason smartens up for role as The Royal Bodyguard

Del Boy star David Jason gets suited and booted for his new BBC role - while Only Fools And Horses pal Paul Barber dons cap and gown for a university ceremony.

To commemorate the life of a man who died last month aged 64, but before that wrote successful sitcoms, including two of Britain's best - Only Fools and Horses and Citizen Smith - here's a televised tribute. As RT went to press, the documentary's makers were still stitching it together, so we can only speculate as to its contents. Presumably, David Jason, Robert Lindsay and Nicholas Lyndhurst were top of the production team's to-call list. And I'll eat the umbrella off a pina colada if there aren't clips from his creations and some archive interview footage of the writer himself.

The Comedy Genius of John Sullivan

At 1.15 yesterday I was in the company of many distinguished Actors including Sir David Jason and Nick Lyndhurst, writers, musicians, directors, TV executives, and scores of behind the camera programme making talent.

Q&A Special: Writer John Sullivan, 1946-2011

Comedy writer John Sullivan has died aged 64, writes Adam Sweeting, after spending six weeks in intensive care battling viral pneumonia. The creator of several hit comedy series for the BBC, Sullivan is guaranteed immortality for his masterpiece, Only Fools and Horses, which ran from 1981 to 2002. Featuring the escapades of the wide-boy south London brothers, Rodney and Del Boy Trotter (Nicholas Lyndhurst and David Jason), it became one of the best-loved British comedies ever screened, and also gained a substantial international following. A 2004 poll named Only Fools... as the best British sitcom of all time, and the show's 1996 Christmas Special scored a ratings record of 24 million viewers.

David Jason 'devastated' by Sullivan death

Sir David Jason has admitted that he is "totally devastated" by the death of Only Fools and Horses creator John Sullivan.

David Jason's daughter joins him on red carpet

To use Del Boy's vernacular, she may still only be a littl'un. However, even at the tender age of nine, Sir David Jason's daughter Sophie is already a chip off the old block.

This review contains spoilers...

Albert's Memorial was a bodysnatching road movie starring David Jason, David Warner and Michael Jayston as Second World War veterans who, 45 years earlier, had abjectly failed to rescue a young German girl from murderous Soviet troops. When Jayston's character dies, the remaining two must fulfil his dying wish and bury their comrade in the same field outside Berlin where the atrocity occurred.

Which is one hell of a great opening for a drama. Unfortunately, this was one corpse that had been embalmed in saccharin, for the story was soon floundering beneath a wave of sweetness and sentimentality. The jokes were of the "Quiet, you'll wake the dead!" variety, and the plot had holes big enough to drive a hearse and cart through.

My patience finally expired when the mystery hitch-hiker sharing their road to redemption turned out to be the ghost of the murdered German girl.

It is a tribute to the talents of Warner and Jason that they actually succeeded in delivering very moving performances among all the unadulterated tosh.