All gather round for Mrs Bridges' masterpiece
the next in the series of small screen masterworks…
by Allan Fish
(UK 1971-1975 3,172m) DVD1/2
What are we going to do with Uncle Arthur?
p John Hawkesworth d Bill Bain, Derek Bennett, Raymond Menmuir Simon Langton, Herbert Wise, James Ormerod, Cyril Coke, Lionel Harris, Christopher Hodson, Joan Kemp-Welch, Brian Parker w Alfred Shaughnessy, Jeremy Paul, Charlotte Bingham, Julian Bond, Raymond Bowers, Terence Brady, Maureen Brady, Joan Harrison, John Hawkesworth, Elizabeth Jane Howard, Deborah Mortimer, Rosemary Anne Sisson, Anthony Skene, Fay Weldon, Peter Wildblood created by Jean Marsh, Eileen Atkins m Alexander Faris art John Clements, John Emery, Roger Hall
Gordon Jackson (Angus Hudson), Angela Baddeley (Mrs Kate Bridges), Jean Marsh (Rose Buck), David Langton (Richard Bellamy), Simon Williams (James Bellamy), Rachel Gurney (Lady Marjorie Bellamy), Hannah Gordon (Lady Virginia Bellamy), Meg Wynn Owen (Hazel Forrest), Nicola Pagett (Elizabeth Bellamy), Lesley-Anne Down (Georgina Worsley), Christopher Beeny (Edward Barnes), Jenny Tomasin (Ruby Finch), Pauline Collins (Sarah Moffat), John Alderton (Thomas Watkins), Jacqueline Tong (Daisy Peel), Raymond Huntley (Sir Geoffrey Dillon), Karen Dotrice (Lily Hawkins), Joan Benham (Lady Prudence Fairfax), Anthony Andrews (Lord Robert Stockbridge), Ian Ogilvy (Lawrence Kirbridge), Gareth Hunt (Frederick Norton), Anthony Ainley (Lord Charles Gilmour), Charles Gray (Sir Edwin Partridge), Cathleen Nesbitt (Lady Mabel Southwald), Keith Barron (Gregory Wilmot), George Innes (Alfred), Nigel Havers (Peter Dinmont), Celia Imrie, Freda Dowie, Ursula Howells, Robert Hardy, Georgina Hale,
If ever a series came to define prestige British television in the seventies, it must surely be Jean Marsh and Eileen Atkins’ extended variation on Noël Coward’s Cavalcade. It tells the fortunes of the inhabitants, both masters and servants, of 165 Eaton Place, London, from 1904 to 1930, encompassing the Edwardian era, the Titanic sinking, World War I, the roaring twenties and the Wall Street Crash. It encompasses every form of drama and melodrama, played out in an inimitably reserved fashion. In many ways, 165 became a microcosm not just for the period of British history it related, but for the audiences of British television of its era. Even now, it is profitably reshown on satellite TV in the UK and on Masterpiece Theatre in the US, not to mention on DVD. It became a byword for quality and, thirty years on, that quality remains basically undiminished.
Not that it was entirely without faults; it did suffer from being made in that era of British TV when camerawork was so theatrical as to defy reality, and the sets and costumes were cheap indeed. The final series, also, went forward far too quickly through the twenties and it almost seemed as if they had to wrap it all up quickly to get the Wall Street Crash that was always going to prove the series’ end. By 1974 the demand was more for serials than series that ran for years, and such classics as Jennie and Edward the Seventh became the new requirements. Yet Upstairs lost little of its quality in that final year, and the performances stayed powerful to the end. Langton was perfectly noble as the father of the family, Pagett was impressive for the year or so she was seen, while Williams was very touching as the son doomed to failure and a most miserable, lonely end. Everybody remembers Alderton and Collins as Thomas and Sarah, who got their own short lived spin-off, Andrews looked forward to another TV epic, while Tomasin was unforgettable as the truly unforgettably useless Ruby and the imperiously supercilious Huntley was magnificent as the family friend and lawyer. At its heart, however, it was three imperishable servants who dominated. Co-writer Marsh as poor Rose, Baddeley – sister of Hermione – as the indomitable, often unbearable but basically gold-hearted Mrs Bridges (who sadly died only a few months after filming her final scene), and the truly stunning Jackson as Hudson, a role he despised but never showed it on screen. I guarantee that in the scene in the final episode where he hands Beeny his black book, there will not be a dry eye in the house. Not to mention Rose’s final memories as she leaves Eaton Place. You’ll be as reluctant to leave as she was.
And I’ve always been a fan of this as well.
Robert Altman’s GOSFORD PARK favorably derives from it too. Fine review.
Very happy to see this excellent piece. My favorite British show of all time but possibly my favorite from anywhere! I do agree with some of the drawbacks mentioned here.
Thanks for a nice review. Upstairs Downstairs is my all-time favourite British TV series. The great writing and performances show a low budget doesn’t have to make that much difference.
Thanks, Lulu.
One great series after another. Are you trying to meet a quota Mr. Fish?
Anyway, very impressive writing, and another series that’s among my favorites.
hmmmm….Allan, I’d have to respectfully disagree. I’ve watched the series several times and love it and I’d have to say that the camerawork wasn’t ever theatrical. I don’t ever remember it being stuck in the stalls for the duration of the show, like George Melies little films. It was where the director needed it to be to tell the story.
