# Jack Jarvis (Still Game character)

Jack Jarvis (c. 1930 - c. 2019) is a fictional character from the Scottish sitcom Still Game, and previously Chewin' the Fat. In both shows, he was portrayed by Ford Kiernan. He is one of the two lead characters in Still Game, alongside Victor McDade, portrayed by Greg Hemphill.

## Biography

Not much is known about Jack's early life, however he was born in Glasgow, likely in the late 1920s or early 1930s. His father was a shopkeeper who had his finger bitten off by the family dog. Jack later took over the shop. As a teenager, he was a boxer.
Jack and Victor met in 1943 when a boy named Frank McCallum was hit by a tram; Victor had rushed into Jack's father's shop to phone for an ambulance and it was there that they met. This is explored in the episode Shooglies. At some point in the 1940s he also made friends with Winston and Isa, and presumably Tam too. Jack did his national service once he reached 18.
At some point after this (but before he married his wife), Jack was seeing a woman called Jenny Turnbull. Unbeknownst to him, she was also seeing both Victor and Winston at the same time. After her illegitimate son Chris resurfaced in Craiglang, all three men were worried they could be the father. Fortunately, it was none of them and was actually Pete the Jakey.
Jack soon married his wife, Jean; and at this point they considered immigrating to Canada, however eventually decided against it and remained in Craiglang. They had a daughter, Fiona, who eventually went to Canada herself, settling in Toronto. She later marries and has two sons; one of whom is named after Jack. She seldomly appears in the show but is mentioned often.
Jack is seen as a middle-aged man in The Party which takes place on Hogmanay 1975. On the night, he eats too much pakora (supplied by a recently immigrated Navid & Meena) and he vomits on Victor's wife Betty. This ensues a fight between the two, but they soon make up in time for the bells.
His wife Jean died on 10 December 1991. After she died, he visited Fiona in Canada, where he met and slept with a neighbour of a similar age called Charlotte.

## In the programme

The characters of "Jack & Victor" first appeared in Pulp Video (another Kiernan & Hemphill production), then appearing in a stage show also titled Still Game, and then appearing again in a number of skits in a tongue-in-cheek documentary about Scottish pop music called Och Around the Clock. They then appeared as recurring sketch in Chewin' the Fat, also produced by Kiernan & Hemphill. It was in Chewin' the Fat that the characters of Jack & Victor (alongside Winston & Tam) rose to prominence, resulting in a spinoff, Still Game.
In the first episode, Jack is introduced as a widower, unhappy in his house with obnoxious and anti-social neighbours. When his best friend Victor's neighbour dies, Jack sees it as an opportunity to move in next door to his him, though Victor isn't so keen at first. He eventually does, not before having to live with Victor briefly after all of his furniture is set on fire.
Jack, in comparison to Victor, is short and stout, and, like Victor, sports a moustache. He wears a bunnet in contrast to Victor's trilby. He spends most of his time at the local pub, The Clansman. He, like many of his friends, enjoys gambling, and often put bets on horse racing, and occasionally plays cards in the pub, much to landlord Boabby's chagrin. He is often portrayed to be not as smart as Victor, and often has to be corrected and stopped from rambling, usually by Victor.
He smokes a pipe and has done most of his life; though he tries to quit briefly in Aff after Winston has to get his leg removed due to years of smoking. He is not seen smoking after series four due to Scotland imposing a smoking ban which extends to actors on sets for television shows, but throughout the show after this it is mentioned in passing that he does still smoke.
Jack always addresses himself formally as "Esquire". His front-door nameplate reads J. Jarvis Esq.