Australian TV Plays: A Sleep of Prisoners (31 Jan & 2 March 1961) (Perth, Brisbane)

A Sleep of Prisoners (31 Jan & 2 March 1961) (Perth, Brisbane)

The first TV drama from Perth and Brisbane.

Plot

Four English soldiers are trapped in a bombed out Cathedral. Private King attempts to strangle Private Able. Separated by Corporal Adams and Private Meadows they bed down for the night.

The remainder of the play reveals the dreams of each soldier and their attitude to life and death.

Perth Cast

Ron Haddrick as Pvt. David King
James Bailey
Paul Nayton
Philip Clarke

(Another article below says the cast would be Haddrick, Philip Clarke, James Bailey, Paul Nayton)

Brisbane Cast

Ron Haddrick as Private David King
Don McTaggart as Corporal Joe Adams
Kerry Francis as Private Peter Able
Frank Evans as Private Tim Meadows

Background

Commissioned as part of the Festival of Britain, the anti-war drama, directed by Michael Macowan, opened at St. Thomas' church in Regent Street, London, in May 1951.

It toured churches around Britain with its cast of Stanley Baker, Denholm Elliott, Hugh Pryse and Leonard White. It was also performed in churches in America later the same year.

Fry wrote:

The first thought of A Sleep of Prisoners came on a summer afternoon in 1950. I had been invited by the Religious Drama Society to write a play for them for the Festival of Britain and could not bring myself to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’. I had vague ideas for two plays in my head but both were for the theatre. I had promised to start work on one of them soon. It has always seemed to me that the differences and conflicts between men spring often – perhaps more often than not – from the differences between the outward armour, the facades behind which we hide our spirits. Perhaps the design of the play could be to show first of all a group of men as they seemed on the surface to each other and then let them sleep and dream, each man dreaming of the other three and of himself, so that each character would be seen four times over. What is the truth of a man? What is difference; what is conflict? In A Sleep of Prisoners I have tried to make a more simple statement, though in a complicated design where each of the four men is seen through the sleeping thoughts of the others, and each, in his own dream, speaks as at heart he is, not as he believes himself to be.

You can borrow a copy here.

Other adaptations

The play was broadcast by BBC TV in 1951 and BBC radio in 1952.

It was filmed by Canadian TV in 1961.

Production

The Australian stage premiere took place in January 1952 at Middle Park in Melbourne. It was directed by Alan Burke, who became a noted TV director. A few months later it was performed in a Melbourne church. In December 1957 there was another production at Union Theatre. There was another production in Melbourne in 1961.

The ABC decided to produce it in Cathedrals in Perth and Brisbane. Ray Menmuir directed and Ron Haddrick starred in both.

The play was also filmed for Brisbane television in March 1961 with Ron Haddrick yet again. It was shot at St John's Cathedral in the first week of March.

Some viewers felt the "rough talk" of soldiers in a cathedral was blasphemous. "I feel this is a very wrong interpretation," said Menmuir. "Actually, in the play the author, Christopher Fry, emphasises the part religion plays in the life of ordinary human beings.

The Perth production was shot in St George's Cathedral with Michael Altria the lighting director.

The Brisbane cast consisted of four - imported Ron Haddrick, ad exec Don McTaggart and two professional actors. Menmuir told the TV Times "this production will be different from anything yet attempted in Sydney or Melbourne. Having lived in Brisbane I knew the possibilities of the cathedral as the setting of Sleep of Prisoners. Already we have carried out detailed surveys with lighting men and engineers. They have proved completely satisfactory."

Haddrick arrived in Brisbane in early February for rehearsals, which mostly took place at a hall in West End.

Dean Baddley of St Johns said he knew Christopher Fry personally and felt he was a great Christian. "I am hoping we will equal if not better the Perth production," said Menmuir^.

The ABC broadcast an 8 minute preview on Brisbane TV the night before the broadcast. Some screenshots from that are below.

