    jack morris rosenthal cbe (8 september 1931 â 29 may 2004) was an english playwright, who wrote 129 early episodes of the itv soap opera coronation street and over 150 screenplays, including original tv plays, feature films, and adaptations. ==biography== rosenthal was born in cheetham hill, manchester, into a jewish family. after studying english literature at sheffield university, he carried out his national service in the royal navy. he worked briefly in advertising before joining granada television. he earned his first television credit with granada in 1961, assigned as a writer of episode 31 of britain's longest-running soap opera, coronation street. he became a regular writer for the series and began writing for other series as well. during the 1960s, he contributed material for various television comedy shows including the satirical that was the week that was. at granada television, he wrote a spin off series from coronation street for the character, leonard swindley, played by arthur lowe called pardon the expression and created two comedy series the dustbinmen and the lovers starring richard beckinsale and paula wilcox. in 1976 he also wrote a tv drama for itv, called ready when you are, mr mcgill, which was later remade in 2003. rosenthal won three bafta awards for bar mitzvah boy (about a jewish boy's bar mitzvah), the evacuees (based on his own war-time evacuation) and spend, spend, spend (about the football pools winner, viv nicholson, directed by john goldschmidt). he also wrote the knowledge, a film about london taxi-drivers which has become a classic for cabbies-in-training. he created london's burning as a one-off drama in 1986, and this later developed into a long-running tv drama. rosenthal adapted the novel "the devil's lieutenant" for director john goldschmidt as a mini-series for channel 4 and zdf, and wrote the screenplay 
1931_births 2004_deaths Alumni_of_the_University_of_Sheffield BAFTA_winners_(people) Burials_at_Golders_Green_Jewish_Cemetery Cancer_deaths_in_England Commanders_of_the_Order_of_the_British_Empire Deaths_from_multiple_myeloma English_Jews English_dramatists_and_playwrights English_soap_opera_writers English_television_writers People_from_Cheetham_Hill Writers_from_Manchester