Iain Pattinson, scriptwriter on I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue, ‘the antidote to panel games’ – obituary
A purveyor of what Humphrey Lyttelton called ‘blue-chip filth’, he left a high-flying career behind to join the anarchic radio show
Iain Pattinson
Credit: PA
Iain Pattinson, who has died from leukaemia aged 68, was the scriptwriter behind I’m Sorry I Haven’t A Clue, the anarchic “antidote to panel games” on Radio 4, famous for its smutty jokes that have made it cult listening for nearly half a century.
Hired in 1993 by a new producer, Jon Naismith, Pattinson furnished the show’s chairman with a weekly script bookended by a discursive introductory monologue and an ornate final farewell, interlaced with the show’s regular features like One Song to the Tune of Another and the impenetrable round known as Mornington Crescent.