In 1975 when BBC producer Cedric Messina was working on a drama at Glamis Castle, he decided that it would be the perfect location for a production of Shakespeare’s As You Like It. Thinking about it some more, he wondered why he should stop there? Why not film all of the plays in the canon (thirty-seven at that point, Two Noble Kinsmen and Edward III not having been admitted yet), some jolly good Shakespeare, for broadcast on television? The BBC liked that idea. And eventually so did the American co-producers, oilmen and bankers (the likes of Exxon and Morgan Bank who wanted to be seen to be very interested in culture). A big event, an epic undertaking, televising the canon was a chance for the BBC to thump it’s chest and shout “This is what we do!” (with a little help from some friends).
As Susan Willis explains in
The BBC Shakespeare Plays: Making The Televised Canon, a celebration of Messina's undertaking, the Americans having stipulated that it shouldn’t be too radical, so none of that modern dress malarkey, the producer would see his original vision be revised and revised, and ultimately completed six years later, having gone through three producers with three different visions, a panoply of directors (some television veterans new to Shakespeare, some Shakespeare veterans new to television) though Messina got his wish to film As You Like It at the castle and surrounds and later taking Henry VIII on location to the actual historical palaces, everything else was shot in the studio, engaging some of the greatest theatre actors of all time and whoever else was popular at the time.
As anyone lucky enough to own
the dvd boxset will know, the results are something of a mixed bag. In her investigation, Willis (associate professor of English at Auburn University at Montgomery) notes (and I agree with her) that those plays which are less well know, Measure for Measure or Pericles or All’s Well That Ends Well are the best served out of the lot because the directors didn’t feel constrained by what has gone before, whereas Romeo and Juliet, huddled then in the shadow of the recent Zeffrelli movie doesn’t do anything new. The crowning achievement is probably Henry VI – Richard III in which director Jane Howell through an ensemble cast doubling roles, on a single set resembling an adventure playground, portrays this history as the games of school boys play-acting; in isolation it’s as entertaining as I, Claudius, with just as many wild performances and narrative meanders.
Writing just a few years after the final broadcast, Willis clearly has a great admiration for the series. Beyond the history, she offers a forensic analysis of some of the project's auteurs, Jonathan Miller, Elijah Moshinsky and Howell demonstrating how they turned the constraints into benefits by taking full advantage of the televisual medium to emphasise the meaning of a scene through the mis-en-scene or stylising the sets to thematically underscore the motivations of a character. She carefully manages to keep such analysis with the production, only ever broadly venturing into the text when its absolutely necessary usually when describing cuts made or scene changes.
The book closes with some gossipy production diaries for Troilus and Cressida, Titus Andronicus and The Comedy of Errors, contrasting different directing styles and showing how the BBC’s production methods of the time constrained their artistic decisions (familiar to anyone who’s watched the documentaries on Doctor Who DVDs – the 10pm shutdown effected high art too). It's the kind of thing which would be of use to anyone with an interest in this period of television or theatre history and has some wonderful moments were the diva gene in some actors takes full bloom, their competitive streak, but unfortunately more often than not, Willis refuses to name names, though a close analysis of the cast list would probably offer a few ideas.
If there’s a problem, having concentrated on her favourites, Willis rather dumps everyone else into a single chapter, though the writer does somewhat justify that choice by explaining what she thought went wrong with, for example, As You Like It. It’s the nature of these things that I’m bound to disagree with her on a great many things but her observations are correct more often than not, especially in relation to Richard Griffith’s Falstaff dozing his way through a The Merry Wives of Windsor (working against a wonderful Judy Davis and Ben Kinglsey), and particularly about the fiery chemistry between Tim Pigott-Smith as Angelo and Kate Nelligan as Isabella in Measure for Measure, an early triumph and one of the reasons I became interested in Shakespeare, which was the aim the project, to get the disaffected interested in early modern drama, so it succeeded in that, at least with me.
Grange Hill
" When Grange Hill hit our screens in 1978 it was the first time ordinary British schoolchildren had seen characters like themselves reflected on screen. Phil Redmond’s pioneering drama, set in a fictional north London comprehensive school, ran for 30 years, making it one of the longest-running programmes on British television."
[BBC Sounds][BBC Programme Index]
"I was called the devil and accused of trying to break down society. There were questions in the Commons."
