
by Allan Fish
(UK 1967 1,295m) DVD1/2
The aristocracy of wealth
p Donald Wilson d David Giles, James Cellan Jones w Lennox Philips, Donald Wilson, etc. novels John Galsworthy m Eric Coates art Spencer Chapman, Julia Trevelyan Oman
Eric Porter (Soames), Nyree Dawn Porter (Irene), Kenneth More (young Jolyon), Susan Hampshire (Fleur), June Barry (June), Margaret Tyzack (Winifred), Joseph O’Conor (old Jolyon), Ursula Howells (Frances), Lana Morris (Helene), John Welsh (uncle James), Fay Compton (Ann), John Bennett (Philip Bosinney), Terence Alexander (Monty), Nicholas Pennell (Michael Mont), Martin Jarvis (John), Michael York (Joly), Nora Swinburne (Aunt Hester), Terence Alexander (Monty), John Barcroft (George), A.J.Brown (Roger), John Baskcomb (Timothy), Cyril Luckham (Sir Lawrence Mont), Geraldine Sherman (Victorine Bicket), Terry Scully (Tony Bicket), Derek Francis (Elderson), George Woodbridge (Swithin), Nora Nicholson (Aunt Juley), Kynaston Reeves (Nicholas), John Bailey (Aubrey Greene), Austin Trevor (Botterill), Karin Fernald (Anne Wilmot), Alan Rowe (Settlewhite), Maggie Jones (Smither), John Phillips (Sir Alex McGown), George Benson (Marquess of Shropshire), Caroline Blakiston (Marjorie Ferrar),
Where would we be without The Forsyte Saga? It was made as the flagship of the BBC’s fledgling new channel, BBC2, running for six months in the first half of 1967. So popular was it that, armed with numerous BAFTA awards, it then showed on BBC1 the following year and literally stopped the nation on Sunday evenings and whole episodes were not so much talked about for days as months. It was like a cultured soap opera, the intelligentsia’s antidote to Coronation Street. Some critics may point at the BBC’s using black and white when colour was literally just around the corner – literally, with Susan Hampshire appearing in colour in Vanity Fair before the year was out. However, the producers felt they had the cast they wanted and any delays would have meant losing several cast members, so they decided to shoot straight away. Much as though colour would have been beneficial in some ways, monochrome suited the stuffed-shirt world of the Forsytes, and added to the sense of the funereal about their undertakings. (more…)
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