TV: Jeeves Makes Exit

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31097, 28 June 1966, Page 12

TV: Jeeves Makes Exit

Dennis Price (left), the impeccable Jeeves in “The World of Wooster.” 8.8. C. Television’s highly successful adaptation of the P. G. Wodehouse stories, has caused a stir by going into voluntary exile and blaming the British income-tax man, writes the London correspondent of ‘"rhe Press.” The 55-year-old actor says he has been “hounded” out of Britain. He had been paying £5O a week in tax. but the demand had suddenly been raised to £2OO. “There’s just no point in working. I’ve been doing it for 35 years and they have done quite well out of me,” he said. He has gone to live in a cottage on the Channel Island of Sark (where there is no income tax at all, but residents are trusted to pay Is lOd in the £ to help the poor). He will spend his time cultivating daffodils, driving a tractor and working with his hands. Dennis Price once starred in top British pictures, such

as "Kind Hearts and Coronets,” “I’ll Never See You , Again,” and "The Bad Lord Byron"—earning a reputed £25,000 a year at his peak. His marriage to the actress. Joan Schofield, ended in divorce in 1950. His manager, Marcus Wooton, who took over Price’s furnished flat in Curzon street, Mayfair, said that after Price had paid his tax, his alimony, his rent and other essentials, he only had about £3O a week left for himself. "Dennis cannot afford to live in England any longer. He has a backlog of tax to clear up,” he said. Price broke off negotiations to appear in a third “World of Wooster” series and left for Sark. Now the BBC spokesman is saying that while there are more Wode house stories about Jeeves and Wooster, they had almost reached the end of those adaptable for television. The series has been purchased by the N.Z.B.C. The second picture shows lan Carmichael as Bertie Wooster.