Romana Barrack (5 August 1928 – 31 May 2016), known by the pseudonym Carla Lane, was an English screenwriter and animal rights campaigner. Lane was known for creating or co-creating successful British sitcoms such as The Liver Birds (1969–1979), Butterflies (1978–1983), and Bread (1986–1991).
Described as "the television writer who dared to make women funny", much of Lane's work focused on strong female characters, including "frustrated housewives and working class matriarchs".
Early life
Romana Barrack was born 5 August 1928 in Walton, Liverpool, to Gordon DeVinci Barrack (1907–1970), a steward in the Merchant Navy, and Ivy Amelia (;1906–1993). Lane's father was born in Cardiff and was of Italian descent, and her mother was born in Liverpool and was of Irish descent.
Lane had two siblings and grew up in West Derby and Heswall, Cheshire (present-day Merseyside). Lane was christened on the 9 January 1929, and attended convent school until the age of 14. Her first successes came in collaboration with Myra Taylor, whom she had met at a writers' workshop in Liverpool,
Lane and Taylor submitted some comedy sketch scripts to the BBC, where they were seen by head of comedy Michael Mills. He encouraged them to write a half-hour script, which was broadcast as a pilot episode of The Liver Birds in April 1969. A short first series followed to little acclaim, leading Mills to abandon plans for a second series, though he changed his mind when he read Lane and Taylor's new scripts. The series soon became one of the most popular of its time, characterised by Lane's "ability to conjure laughs out of pathos and life's little tragedies". Mills left his position as the BBC's head of comedy in 1972, leaving Lane to take sole responsibility for writing the show's scripts the following year. Butterflies star Wendy Craig said of Lane, "Her greatest gift was that she understood women and wrote the truth about them ... she spoke about what others didn't. In the case of [my character], it was all about what was going on inside herand many other women at the time."
With Bread, which ran for seven series, Lane was said to have become "the first woman to mine television comedy from sexual and personal relationships through a galère of expertly-etched contemporary characters, developed against a backdrop of social issues such as divorce, adultery, and alcoholism". In the late 1980s, Bread had the third-highest viewing figures on British television, beaten only by EastEnders and Neighbours. an opinion Lane rejected.
Lane was made an OBE for services to writing in 1989, but returned it to Prime Minister Tony Blair in protest against animal cruelty in 2002. She moved back to her native Liverpool in 2009.
Death
On 31 May 2016, at the age of 87, Lane died at Stapley Nursing Home in the Mossley Hill suburb of Liverpool.
Credits
- 1969–1979, 1996: The Liver Birds (with Myra Taylor and others)
- 1971–1976: Bless This House (with Myra Taylor and others)
- 1978–1983, 2000: Butterflies
- 1984–1985: Leaving