Perth crew ; technical producer - Mr Peppercorn, lighting - Michael Altria, sound - Dick Murphy.

Reception

The Bulletin TV critic called the Perth production "a triumph... must rank with the best in live television."

Radio Times 14 Dec 1951

The Bulletin 8 Feb 1961 p 23

TV Times 2 March 1961

TV Times 12 Jan 1961

TV Times 12 Jan 1961 p 1

Courier Mail 1 March 1961

TV Times 15 Feb 1961

Courier Mail 1 March 1961

TV Times 2 March 1961

TV Times 16 Feb 1961

First play on Perth and Brisbane TV has historic revival after 60 years
by FilmInk staff
February 19, 2021
A slice of Australian entertainment history will be recreated next month with simultaneous tributes to the 60th anniversary of the first television drama ever produced in Perth and Brisbane.

A Sleep of Prisoners, the verse play by English dramatist Christopher Fry, is being performed on Thursday 4 March at both St George’s Cathedral in Perth, and St John’s Cathedral in Brisbane.

This is 60 years after the same play was filmed live by ABC television in both cathedrals, becoming the first small-screen drama made in either city.

The 1961 productions ran for 75 minutes and were both directed by Raymond Menmuir and starred Ron Haddrick. The Perth production was broadcast from St George’s Cathedral in January 1961; Haddrick and Menmuir then flew across country and filmed a Brisbane version in St John’s two months later.

Brisbane writer, and regular FilmInk contributor, Stephen Vagg approached both cathedrals last year with the idea of staging a one-night only revival of the play in Perth and Brisbane to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the original broadcasts.

“Television drama production in Australia is traditionally associated with the cities of Sydney and Melbourne,” said Vagg. “There was even an industry slang term for the cities outside those two places ‘BAPH’ (Brisbane Adelaide Perth Hobart).

“Yet Brisbane and Perth have their own rich history of making TV drama – from recent efforts such as Harrow and The Heights, through Round the Twist and the 1980s revival of Mission Impossible, back to the 1960s live plays from the ABC at Toowong and the WA musical The Good Oil.

“Before any of these was A Sleep of Prisoners, broadcast in both cities only a few years after television was introduced to Australia. It is thrilling that St George’s and St John’s have agreed to host live readings of the play in the exact same locations they were first recorded in Perth and Brisbane sixty years ago.”

Vagg said the play’s original author, Christopher Fry, was a towering figure of English post-war entertainment, including working on the screenplay of Ben Hur (1959). “No one performs Fry much these days but he was very much in vogue for a time after World War Two,” said Vagg. “He was an excellent writer – the language is a delight.”

A Sleep of Prisoners, Fry’s lyrical reflection on life, death, violence and purgatory was originally commissioned as part of the Festival of Britain; it opened at St George’s church in Regent Street, London in May 1951, with a cast including Stanley Baker and Denholm Elliott. The play is set in a bombed-out church during WWII and focuses on four soldiers and their dreams of biblical stories.

Vagg says the play was originally selected for filming by the ABC in part because it could be performed in a church. “In 1961, neither Perth or Brisbane had the studio facilities to shoot television drama,” Vagg said. “However, one of the ABC’s leading TV directors, Ray Menmuir, had lived in both cities and knew where he could find cathedrals that would make an ideal filming location for a small screen production of A Sleep of Prisoners.”

It was decided to film in West Australia first. Menmuir flew to Perth along with Haddrick, using local actors to play the other three parts at St George’s Cathedral. Menmuir and Haddrick then travelled to Brisbane, re-cast the other roles locally, and broadcast the play once more at St John’s Cathedral on 2 March 1961.

In a symbolic reaching of hands across the nation, A Sleep of Prisoners will be concurrently performed on 4 March at St George’s Cathedral in Perth. “I think it’s fascinating that Brisbane and Perth both started TV drama production with versions of the same play, and the same director and lead actor,” said Vagg. “So it’s fitting that sixty years later the original cathedrals are hosting live readings of that play on the same night.”

