Premiering at London’s Warner cinema on the 24th of March in 1960, the film is based on a popular series of books on One-upmanship written by Stephen Potter, published during the 1940s and 1950s, in which he explained “how to win without actually cheating”.

The tongue-in-cheek self-help books gave tips on how to gain the psychological advantage over everyone else because otherwise, as Alastair Sim‘s version of Stephen Potter puts it in the film, “if you’re not one-up, you’re one-down”.

Starring Terry-Thomas, Ian Carmichael, Alastair Sim & Janette Scott, and classic set pieces, such as the tennis matches, Peter Ustinov as an uncredited co-writer, and cameos from John Le Mesurier and Irene Handl, School for Scoundrels is a pleasurable example of Mid-Century British cinema that charms to this day. School for Scoundrels was art director Terence Verity’s last film before returning to architecture. He went on to design the M6 motorway service station Charnock Richard.

“On the Fiddle” with Alfred Lynch, Stanley Holloway, Wilfrid Hyde-White & Barbara Windsor, “Go to Blazes” with Maggie Smith, “Jigsaw” with Jack Warner & Ronald Lewis, “The Wrong Arm of the Law” with Bernard Cribbins, “The Pink Panther” with David Niven, Capucine & Claudia Cardinale, “Hot Enough for June” with Dirk Bogarde, “Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines” with James Fox & Benny Hill, the Bond film “Thunderball” with Sean Connery, Earl Cameron & the theme sung by Tom Jones, “Doctor in Trouble” with Harry Secombe & Sylvana Henriques, “The Italian Job” with Michael Caine, Valerie Leon & George Innes, “Confessions of a Window Cleaner” with Melissa Stribling, “Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?” with Robert Morley, and the Tony Hancock films “The Rebel” with Mervyn Johns & “The Punch & Judy Man” with Sylvia Syms & Barbara Murray.

A few of his many television credits include multiple episodes of “Hancock’s Half Hour“, two episodes of “The Avengers“, one with Ian Hendry and one with Mrs Peel, “Danger Man“, “Frankie Howerd“, “Jason King“, “The Dick Emery Show”, “Doctor at Large” with Richard O’Sullivan & Madeline Smith, “Brideshead Revisited” with Bill Owen & Jenny Runacre, as well as many more, but perhaps Le Mesurier’s most famous television role is as Sergeant Arthur Wilson in the long-running sitcom “Dad’s Army” with John Laurie.