Laat Maar Zitten was an adaptation of the British comedy Porridge, one of the all time best comedies ever written for television. Harm Edens and mine adaptation for Dutch tv is now forgotten because it is never repeated, but at least for a while it was very popular and had the highest possible ratings. There were 21 original episodes which we all did in Dutch before writing our own. This had always been the intention, but we still owe both the VARA and producer/director John van de Rest a huge debt for making the start of our writing career so relatively easy. We just sat in our offices and wrote and wrote and wrote. Was it any good? Well, we were just starting out and finding our own voice, but thankful, the basic idea for this series set in a remote and relatively friendly prison, was a good one. Lots of underlying drama to give the comedy some pathos. The first twelve episodes we did ourselves I am still proud of and they got the highest ratings of the whole series. After that Johnny Kraaykamp (our Ronnie Barker) left the series and we had to find a new balances for the remaining characters. Still, we did a couple of episodes I am still proud of. Unfortunately some new actors were added we didn't like and under a new director the series drifted towards sketch humor acting. The final series, we used guest writers. But the VARA had decided to cancel the series anyway and most of those last thirteen were edited quite badly, as if the director wanted to punish the network. All in all, about eighty episodes were done sixty of which were originals. None are being repeated at the moment of available on video, so believe me when I say they were all marvelous.