The 2021 Perth production of A Sleep of Prisoners will be performed by local actors under the direction of Stuart Halusz.

The 2021 Brisbane performance will be directed by Rob Pensalfini, one of Queensland Shakespeare Ensemble’s founders and its artistic director since 2001. He said QSE had a long track record of performing both verse drama and contemporary local stories.

“We have worked extensively with prisoners, returned military personnel with PTSD, and wartime stories,” Mr Pensalfini said.

“Our mission at QSE is to bring classical stories to life for a contemporary local audience and in particular through the lens of the marginalised, which is exactly what Fry did with A Sleep of Prisoners, juxtaposing key biblical texts with modern characters in extremis.

“The key components of this play – dramatic verse, liminal and subliminal states, deprivation, and moral complexity – resonate strongly with the themes which QSE explores in its work both on stage and in our communities.

“The important place of this text in Australian performance history, which led to one of the first televised Australian-produced dramas, demonstrates the importance of classical stories and verse drama to the development of new and vibrant forms of performance.”

Tickets for the Brisbane show, which starts at 7.30pm on Thursday 4 March, are just $15. It will feature a lecture from Stephen Vagg on the history of the 1961 TV production.

For bookings, visit:

https://www.trybooking.com/events/landing?eid=711888&

Tickets for the Perth show, which starts at 7.00 pm on Thursday 4 March, are $50.

https://www.perthcathedral.org/event/a-sleep-of-prisoners/?instance_id=90452

Brisbane A Sleep of Prisoners cast:

Leah Fitzgerald Quinn (Private Peter Able)

Rebecca Murphy (Corporal Joe Adams)

Rob Pensalfini (Private Tim Meadows),

Angus Thorburn (Private David King).

Director: Rob Pensalfini

Perth Cast

Andrew Hale as Private Tim Meadows

Sam Ireland as Private Peter Able

Peter Williams as Corporal Joe Adams

Haydon Wilson as Private David King

Director: Stuart Halusz

Lecture:

On the evening of Thursday, 2 March 1961 the citizens of Brisbane who had access to a television were presented with three viewing options at 8.30 pm. On Channel Seven (7) they could watch Diane McBain in the private eye show “Surfside Six”. On Nine (9) there was Ward Bond in the Western series “Wagon Train”.

And on the ABC, you could see the first TV drama made in this city: A Sleep of Prisoners, based on the play by Christopher Fry, filmed live in this very cathedral.

[SHOW PICTURE OF TV GUIDE]

That’s right. Years before Harrow and Secrets and Lies, and Fire and Fire 2, before the first season of the revived Mission Impossible, a very big deal when I was at high school just up the road here, they made TV drama in Brisbane. Sixty years to be precise, when these walls turned into a TV studio.

Television broadcasting started in Australia in 1956. There was a fair bit of locally made drama in the early days, far more than is realised. The ABC would broadcast an Australian made TV play roughly once every fortnight. The commercial networks made some too. But all of it was shot in Sydney or Melbourne, the “cultural capitals” of our nation. Indeed, there was even a slang term used in those cities at the time: “the BAPH States”. BAPH being short for Brisbane, Adelaide, Perth and Hobart. They lumped us all in together. (The poor old territories didn’t even get a look in.)

I’m not sure what prompted the decision to film A Sleep of Prisoners in Brisbane, but I’m willing to guess that it began with a complaint. And that complaint would have been along the lines of “it’s the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, not the Sydney and Melbourne Broadcasting Corporation, how about we make some TV drama outside those two places?”

So in 1961 the ABC decided to kill two birds with one stone - they would film a live performance of a play in Perth and then Brisbane.

