Still Open All Hours is to return to BBC One for a 2016 Christmas special and third series

The series, written by Roy Clarke, has been a huge hit with audiences since it began in 2014, with the most recent run of episodes being the highest rated comedy series of the past 12 months. Location filming will begin in the coming weeks, with studio filming to follow from October.

On returning to one of his most famous roles, Sir David Jason (Granville) said “I can’t wait for viewers to see the scrapes Granville gets into this series, almost as much as I can’t wait to start filming them. Roy Clarke has once again written seven fantastically warm, funny and inventive scripts, full of the humour and eccentric characters that the nation has come to love over the years.”

The series opens with a Christmas special where Granville and Gastric (Tim Healy) find themselves playing marriage counsellors, whilst Leroy (James Baxter) adopts a festive disguise to avoid relationship trouble of a different kind. Meanwhile, Mrs Featherstone (Stephanie Cole) struggles to get into the Christmas spirit and Kath (Sally Lindsay) attempts to bring the street together as one harmonious choir of carollers and beat Finkle Street once and for all – but does Granville have a trick up his sleeve to help them out?

They will be joined by series regulars Maggie Ollerenshaw as the love of Granville’s life, Mavis, plus Johnny Vegas as Eric, Kulvinder Ghir as Cyril, Brigit Forsyth as Madge, Nina Wadia as Mrs Hussein and Geoffrey Whitehead as Mr Newbold.

Unfortunately, Lynda Baron is unable to join the cast for this series, saying “I was