The journey of the fifth horse 1966 - Dustin Hoffman's first starring role on television

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IMDB Rating: 7,7

Directors: Larry Arrick, Earl Dawson
Main Cast: Dustin Hoffman, Susan Anspach, William Bassett, Michael Tolan, Charlotte Rae

"In 1966, a year before he rose to overnight fame in The Graduate, Dustin Hoffman won an Obie Award for his performance in Journey of the Fifth Horse, a stage adaptation by Ronald Ribman of the story Diary of a Superfluous Man by Ivan Turgenev. The play was videotaped for public television that same year, and this home video release presents a recording of one of Hoffman's first truly great roles. Dmitri Zoditch (Dustin Hoffman) is a lower-level manuscript reader for a large publishing company, and while he's in love with the daughter (Susan Anspach) of the firm's deceased founder, he lacks the courage to court her. The diary of a second-rate nobleman who has fallen on hard times, Nikolai Alexeyevich Chulkaturin (Michael Tolan), has been submitted for publication, and the manuscript is given to Zoditch for appraisal. Told he must read the work in one night, Zoditch soon finds himself drawn into the world of the bitter Chulkaturin, whose angst is a compliment for the insignificance of Zoditch's own life." - www.allmovie.com

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Hamlet at Elsinore 1964 - English/Danish co-production filmed on location in Denmark

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IMDB Rating: 7,3

Director: Philip Saville
Main Cast: Christopher Plummer, Robert Shaw, Alec Clunes, Michael Caine, June Tobin, Jo Maxwell Muller, Donald Sutherland

"Hamlet at Elsinore is a 1964 television version of Shakespeare's play. Produced by the BBC in association with Danish Radio, it was shown in the U.S. on NET. Broadcast a few days before Shakespeare's 400th birthday, Hamlet at Elsinore was the BBC's major contribution to the quartercentenary celebrations, as well as being a technical milestone. Up to then, television Shakespeare broadcasts were exclusively studio reconstructions or relays of live theatre productions, but this was the first time that a full-length play had been taped on location, in this case at Denmark's Kronborg Castle in Elsinore. This programme was recorded and edited on video tape and not 'filmed'. It is the longest version of the play telecast in one evening up to that time, running nearly three hours. (A 1947 telecast of the play had split it up into two ninety-minute halves over two weeks.)
The Canadian actor Christopher Plummer took the lead role as the Melancholy Dane and earned an Emmy Award nomination for his performance. In supporting roles were Robert Shaw as Claudius, Donald Sutherland as Fortinbras, Roy Kinnear as the Gravedigger and Michael Caine, in his only Shakespearean performance, as Horatio. Sutherland, Caine and Shaw were, at the time, almost completely unknown to American audiences, and just before the presentation's first U.S. telecast, Plummer began to gain popularity in the U.S. because of his appearance in the 1965 musical film The Sound of Music."

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Hedda Gabler 1963 - Ibsen's immortal classic featuring Ingrid Bergman in the title role

Ingrid Bergman and Michael Redgrave in Hedda Gabler (1963)

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IMDB Rating: 7,3

Director: Alex Segal
Main Cast: Ingrid Bergman, Michael Redgrave, Ralph Richardson, Trevor Howard

"In one of the great dramatic roles in all of theater, the always magnificent Ingrid Bergman seethes with frustrated ambition. Hedda Gabler is a woman who, for financial security, has married an earnest and dutiful academic who lacks the passion and imagination that drive Hedda. When Eilert Lovborg (Trevor Howard), a former lover, returns to their city, she discovers that a new woman has rescued him from his alcoholism and given him the strength to write a brilliant book. Consumed with jealousy, Hedda seizes an opportunity to ruin Lovborg's life - and by doing so, places herself in the power of the glib and predatory Judge Brack (Ralph Richardson), who longs to have his way with her.
This 1963 British television version of Henrik Ibsen's Hedda Gabler is skillfully condensed into a taut 75 minutes, fantastically played by the superb cast (which also includes Michael Redgrave). Bergman and Richardson, in particular, draw out every drop of hidden resentment and lust."

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The lover 1963 - Eroticism on early television

Vivien Merchant

Alan Badel

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IMDB Rating: 7,2

Director: Joan Kemp-Welch
Main Cast: Vivien Merchant, Alan Badel, Michael Forrest

"At the time his first play for television, 'A Night Out' was broadcast, Harold Pinter was just beginning to attract attention. By the time of The Lover, Pinter was already well-established as one of the most gifted and versatile writers of his generation, switching freely between stage, television, radio and, shortly, film - his first screenplay, The Servant (directed by Joseph Losey) was released later in 1963.
The Lover is a typically claustrophobic work, in which a suburban middle-class couple, played by Alan Badel and Pinter's then wife Vivien Merchant, become trapped in the sexual role-playing games they use to spice up their otherwise conventional marriage.
From its striking opening, in which two sets of silhouetted fingers tap upon a drum and entwine themselves like a pair of mating tarantulas, the play creates an atmosphere of eroticism unusual for television in 1963."