The idea for this seems to have come from Ray Menmuir, one of the leading directors of TV drama at the time, who later had a hugely successful career in England. Menmuir was born in Perth and had worked in Brisbane, so he was familiar with both cities. Neither town had much in the way of studio facilities in 1961, but they did have Cathedrals, and Menmuir knew of a play that was perfect for filming in one.

This was Christopher Fry’s A Sleep of Prisoners, which you’re seeing tonight.

Christopher Fry’s works aren’t produced much these days, but he was a very highly regarded poet and playwright, particularly in the years immediately after World War Two. He also did some screenwriting on the side, being responsible for the final uncredited rewrite of the 1959 film version of Ben Hur. Charlton Heston attributed much of the success of that script to Fry.

[PICTURE OF CHRIS FRY?]

Fry was renowned for his verse dramas, many of which were filmed by ABC television in the 1950s and 1960s, including A Phoenix Too Frequent, The Lady’s Not for Burning, Venus Observed and tonight’s play.

A Sleep of Prisoners was originally commissioned for the Festival of Britain in 1951. The cast of the first production included two actors who later became film stars, Denholm Elliott and Stanley Baker. The play was a great success, being performed around the world, including a season in New York and numerous productions in Australia.

Part of the reason behind its popularity - apart from its quality - was A Sleep of Prisoners could be staged in a church rather than a regular theatre. Ray Menmuir felt the ABC could easily film it in St George’s Cathedral in Perth and St John’s Cathedral in Brisbane. It would be the first TV drama made in either city.

The West Australians, it must be admitted, got there first before us Queenslanders. Ray Menmuir travelled to Perth in late 1960 accompanied by the actor Ron Haddrick, then at the beginning of his distinguished career. Haddrick played one role, with the other three parts being played by local actors. The production was broadcast from St George’s in January 1961, and we are honoured that that Cathedral is putting on its own performance of the play tonight in tribute.

Ray Menmuir and Ron Haddrick then travelled to Brisbane and repeated the process. As with the Perth production, the other three roles were cast locally in Brisbane: Don McTaggart, Kerry Francis and Frank Evans. Rehearsals took place over several weeks at a hall in West End while St Johns Cathedral was prepared for filming. The night before the broadcast, the ABC showed a short preview of the show for the audience. We have a clip of that here.

[SHOW CLIP]

I’ve been unable to discover how well the production was received. I’ll go out on a limb here and guess most of the Brisbane audiences would have preferred to watch Wagon Train or Surfside Six.

But the productions clearly had an impact because after Perth and Brisbane put on A Sleep of Prisoners, the ABC started filming other TV plays in Cathedrals in Sydney and Melbourne.

In December 1961 the medieval work, The Play of Daniel, was broadcast from St Mary’s Cathedral, in Sydney. In 1964 they recorded the medieval play “Everyman” from St Patrick’s Cathedral in Melbourne, and “The Play of Herod” at St Mary’s.

I like to think for once, this was clearly a case of Sydney and Melbourne copying the “BAPH states”.

Out of interest, the second TV drama production made in Brisbane was broadcast in June 1963. That was Vacancy in Vaughan Street, based on a play by Brisbane author George Landen Dann, which was shot at the ABC studios in Toowong. Indeed, there was a mini drama boom in Brisbane in the mid 60s, with the ABC and the commercial networks BTQ-7 and QTQ-9 making TV plays.

_If you’ll forgive my indulgence I’d like to read out the titles that I have because if not now then when...._

_Crisis - Oct 1963_
_Dark Brown - Dec 1963_
_Dear Edgar - March 1964_
_Ring Out Wild Bells - Nov 1964_
_The Quiet Season - June 1965 _
_(Arabesque for Atoms) (1965)_
_In The Absence Of Mr. Sugden - ABC, Oct 1966_
_The Monkey Cage (1966)_

It’s a period that should be better known and remembered. To all the men and women who worked on these productions in the BAPH states - your work has not been forgotten. Thank you for your time.