Comedy Playhouse 1971) starring Nicky Henson and Angela Scoular The Importance of Being Hairy (6 May 1971) starring John Cater and James Copeland The first episode of "Are You Being Served?" was broadcast as an episode. Of Funerals and Fish (4 January 1973). The pilot episode of the World's longest-running sitcom, "Last of the Summer Wine". The Rescue (11 January 1973) starring Moyra Fraser, Peter Jones and Nicholas Parsons. Elementary, My Dear Watson: The Strange Case of the Dead Solicitors (18 January 1973) starring John Cleese, Willie Rushton and Bill Maynard. The Birthday (25 January 1973) starring Gordon Peters, Frank Thornton and
British sitcom consciously avoids traditional situation comedy themes and storylines to branch out into more unusual topics or narrative methods. "Blackadder" (1983–1989) and "Yes Minister" (1980–1988, 2013) moved what is often a domestic or workplace genre into the corridors of power. A later development was the mockumentary in such series as "The Office" (2001–2003). The first British television sitcom was "Pinwright's Progress", broadcast by the BBC from 1946 to 1947, but the form did not take off until the transfer of "Hancock's Half Hour" from BBC radio in 1956. Hancock biographer John Fisher dates the first use of the term 'situation comedy'