The Big Client (19 July 1961)

Based on a British TV play. Directed by James Upshaw.

Plot

It is set in a small London advertising firm, JCB Partners, whose manager is Fred Cooper.  Henderson is an American millionaire launching a brand of tranquillisers and has just fired his London agency. Fred Cooper is keen to get the account even though they are only small, and the three directors are reluctant: Sam Bloomberg, Philip Comely and Peter Jones. Fred is good friends with copywriter Dave Mason, who is crippled.

Fred asks his secretary, Eleanor (Philip's wife), to find out all he can about Henderson. Henderson asks for a variety of London agencies to pitch him ideas. He explains he fired his London agency after one of their agents got drunk and made a fool of himself.

At the pitch, Fred meets Jennifer, who he fired from JCB, who now works for another firm, run by Mr Dixon; it becomes clear Fred has a chip on his shoulder about his working class origins in a business dominated by public school men.

Eleanor and Dave are platonically close; she tells him that she is thinking of leaving Philip. Fred finds the man who caused Henderson's old agency to be fired - Geoff Manning; Fred blackmails Manning into helping him through knowledge of some corporate fraud. This inside office helps Fred impress Henderson and JCB get the account.

Henderson arranges a meeting with Jennifer, and makes a romantic overture towards her. She refuses. She tells him she is interested in Fred, but that he fired her because he had become attached to her.

Fred tells Sam that Henderson is from the south and suggests Sam leave his (Jewish) name off. The immigration department tells Peter Jones he can't go due to a trip Peter once took to Poland (Fred had secretly tipped them off about this). So Fred is the one who has to go to America.

However when Fred comes back, one of the directors, Philip, has returned and insists he is the one who gets to go to America, while Fred stays behind to manage the office. Eleanor reveals to Fred she overheard him dob in Peter to the immigration office, and so recalled her husband to the office.

Henderson holds a drinks function for JCB that night. Fred tells Dave that Henderson did not want to work with Sam because Sam was Jewish; Dave however knows that Henderson's wife is Jewish. Fred admits he did it because he resents the college education of Sam and the other directors. Dave is disgusted by what his childhood friend has become.

Fred tells Philip that Eleanor is having an affair with Dave.  This upsets Philip who thinks Fred it too ruthless and tells Henderson that Fred is leaving.

David tells Jennifer he has been fired by Philip and that he feels Fred is lonely. Jennifer visits Fred who tells him he has been fired. Jennifer is relieved. Fred proposes to her and she accepts. 

Then Henderson calls Fred and asks him to come to America on his own - he is interested in Fred, not JCB. He also asks Fred's help in seducing Jennifer, regardless of her engagement to Fred. Fred agrees to help but is aware how much he's sold out.

Cast

• Barry Linehan as Fred Cooper
• James Condon as J.G. Henderson
• Alistair Duncan as a copywriter Dave Mason, a crippled ad exec
• Diana Perryman as Eleanor Comely
• Pamela Page as Jennifer King
• Keith Buckley as Geoff Manning
  
• Ric Hutton as Peter Jones, a playboy
• Deryk Barnes as Phillip Comely, director of JCB 
• Noel Brophy as Sam Bloomberg
  
• Coralie Neville as Greta Heffner, Fred's secretary
• John Fleming as Mr McKenzie
  

Original TV play

The play by British writers Eric Paice and Michael Hulke had been filmed on British TV in 1959 directed by Ted Kotcheff. Ian Bannen starred.

Other productions

There was a 1961 stage production in Bristol. The Guardian said it was not as good as the TV play.

Production

This was shot in Sydney. James Upshaw was a former ballet dancer who mostly directed variety shows, notably ones with Lorrae Desmond.

Geoffrey Wedlock did the sets. Technical supervision - Harrie Adams.

It went for 75 minutes.

 Reception

The TV critic from the Sydney Morning Herald thought an advertising executive would have.been hard put to clarify the curious dramatic direction—embracing shifts of meaning and emphasis" in the play, adding "it was a fault of the play, not, generally speaking, of the actors or of James Upshaw's compact though not very imaginative production." 

TV Times admired Linehan's performance and said Upshaw's direction was effective.

