Australian TV Plays: A Man for All Seasons (16 Oct 1963)

The classic Robert Bolt play - adapted for Australian TV!

Premise

Sir Thomas More faces a crisis of conscience.

Cast

Wynn Roberts as Sir Thomas More
John Gray as The Common Man
Kevin McBeath as Thomas Cromwell
Neil Curnow as Robert Rich
Hugh Stewart as the Duke of Norfolk
Terri Aldred as Alice More
Fay Kelton as Margaret More
Douglas Kelly as Cardinal Wolsey
Terry Norris as King Henry VIII
Bruce Morton as William Roper
John Morgan as Chapuys
Campbell Copelin as Cramner
Barbara Brandon as a woman
Laurence Beck as Chapuys' attendant

Original play

An early form of the play had been written for BBC Radio in 1954, and a one-hour live television version was produced in 1957 by the BBC^{. .}

After Bolt's success with The Flowering Cherry, he reworked it for the stage. It premiered in 1960 and was a huge success in London then Broadway and was a successful film in 1966.

A copy can be borrowed here.

Other Australian versions

The play debuted on stage in Australia in 1962 for the Elizabethan Theatre Trust with Robert Speaght as Sir Thomas More.

It was adapted for ABC radio in 1964 with Alexander Archdale.

Production

It was shot in Melbourne.

It was directed by William Sterling who thought the play was "the finest in construction and conception on the large heroic scale to come out of England since the War. Bolt has captured the seething historical background of the period as well as conceiving magnificent character studies of famous people of the time."

Sterling elected not to use "fades" in his production.

Reception

The Age said it "translated convincingly on the TV screen" call it a "production which, though not perfect gave glamor to honesty." That paper later said it was the best ABC drama of the year.

The TV critic from the Sydney Morning Herald thought that "the stage devices" of the original play "were all too evident for the good of its TV adaptation", notably the reliance of one set for all the action, and the use of the device of the Common Man, adding "the black and white directness of television demands less pageant-like solemnity. But it was able to assist valuably when the dialogue came alive with character and force."

The Bulletin (William Daniel not Frank Roberts) said William Sterling is perhaps the most distinctive and stylistic producer in Australian television. In each of his shows he rarely misses an opportunity for adventurous experiment with lighting or camera-angles." He called the production of A Man for All Seasons "superb" adding that it "succeeded where some of his [Sterling's] previous productions have failed, because all his gimmicks worked, and worked magnificently, so that the effect was exciting where it may have been (and has been) merely tricksy and pretentious."

The production was so well received it was repeated in Sydney and Melbourne in March 1964.