The radio series starred Tony Hancock, with Sidney James, Bill Kerr and,at various times, Moira Lister, Andrée Melly, Hattie Jacques, and Kenneth Williams.

The television series also featured Sidney James with regular appearances from John Le Mesurier, Hugh Lloyd, Warren Mitchell, Liz Fraser and Patricia Hayes.

In the final television series, renamed simply Hancock, the supporting cast included established actors such as Jack Watling and Patrick Cargill.

Instead of the traditional variety mix of sketches, guest stars and musical interludes, the show's humour derived from characters and situations developed in a half-hour storyline.

Roger Wilmut, in his 1978 book about Tony Hancock as a performer, credits two British radio comedy shows, already running in 1954, with establishing an uninterrupted 30-minute sitcom format: A Life of Bliss, written by Godfrey Harrison and starring George Cole, and Life with the Lyons, a programme heavily based on the US tradition of sitcoms; he therefore dismisses the notion that Galton and Simpson invented the genre.

The playlet "Look Back in Hunger" (spoofing John Osborne's Look Back in Anger) in the episode "The East Cheam Drama Festival" from the fifth series, showed that writers Galton and Simpson were in touch with developments in the British theatre, in the use of sighs and silent pauses, something Osborne's style had in common with the plays of Harold Pinter, whose work began to emerge towards the end of the series' run.

In addition, the measured pacing of the episodes was unusual in an era of fast-talking radio comedians, such as Ted Ray, who typically used a machine-gun style of delivery to fill every single second of airtime.

Commissioning of series in the UK was then closer to American practice with extensive runs not unknown, but in this case, with only two writers, continuity was yet to develop, and details changed to suit each episode.

Among the well-known actors who appeared in the series were Hugh Lloyd, Patricia Hayes, Dick Emery, Warren Mitchell, John Le Mesurier and Richard Wattis.

In April 2014 the BBC started to re-record the lost episodes under the banner The Missing Hancocks, produced by Neil Pearson and Ed Morrish.

The scripts for this five-episode run were selected by Galton and Simpson and recorded in their presence, with Kevin McNally taking the part of Tony Hancock.

"The Department Store Santa" was re-recorded on 3 September 2017 and broadcast in December 2018, opening the fourth series of The Missing Hancocks.

Shortly before the series was due to be recorded Hancock walked out on a theatre performance suffering from "nervous exhaustion" and flew to Rome.

Secombe starred in the first three episodes and made a guest appearance in the fourth, by which time Hancock had returned to complete the series as scheduled.

The fourth episode, "A Visit To Swansea", featured Tony being forced to go and thank Harry who'd returned to Wales, and was littered with references to how good Secombe had been.

On 2 December 2016, the BBC re-recorded "A Holiday in France", followed by "The Race Horse" and "The Crown Jewels" with Andy Secombe as his late father Harry.

[5] "The Blackboard Jungle" was recovered in 2002 from off-air home recordings made by listener Vic Rogers, along with the original version of "The New Secretary" from series 4.

In April 2014 the BBC re-recorded "The New Neighbour", "The Breakfast Cereal" and "The Newspaper", selected by and recorded in the presence of Galton and Simpson, for the first series of The Missing Hancocks.

On 21 July 2015 the BBC re-recorded "The Red Planet" and "How Hancock Won The War" (which, though not missing, is the poorest-quality surviving recording) for broadcast in November as part of the second series.

[8] "Bill and Father Christmas" These episodes are remakes for overseas sales, rewritten to remove any topical or UK-specific references.

Only Sid James transferred from the radio series, although Kenneth Williams and Hattie Jacques each made a couple of appearances.

In 1962, the show became the first imported programme to win a Jacob's Award following its transmission on Telefís Éireann, the Republic of Ireland's national TV station.

Information on series dates taken from the book Tony Hancock: Artiste (1978) by Roger Wilmut, Eyre Methuen ISBN 0-413-38680-5 (subsequent reprints in 1983 and 1986 contain additional details).

BBC Records released an LP titled Hancock featuring the original TV soundtracks of two episodes, "The Lift" and "Twelve Angry Men."

The episode "The Lift" was taken from the separate magnetic soundtrack of the telerecording, with the opening non-dialogue sequence omitted and one extra line of dialogue added: "Watch that door button... Oh my God!"

"Twelve Angry Men" was from the optical soundtrack of the telerecording, with theme and incidental music omitted, a few lines of dialogue edited out and pauses shortened.

The other five were by BBC Records, released as Hancock's Half Hour: "The Poetry Society" and "Sid's Mystery Tours", released in 1980; "The Americans Hit Town" and "The Unexploded Bomb" in 1981; "The Scandal Magazine" and "The Last of the McHancocks" in 1982; "The Sleepless Night" and "Fred's Pie Stall" in 1983; and finally "Hancocks War" and "The Christmas Club" in 1984.

Also, a number of comedy-themed LPs, EPs and 7-inch singles have been released over the years which have featured short extracts from various radio episodes.

The next video release was not to be for another nine years, and that was "The Very Best of Hancock," a compilation including all episodes from the final series but excluding the last, "The Succession: Son and Heir."

In June and August 2009, six off-air audio recordings of lost TV episodes from Series 4 were unearthed, though they had been knocking around the bootleg market for some time; however, two of them are very poor quality.