SMH TV Guide 17 July 1961 p 1

SMH 19 July 1961 p 14

SMH 20 July 1961 p 11

SMH 16 July 1961 p 72

SMH 17 July 1961 p 14

The Age 24 Aug 1961 p 33

The Age 30 Aug 1961 p 20

Piece on James Upshaw - SMH 19 Jan 1959 p 16

TV Times 7 Sept 1961 p 16

Forgotten Australian TV Plays: The Big Client
by Stephen Vagg
May 14, 2021
Stephen Vagg’s series on forgotten Australian TV plays looks at the ABC’s 1961 advertising industry drama, The Big Client.

Advertising agencies have traditionally been a great crucible of talent for Australian film and TV. The reasons are obvious – many of the skills for working in advertising are transferrable to drama, namely, the importance of being creative/being political/faking confidence/working to a budget/sucking up/developing a drinking problem/creating an awards system to give yourself a sense of validation, etc. Many people behind our most successful shows and films have an advertising background or even foreground: writers (Bryce Courtney, Pat Flower, Bob Ellis), directors (Ray Lawrence, Paul Middleditch, Fred Schepisi), producers (Michael Robertson, Philip Adams, Robert Stigwood) and actors (Cate “Tim Tams” Blanchett).

So, it’s surprising, in a way, that so few Australian TV shows and movies are set in the advertising world. It’s not as if Australians are hostile to stories that take place there – look at the success of Mad Men (aka the show that made a thousand baby boomer ad execs cry out “that was my idea…”). There are exceptions: The Gruen Transfer, of course; the 1985 film Bliss, and the TV sitcom 30 Seconds; the male juvenile in Dad and Dave Come to Town was an ad man (played very sympathetically by Billy Rayes – Ken G Hall came from publicity and had a soft spot for the breed). There was also the 1961 TV play The Big Client.

This was based on a script by the British team of Eric Paice and Malcolm Hulke (later a notable contributor to Dr Who), which had originally been filmed in England in 1959 under the direction of Ted (Wake in Fright) Kotcheff and starring Ian Bannen. The play was very well received – it was adapted for stage – and the ABC decided to film it in 1961.

The Big Client is set in a small British advertising firm, whose manager, Fred (Barry Lineman), is determined to secure the lucrative account for an American pharmaceutical company run by a ruthless millionaire (James Condon). Fred is a classic angry young man of the time, bitter at his lack of education and working class origins, and prepared to do whatever it takes: he blackmails a fraudster, betrays his best friend and fiancé, dobs in one colleague and misleads another, exposes a bad marriage, gives up his one chance at happiness just to land the client… There are numerous supporting characters, including the office secretary (Diana Perryman) who is unhappily married to Fred’s boss (Deryk Barnes), Fred’s crippled best friend (Alistair Duncan), Fred’s other bosses, one Jewish (Noel Brophy) the other a lazy playboy with a left wing past (Ric Hutton), a fraudster (Keith Buckley), and Fred’s possible true love (Pamela Page).

The writers were left wingers and apply an acid look at the advertising industry. This cynicism helps the piece age well (that and the fact that it is simply well written)… I’m surprised this was never turned into a feature, as it fits very neatly into the Angry-Young-Man-chasing-after-excess-in-soulless-London films made at the time (Room at the Top, Saturday Night Sunday Morning, I’ll Never Forget What’s-is-Name, Nothing But the Best); you can easily imagine how they could add swinging sixties sex and glamour to jazz it up for something starring Laurence Harvey/Stanley Baker/Albert Finney/Oliver Reed. People who love stories set in advertising firms will find all their trope boxes nicely ticked here: there’s chain-smoking execs getting stuck into the booze at the bar, seen-it all secretaries, intense sales sessions on the phone, propositions from married men to sassy career girls, poor but honest cripples, corporate betrayal, constant lying, and devastating realisations that the lure of money has cost you your soul but you go after it anyway. I enjoyed it tremendously.

The Australian production was directed by James Upshaw, a French-American former ballet dancer who moved to Australia when he married an Australian woman and got into television. He does a fine job, helped by a solid cast; it’s a particularly showy piece for Lineman, an actor who mostly worked in Britain but was out here at the time.  Once more, I wish the ABC had used their budget to film an Australian script instead, but at least this one is very well made, and makes for an entertaining TV play.

TV Times