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The cherry orchard 1962 - A studio version of the Royal Shakespeare Company's production

Dorothy Tutin, John Gielgud and Judi Dench

(in The cherry orchard 1962)

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IMDB Rating: 7,3

Director: Michael Elliott
Main Cast: Peggy Ashcroft, John Gielgud, Dorothy Tutin, Judi Dench

"The production is adapted by John Gielgud and directed by Michael Elliott and Michel Saint-Denis. It also stars Gielgud as the family patriarch, Gaev, and Peggy Ashcroft (Sunday Bloody Sunday) as Madame Ranevsky. A very young Judi Dench plays their head-in-the-clouds daughter, Anya, and in his earliest performance of the set, Ian Holm is Trofimov. This character is not only Anya's love interest, but as an adult student, he is another of Chekhov's thinking environmentalists. His vision of a future where humanity and the natural world will find some harmony is contrasted against the plight of Gaev and Ranevsky.
Having returned from a trip, they are told they must sell their family orchard in order to pay their debts, a situation they face with a stiff upper lip that looks a lot like denial. This subplot lends a nostalgia to the script, as Chekhov is examining the passing of an age. Class distinctions are clearly drawn, with an almost upstairs-downstairs structuring that cuts back and forth between the servant class and the landowners, a line that will be erased as the play goes on."

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Lullaby 1960 - An interesting Don Appell drama on the small screen

Husband and wife: Eli Wallach & Anne Jackson

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IMDB rating: 7,0

Director: Don Richardson
Main Cast: Eli Wallach, Anne Jackson, Ruth White, Tom Carlin

"A 38-year-old truck driver and a weary cigarette girl from a nightclub elope and discover that they know very little about each other. The mama's boy's domineering mother gives them no peace or privacy on their honeymoon and soon the marriage turns into the eternal triangle - with his mother as the 'other woman'. This televised stage play was shown as part of the anthology series called Play of the Week in NTA Film Network Syndication."

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The iceman cometh 1960 - Excellent television production with a stellar cast

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IMDB Rating: 7,6

Director: Sidney Lumet
Main Cast: Jason Robards, Myron McCormick, Tom Pedi, James Broderick, Robert Redford

"Done as part of WNTA's 'Play of the Week' series, Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh was a major television 'event' in its time, getting the seal of approval from The New York Times theater critic Brooks Atkinson, who introduced both halves of the presentation (it was done in two nights, a week apart). Sidney  Lumet got a dream cast here, starting with Jason Robards Jr., who recreates his success as Hickey from the 1950s off-Broadway revival (which is where the play became a success, in the hands of director Jose Quintero). Also present are Myron McCormick as Larry, and such names as James Broderick, Robert Redford, Roland Winters, and Michael Strong. Lumet proves adept at moving his actors and cameras in what is essentially a dramatic ballet. Those who know his film 12 Angry Men will love this production and the opportunity to experience the excitement that attended the broadcast. This is also a wonderful showcase not only for Robards, whose portrayal of Hickey was one of the highlights of his career, but also for Myron McCormick, a much-loved stage actor whose film work (including No Time for Sergeants) was only a shadow of his true dramatic range, his talent captured here about as well as it ever was." - www.allmovie.com

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Brand 1959 - The BBC Television adaptation for World Theatre

Patrick McGoohan (playing Brand)

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IMDB Rating: 8,2

Director: Michael Elliott
Main Cast: Patrick McGoohan, Dylis Hamlett, James Maxwell, Patrick Wymark, Peter Sallis

"Henrik Ibsen’s Brand (1866) is rare amongst television adaptations of stage plays in that it was a drama never originally intended for theatrical production, but as an epic verse drama set out in dialogue as a script to be read. The play contains a scene of a storm at sea and concludes with an avalanche, both seemingly beyond the limitations of nineteenth century staging, and if performed uncut (as on its first staging in Stockholm in 1885). Patrick McGoohan stars in this adaptation ot the Henrik Ibsen play in which an uncompromising and ultimately tortured priest forces those around him to accept the only true path to God, including the residents of the village in which he was born. Through his fanatic beliefs he manages to cause the death of his wife, lose his son and eventually get exiled and stoned by the villagers."

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The lark 1957 - A live televised version of Jean Anouihl's play

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IMDB rating: 6,9

Director: George Schaefer

Main Cast: Julie Harris, Boris Karloff, Eli Wallach, Basil Rathbone, Denholm Elliott, Jack Warden

"Starring Boris Karloff, Bruce Gordon, Michael Higgins and Julie Harris reprising their roles from the Broadway play that ran 229 performances in New York beginning in late 1955! Karloff was nominated for the 1956 Tony Award for Best Actor in a Drama for 'The Lark' so now you can watch this rarely-seen and obscure film about the story of Joan of Arc, and the people who convincted and sentenced her to death."

Download links:

https://archive.org/download/HallmarkHallOfFameTheLark/TheHallmarkHallOfFame-theLark.avi