Editing Dennis Potter (section)

===Final works===

The last serial broadcast during Potter's lifetime was the romantic comedy ''[[Lipstick on Your Collar (TV series)|Lipstick on Your Collar]]'' (1993). Set during the [[Suez Crisis]] of 1956 like the much earlier ''Lay Down Your Arms'' (1970), elements of which it recycled, this six-parter did not become a popular success and in it Potter returned to use of lip-synched musical numbers in the manner of ''Pennies from Heaven''. It helped to launch the career of actor [[Ewan McGregor]].<ref name="BFI"/>

On 15 March 1994, three months before his death while his health was deteriorating, Potter gave an interview to [[Melvyn Bragg]], later broadcast on 5 April 1994 by [[Channel 4]]. He had broken most of his ties with the BBC as a result of his disenchantment with Directors-General [[Michael Checkland]] and [[John Birt]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thetvfestival.com/website/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/GEITF_MacTaggart_1993_Dennis_Potter.pdf|title=Occupying Powers|work=MacTaggart Lecture, Edinburgh International Television Festival|date=28 August 1993|access-date=22 October 2016}}</ref> Using a [[morphine]] and [[champagne]] cocktail as pain relief, and [[chain smoking]], he revealed that he had named his cancer "Rupert", after [[Rupert Murdoch]], who Potter said represented so much of what he found despicable about the mass media in Britain.<ref>{{Cite web|last=BFI|title=Interview with Dennis Potter, An (1994) Synopsis|url=http://www.screenonline.org.uk/tv/id/1055970/synopsis.html}}</ref> He described his work and his determination to continue writing until his death. Telling Bragg that he had two works he intended to finish, he proposed that these works, ''[[Karaoke (TV series)|Karaoke]]'' and ''[[Cold Lazarus]]'', should be made with the rival BBC and Channel 4 working in collaboration, a suggestion which was accepted.<ref name="BFI" />

The Bragg TV interview had revealed the "real" Dennis Potter as gentle and thoughtful and the immediate response was intense. ''The Guardian'' printed a full transcript the next day while Bragg reported: "Thousands of people reacted with phone calls and letters." [[Michael Grade]], Channel 4’s chief executive, said: "I've never known a reaction to a programme like that, achieving such intimacy with an audience. Nothing stacks up against it in terms of impact."<ref>Carpenter, p. 563</ref>

Potter's final commission came from ''The Daily Telegraph Arts & Books'' section, prompted by the TV interview in March, to which he replied on 16 May, after honouring his television commitments: "I am pleased to tell you that I have completed ''Karaoke'' and ''Cold Lazarus'' – which I regard as essentially one eight-part piece. Now all that effort is of course evaporating into an overwhelming sense of loss, I itch to scribble ''something''."<ref>Carpenter, p. 574</ref> Immediately he was prompted to consider "the prospect of confronting imminent death" and on 25 May he submitted "my first and last short story" titled "Last Pearls",<ref>{{Cite book| last=Potter | first=Dennis | year=1994 | title=Seeing the Blossom | place=London | publisher=Faber & Faber, 2nd edition | isbn=0-571-17436-1}}</ref> which was published on 4 June, days before he died.

The two related stories, ''Karaoke'' and ''Cold Lazarus'', were eventually broadcast in 1996. One set in the present and the other in the far future, both feature [[Albert Finney]] as the same principal character. Both series were released on DVD on 6 September 2010.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1zQ2DwAAQBAJ&q=dvd+release+6+September+2010+cold+lazarus+and+karaoke&pg=PT407|title=The Art of Invective: Selected Non-Fiction 1953–94|first=Dennis|last=Potter|date=September 2015|section=Note 336|isbn=978-1-78319-203-8|publisher=[[Oberon Books]]}}</ref>