Written by Dick Clement and Ian La Fresnais, it's nothing more than an extended episode of the TV show really, but very enjoyable. The usual cast - Barker, Beckinsale, Mackay, Wilde, Vaughan, Kelly - are joined by Julian Holloway and Daniel Peacock, as the new warder and inmate, respectively, Geoffrey Bayldon as the governor (who Q identified as Catweazle after 50 years) and Barrie Rutter as the escaping criminal.
Best moment: when Barker and Beckinsale are pretending to be a runner and his trainer and an observing farmer drily remarks 'There's a couple of escaped prisoners'.
Clement and La Fresnais haven't written anything since the Porridge TV series reboot in 2017 - you can't really blame them, both being 94. Their three part Rotter's Club adaptation from 2005 looks worth watching (no longer in print), as does Still Crazy. Spies of Warsaw needs a rewatch also.
(The next day we saw the classic 1974 episode 'A Night In', which takes place entirely in the cell, a two-hander between Barker and Beckinsale, beautifully darkly lit by Peter Smee. I can't see an episode like this coming out in anything these days.)
Beckinsale died of a heart attack in 1979 aged 31, resulting from coronary artery disease.
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