h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

John Mortimer once said that he would continue to write Rumpole stories only as long as Leo McKern was alive to play the character on TV. When McKern died in July 2002, Rumpole died with him. May they both rest in peace.

INCORRECT. Even before the last post was written, In the autumn of 2003 BBC Radio 4 broadcast four new 45-minute Rumpole plays by Mortimer, starring Timothy West as Rumpole and his wife Prunella Scales as Hilda.

I was only repeating what Mortimer himself had said. Besides, in the context of broadcasting, 'new' only means it hasn't been seen or heard before. We have no way of knowing when the plays were written, so they could have been written before Leo McKern died.