[The Guardian]
For many of us, this was the first time we’d seen our schools – ugly, noisy and crowded – our teachers, and our selves on screen.
[The New Statesman]
"I suspect Albert was expecting a comment from myself as the “Grange Hill” culprit……."
[tech-ops]
"In 1987, the strange and bleak Grange Hill: The Computer Game came out on the Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum..."
[Gen of Deek]
"Viewers express their delight and/or dissatisfaction with the groundbreaking children's TV show, created by Phil Redmond. This clip is from The Great Grange Hill Debate."
[BBC Archive]
Archive
"Commissioned by BBC TV as the unannounced opening work for their special Arena video art programme. First transmitted March 10, 1976."
A video art piece featuring Richard Baker.
"Preview of Ideal Home Exhibition at King's Hall, Belfast."
Features menacing silent footage of a Dalek.
[BBC Rewind]
"Documentary highlighting the work of wartime volunteer radio operators."
[East Anglian Film Archive]
"A BBC East documentary depicting the working life of an inter-city rail service."
[East Anglian Film Archive]
"In August 1980 Sir Terry Wogan broadcast an edition of his radio breakfast show from Brighton. BBC South filmed the entire broadcast and the original camera negatives have been rediscovered. This is a selection of some of the recently rediscovered footage."
Places
"A new BBC Radio station, BBC Scotland, launches in November this year. What will be its image and its objective? And will it be like its neighbour, independent local radio station, Radio Clyde?"
[BBC Rewind]
"Radio Wales hit the airwaves from Cardiff in November 1978. Anita Morgan presented the first radio show, where she met Terry Downey and his singing parrot. The listening public, however, had mixed reactions."
[BBC Archive]
"The new television studio has launched at BBC Dundee. For the first time, viewers in the area will be able to see local news reports in colour."
[BBC Rewind]
Programmes
"The TV Museum group has today released footage of a 1978 BBC Two junction which includes 7 seconds of the Christmas ident from that year."
[Clean Feed]
"Nationwide reporter Vera Gilbert at the Maida Vale studios celebrating 21st years of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop."
"Kieran Prendiville visits the set during the filming of Pennies From Heaven, the latest BBC serial by Dennis Potter. He speaks to Bob Hoskins about the character of Arthur Parker, and Dennis Potter about miming, compromise and moral outrage."
[BBC Archive]
"It was a performance like no other."
[Hawai'i Magazine]
"Preview of BBC TV's 'It's a Knockout' programme at Carrickfergus on Sunday 23 April. Interview by John Conway with unidentified member of production staff and unidentified member of Carrickfergus team."
[BBC Rewind]
"As Clare Torry's ethereal, melancholy voice melts into the distance - and the series' idiosyncratic title sequence, featuring the cast, pinned amongst the butterflies in a shadow box, fades into the opening scene - you realise this isn't any ordinary domestic sitcom. But then, Carla Lane wasn't any ordinary writer."
[British Comedy Guide]
"Steve Furber recalls how Acorn's System1 hobbyist computer made an appearance in the BBC science fiction series Blake's 7."
[British Library]
"Sticking my hand up a cow’s backside became second nature. I got really good at it."
[The Guardian]
"An amateur film by John Scorer that records the filming of BBC period television series 'All Creatures Great and Small' in Reeth, Swaledale, North Yorkshire, in 1979. The film shows the BBC cast and production team on location followed by general views of rural Swaledale."
[Yorkshire Film Archive]
Scene Around Six
"Richard Lightbody reports on BBC wavelength changes, affecting Radio 1, 2, 3 & 4. Radio Ulster will remain on 224 metres."
[BBC Rewind]
Politics
Almost A Silent Night
"...
the entire BBC Christmas schedule – in jeopardy. An on-going dispute over pay – three years in the making – left the Corporation facing the prospect of blank screens for the holidays."
[Transdiffusion]
"Mike uncovers papers which accused the BBC of biased reporting as Iran descended into revolution in 1978 and 1979."
[BBC Sounds]
Scene Around Six
"BBC's 'Top of the Pops' Pan's People in Belfast to entertain the Army. Interview with Pan's People member Dee Dee Wilde, fellow band member and the unidentified soldier, instrumental in bringing the group over to Belfast."
[BBC Rewind]
"Lasy year the Annan Report, this year the Government White Paper on Broadcasting. Nineteen seventy-eight has indeed been a landmark in the history of public service broadcasting."
[World Radio History]
