Australian TV Plays: The Story of Peter Grey (2 July 1962)

TV series that ran for 156 episodes. Each ep ran for 15 mins. It was produced by ATN-7. It was made in 1961 but not shown in Sydney until 1962.

Premise

Peter Grey is a clergyman appointed to a new parish. He is married to neurotic Brenda. He forms a friendship with his predecessor, Rev Henry Marner and the latter's daughter Jane.

Cast

James Condon as Peter Grey
Diana Perryman as Jane Marner
Don Crosby as a doctor
Stewart Ginn
Lou Vernon as Rev Henry Marner
Lynne Murphy as Brenda Grey
Gordon Chater
Walter Sullivan as Tony Beaumont
Thelma Scott

Production

In 1959, the Seven Network (ATN7) announced they would produce three new television series, two 30-minute dramas and a 15-minute "woman's program". The 15 minute show was The Story of Peter Grey produced in the same style as there previous endeavor Autumn Affair which ended on 20 October 1959. Peter Grey was to be shown three times a week and run for 12 months^.

(The first of the 30-minute dramas was to be called The World of Marius Crump, the story of the devil in the disguise of a charming, whimsical character who wins or loses a soul in each episode, similar to Damn Yankees. Each episode was to be a self-contained story, but Mr Crump will be the central character every week. The series would be written by Richard Lane. It never became an on-going series. Nor did the other 30-minute drama.)

It was announced in June 1960.

Peter Grey was shot on videotape at ATN-7's studios in Epping, New South Wales. By 4 July 1960 the first four episodes had been taped.

It was being filmed in February 1961.

By August 1961 it was reportedly halfway through filming.

Brian Wright told Susan Lever "Just after that, we did another serial after that written by Kay Keen, The Story of Peter Gray. I had a little bit more budget. It was a little bit more polished. I wouldn’t say it was any better, but it took us through another year. "

Brett Porter produced. Hetold the Vincent Committee:

I had a cast for a quarter hour serial. So badly were they in need of practice, that I noticed an improvement beyond all recognition after twelve episodes. By the end of the first twelve episodes, the rehearsal time we had been allocated would have been more than sufficient because they were now so adept. Of course, we spent a great deal of time on the newcomers, particularly the younger ones. Had we remained only with the stalwart permanent members of the cast, our rehearsal time would have been more than sufficient. That is unusual in Australia.

Broadcast

It started showing in Melbourne on 26 May 1964 along with Autumn Affair. It sharted in Canberra on 3 Feb 1964.

Reception

A review from the Bulletin is here from 1962.

One by one, the radio stations have been dropping their perennial day time serials, and many a husband must have noticed a brightening in his wife’s eyes as the drug was withdrawn and contact with reality at least partly es tablished again. Recovery is never com plete, of course. Years, even months of addiction to noble Doctors, saintly but disturbed Reverends, unappreciative Husbands, dreadful Other Women, dan gerous Cads, meddling Mothers and all the rest of the stock characters of the soap operas inevitably placed the victim beyond any cure known to medicine, including Dr Paul’s and Mary Living stone’s, M.D. But it seemed certain that a new gen eration of young married women would be allowed to grow, tall and straight, with no taint of the daytime-serial malady women who had never heard Episode 89,672 of When A Girl Marries. That was how it seemed. It was far too much to expect. Apparently there is supposed to be an inherent yearning for this particular junk, and as The Un touchables has taught us, where there are potential junkies there will always be suppliers. So we have The Story of Peter Grey. In fact, Perth viewers have had it for some time, in two 4 p.m. doses a week. Sydney viewers had the fix offered to them only last week, but the takers will get five daily 3.30 p.m. shots from ATN and become mainstem addicts, unless their husbands are alerted to take drastic action.

Peter Grey is a clergyman, played by James Condon, and as played by James Condon he is an obvious psychoneurotic. He has a wife (Lynne Murphy) who be longs in the same ward. They have just moved to a new parish from a place called Merton Falls, where Something Happened. There are two versions. A girl took a shine to the Rev. Peter, who broke her heart, and then she tried to do A Dreadful Thing. Or else his insanely jealous wife drove an innocent girl to the brink of Taking Her Own Life. His wife eternally complains of headaches and neglects the house, which becomes a mess through which the Rev. wanders looking pained and impotent. She says she loves him, but in a con versation that traces the concentric circles of schizophrenia, she reveals much plotting to make him leave the ministry, study Law, and become rich and famous like Daddy before he Lost Everything. A couple of absent villains named Mother and rich Aunt Susan are sketched in. Muttering, “I just want peace,” he walks outside to stand among the tombstones somehow adjacent tf is Sydney suburban church, lifts his ;e skywards, of all things, and asks is he worthy, or has he Failed. End of Episode 2. Are you still with me, gentlemen? Next day your wives met a blind old minister (Lou Vernon), his daughter (Diana Perryman) who is Good and looks after him, and the local doctor (Stewart Ginn) who is Daughter’s hopeless suitor. The old minister and the doctor reveal that both have received Poison Pen Letters about What Happened at Merton Falls. On the flimsy pretext that the old minister had forgotten to hand over a couple of vital keys, Daughter and Doc amble over to the vicarage to sticky beak, and find Peter standing melan choly in a littered room. Peter and Daughter look at one another, and Something Dawns. There’s a click, Peter stiffens and then goes to the foot of the stairs. All three look upstairs, hold ing their breaths. End of Episode 3. End of my tolerance of this filmed soap opera which perpetuates all of the abor tions of human reality, dignity, sense and good taste which the old audio ‘drips’ committed.

I understand that Peter Grey will be followed by others of its kind. The only hope for a ‘clean’ generation of house wives is that evening television will have made most of them far too sophisticated for this mid-Victorian nonsense. DON BASS

Frank Roberts mentions it briefly in a 1965 piece.

Ratings

The series had an average rating of 1-3 in Melbourne (Autumn Affair was 13).