An Australian play. Aired for Wednesday Theatre. Characters appeared in an episode of Australian Playhouse called "The Final Factor". Both were written by John Warwick.
Premise
A bridge over the Sunda River in Bali collapses killing four adults and 22 children. An investigation results. The bridge was built by Dan Fenner, an ambitious man in his early thirties. The design of the bridge brought him much acclaim. Investigations reveal various jealousies and passions.
Jason, who owns the transport company of the truck involved in the accident, is determined that his driver should be be blamed. Scott Harland is a TV reporter doing items on the disaster. He speaks with Fenner's former assistant, Janice Lucas, who left because of her relationship with Fenner. Janice is the daughter of Jim Lucas, the former construction boss on the project.
Sir Miles Parker arranges for several of the men to travel to Bali, where they meet Jim Lucas. Parker pays off Scott Harland by offering him a job.
Cast
- Michael Duffield as Sir Miles Parker, chairman of the biggest construction group in England
- Frank Wilson as Daniel Kruger, a financial tycoon
- Peter Aanensen as Jason, a transport tycoon
- Wynn Roberts as Dan Fenner, the civil engineer who designed the bridge
- Dennis Miller as Scott Harland, a TV reporter
- William Hodge as Cameron Fisher, head of PR for Baker's
- Lynn Lee as Janice Lucas, daughter of Jim Lucas
- Ian Neal as Jim Lucas, construction boss
- Anne Charleston, as Sally, Kruger's secretary
- John Preston as Harry
- Sheila Florence as Kathy, Jason's secretary
- William King
- Sammy Chen, Adam Joseph, Noel O'Conner, Gino Villani, Gordon Malcolm, Alfred Hoff,Graham Mills, Allan Easthe
Production
It was based on an original TV play by John Warwick. These characters had appeared in "The Final Factor".
Frank Wilson was better known as a "song and dance man" at the time. The credits said he appeared by courtesy of GTV-9.
The play was made in Melbourne's ABC studios. Patrick Barton, who mostly specialised in directing foreign scripts, directed this one.
The play was recorded over October 24, 25, and 26, 1968.
Designer - Alan Clarke. Technical producer - Brian Rodgers. Lighting - Harry Myers. Cinecameraman - Frank Few. Editor - John Gwillam. Titles - Peter Efford.
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| TV Times Qld 4 Dec 1968 p 9 |
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| The Age TV Guide 28 Nov 1968 p 2 |
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| Canberra Times 2 Dec 1968 p 17 |
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| The Age 28 Nov 1968 TV Guide |
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| sMH 17 Nov 1968 p 58 |
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| SMH TV Guide 2 Dec 1968 |
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| TV Times Vic |
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| SMH 4 Dec 1968 p 29 |
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Forgotten Australian TV Plays: Cobwebs in Concrete
by Stephen Vagg
May 30, 2021
Stephen Vagg’s series on forgotten Australian TV plays looks at the 1968 ABC boardroom drama, Cobwebs in Concrete.
One of the great pleasures of late ‘70s Australian cinema was watching Frank Wilson slam his hand on a boardroom table, point his finger and yell at people in films like Money Movers and The Club. It’s less well known that he played a similar sort of role a decade earlier in the 1968 TV play Cobwebs in Concrete.
This was based on a script by John Warwick, an actor-writer of many years’ experience here and in England, whose CV included (arguably) discovering Errol Flynn for In the Wake of the Bounty.
Cobwebs in Concrete was an original for Australian television, a boardroom drama in the style of “fierce looks at unbridled capitalism” British TV series like The Power Game (1965-69) and The Troubleshooters (1965-72).
The story explores the corporate fall out of a bridge collapse near a small village in Bali, which kills four adults and 22 children. The victims are mentioned but never seen (seriously, there’s not even a 50 worder Balinese); the action focuses on the fall out on Australians and Britons involved: the head of the construction company (Frank Wilson) that built the bridge, his millionaire superior (Michael Duffield), the bridge designer (Wyn Roberts), the head of a transport company (Peter Aanensen) whose driver may have caused the collapse, a smarmy TV journalist (Dennis Miller), and a PR man (William Hodge). The crux of the action revolves around the construction company trying to blame the transport company and vice versa, with everyone trying to manipulate/intimidate/bribe everyone else.
There’s a lot of middle aged white alpha males yelling at each other over boardroom tables being ruthless and cynical, with a few female roles thrown into the mix: Aanensen’s secretary (Sheila Florence, later of Prisoner), who, along with a construction boss (Ian Neal) is the closest thing the play has to a moral conscience; Aanensen’s colleague (Lynn Lee), who is Neal’s daughter and used to have a thing for Roberts; and Wilson’s secretary (Anne Charleston) who… is just kind of there.
I had a good time watching it: cynicism ages well and all the macho posturing, corruption and ego clashing feels all too realistic, even in 2021. The story is a sort of forerunner to the workplace clash stories that David Williamson would tell so well on stage, in particular his play The Department – like that, this was an entertaining dramatisation of corporate dick swinging and ambition which occasionally got bogged down by technical detail. Cobwebs in Concrete lacks the humour and characterisation of the best Williamson, but then so does The Department.
It feels utterly wrong that there are no Balinese characters, even though the second half of the story mostly takes place in a backlot Bali. There’s a big climactic scene with a bunch of men shouting at each other about construction specifications which feels like Warwick fell in love with his research. And the ending comes across as abrupt.
However, the strengths of Cobwebs in Concrete outweigh its defects. The acting is very strong. Wilson is superb – I love how he began his career as a song and dance man and then turned into the archetypal tough guy (a career trajectory similar to American actor/singer Jerry Orbach). The director was Patrick Barton, who normally specialised in shooting foreign scripts; he does a decent job, with a funky music score adding freshness. The brutal take down of capitalism is something to see, and a further reminder (if any more were needed) that the great Australian drama revival of the 1970s did not come out of thin air.
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