To me, the sets never wobbled when the doors slammed. Set design, production design, costuming, scripting, acting are some of the great virtures that British television had. The budget was increased year on year because of it’s unexpected sucess. The only time I found it wanting was in a couple of episodes when Elizabeth Bellamy got married, moved out of the house and was with her fiancee, in an old jalopy and the sound was found wanting being buffeted by wind and obscuring some of the dialogue. A technological challenge. It overcame tight budget constraints with imagination, such as suggesting a visit to an opera show by tight framing of Marjorie Bellamy ina two shot and playing the opera soundtrack.
Maybe a widescreen image would have help you appreciate the costumes.
“By 1974 the demand was more for serials than series that ran for years, and such classics as Jennie and Edward the Seventh became the new requirements.”
There is no evidence for this assertion whatsoever. In the “Brideshead Revisited” review you posited the strange idea that “The strain of classic TV drama serials had reached both its zenith and its end in the mid seventies with Jennie, Edward the Seventh and I, Claudius.” But now you state that this was the new model. Not so. “The Duchess of Duke Street”, “Thomas and Sarah”, “Cribb”, “Raffles”, and a host of other like “The Ondein Line”, “Supernatural”, “Danger UXB”, ect, ect, were mixing well with drama serials.
I do admire your taste in movies and tv.
In the 70s more new serials started sprouting up, and though other series of Upstairs ilk did turn up, they were not in the same league.
Theatrical is not referring to the positioning of the camera, but rather to the fact that Upstairs was primarily about the writing and the acting. There were outdoor shots, but shot on video they didn’t seem real.
The classic drama serials of the seventies did reach a zenith in the mid seventies. I can’t comment on The Devil’s Crown, but Edward & Mrs Simpson was not up to earlier examples and only when Brideshead came along did we get another great series – in my opinion anyway.
I agree about with you Allan about “Edward and Mrs Simpson” not being up to the standard of mid and early ’70s serials. Good points.
My point was slightly different though. What I loved about tv in the ’70s and ’60s is that because there were really only two manufacturers of television, the Beeb and ITV – that they raised their standards, making them upping the ante. Consider that “Armchair Theatre” led to “The Wednesday Play”/”Play for Today”, “The Great War” led to “The World at War”, “The Forsythe Saga” to “Upstairs, Downstairs” (Which in turn inspired “The Duchess of Duke Street”), “The Ceasars” to “I, Claudius”, “The Avengers” to “Adam Adamant”, “Hollywood” to “Talking Pictures” & “Cinema Europe: The Other Hollywood”, “Our Mutual Friend” to “Hard Times”, Brideshead” and “Jewel” to “The Fortunes of War”. I love that organic interplay between the Beeb and ITV, who as Bill Cotton once stated – one of whom was given money to make programs, the other made programs to make money.
And that because there were only two suppliers, they would keep the strands running. Anthological play strands run through from the ’50s to the mid ’80s. Serials too, documentaries, current affairs. Unfortunately, the whole process came crashing down with the advent of Channal 4 (which at least gave us Halliwell’s film seasons), and then Satellite (which gave us the buying channels, Chinese, Indian, Arabic, Americian wall to wall tv) which fragmented the audience and drew a chase to the bottom. Something that’s killed off ITV, and now Channal 4, Alas….
Well, some of those you mentioned were 80s and 90s products, but it’s a matter of taste. Dickens’ followers will probably love the 1976 Our Mutual Friend, but I prefer the 1998 version, though both are excellent. I prefer the more cinematic feel – in the traditional sense – of the 1998. Likewise, some prefer the 1985 Bleak House to the 2005, though I edge the latter as it was more atmospheric in terms of its cinematography and production design, and the cast were overall better.
Bobby, I have to ask, you must be based in blighty like myself, or at least have lived there for long periods. I’m not old enough to have seen many of them on first showing (mid 30s), but have caught up on DVD. Nice to have someone else on board who knows their TV stuff. I have done various TV entries on the site, so I’m sure there will be a few other pieces you’ll enjoy. I don’t like to put too many of them up, however, as the main base of the site is Stateside and hasn’t heard of half the TV stuff I have written pieces on. Most people Stateside think the BBC make everything in the UK – how many times I’ve heard them say Brideshead was a great BBC production, and Upstairs Downstairs come to that.
And if only I had been old enough to witness the Halliwell seasons on C4, Halliwell and his books were a founding influence, as another earlier piece I wrote here will testify.
Nice too see someone with great taste in movies and tv, too.
I grew up on Halliwell’s, I used revently stroke the pages as a teenager and it led me to so many dazzling peak moments of truly great films, their makers, photographers, musical composers, editors (something that no other guide did, mentioning those names only in the review txt).
I still very strict on what I’d give a four star rating to….lol
Anyway, Allan – I live in Gants Hill in Essex, have always done so. Looking forward to your selection of the greatest films of the ’50s.
Where are you based?
I’m up in the Lakes in Kendal. I had come to the conclusion you were an ex-pat, but maybe you just had a late night the other night when making those comments.
Yes, Halliwell was a massive influence, as witness my piece on the same. I often didn’t agree with him and am a little more lenient than he was, but he pointed me to stuff I wouldn’t otherwise have looked out for. He started the quest for knowledge, and I won’t forget it.