Man at the Top | |
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Directed by | Mike Vardy |
Written by | John Junkin Hugh Whitemore |
Produced by | Peter Charlesworth Jock Jacobsen |
Starring | Kenneth Haigh Nanette Newman Harry Andrews |
Cinematography | Brian Probyn |
Edited by | Chris Barnes |
Music by | Roy Budd |
Production companies | Hammer Films Dufton Films |
Distributed by | Anglo-EMI |
Release date |
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Running time | 92 minutes |
Country | United Kingdom |
Language | English |
Man at the Top is a 1973 British drama film directed by Mike Vardy and starring Kenneth Haigh, spun off from the television series Man at the Top , which itself was inspired by the 1959 film Room at the Top and its 1965 sequel Life at the Top .
Joe Lampton is promoted to managing director of a pharmaceutical company, and becomes involved with Lord Ackerman, the powerful chairman, who is also his father-in-law. But Joe makes a shocking discovery: his predecessor committed suicide because of his involvement in a drug that left 1,000 African women sterile. Joe threatens to reveal all to the press, while Lord Ackerman seeks to persuade him otherwise, by offering him promotion to Chief Executive. [1]
It was one of several big screen adaptations of television shows at the time, although most were based on sitcoms and Man at the Top was a drama. [2]
Shooting took place from 3 March to 7 April 1973.
The film was not a success at the box office. [3]
Monthly Film Bulletin said it was "too much like an episode of a TV series stretched to feature length". [4]
"Network on Air" noted the film as, "offering a grittier treatment than the 1959 film adaptation and the subsequent television series". [5]
Allmovie noted, " Nanette Newman, a busy doe-eyed ingenue of the 1960s, is quietly effective as the middle-aged Mrs. Lampton." [6]
Room at the Top is a 1959 British drama film based on the 1957 novel by John Braine. It was adapted by Neil Paterson, directed by Jack Clayton, and produced by John and James Woolf. The film stars Laurence Harvey, Simone Signoret, Heather Sears, Donald Wolfit, Donald Houston, and Hermione Baddeley.
Laurence Harvey was a Lithuanian-born actor. He was born to Lithuanian Jewish parents and emigrated to South Africa at an early age, before later settling in the United Kingdom after World War II. In a career that spanned a quarter of a century, Harvey appeared in stage, film and television productions primarily in the United Kingdom and the United States.
Henry Stewart Fleetwood Andrews, CBE was an English actor often known for his film portrayals of tough military officers. His performance as Regimental Sergeant Major Wilson in The Hill (1965) earned Andrews the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actor and a nomination for the 1966 BAFTA Award for Best British Actor. The first of his more than 80 film appearances was in The Red Beret in 1953.
The Wednesday Play is an anthology series of British television plays which ran on BBC1 for six seasons from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually original works written for television, although dramatic adaptations of fiction also featured. The series gained a reputation for presenting contemporary social dramas, and for bringing issues to the attention of a mass audience that would not otherwise have been discussed on screen.
Armchair Theatre is a British television drama anthology series of single plays that ran on the ITV network from 1956 to 1974. It was originally produced by ABC Weekend TV. Its successor Thames Television took over from mid-1968.
Richard Evelyn Vernon was a British actor. He appeared in many feature films and television programmes, often in aristocratic or supercilious roles. Prematurely balding and greying, Vernon settled into playing archetypal middle-aged lords and military types while still in his 30s. He is perhaps best known for originating the role of Slartibartfast in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Other notable roles included the lead role of Edwin Oldenshaw in The Man in Room 17 (1965–67), Sir James Greenley alias "C" in The Sandbaggers (1978–80), and Sir Desmond Glazebrook in Yes Minister (1980–81) and its sequel series Yes, Prime Minister (1987).
Terence Joseph Alexander was an English film and television actor, best known for his role as Charlie Hungerford in the British TV drama Bergerac, which ran for nine series on BBC1 between 1981 and 1991.
John Harvey was an English actor. He appeared in 52 films, two television films and made 70 television guest appearances between 1948 and 1979.
Nanette Newman is an English actress and author. She appeared in nine films directed by her husband Bryan Forbes, including Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964), The Whisperers (1967), Deadfall (1968), The Stepford Wives (1975) and International Velvet (1978), for which she won the Evening Standard Film Award for Best Actress. She was also nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for another Forbes-directed film, The Raging Moon (1971).
Heather Christine Sears was a British stage and screen actress.
Kenneth William Michael Haigh was an English actor. He first came to public recognition for playing the role of Jimmy Porter in the play Look Back in Anger in 1956 opposite Mary Ure in London's West End theatre. Haigh's performance in the role on stage was critically acclaimed as a prototype dramatic working-class anti-hero in post-Second World War English drama.
Life at the Top is a 1965 British drama film, a production of Romulus Films released by Columbia Pictures. The screenplay was by Mordecai Richler, based on the 1962 novel Life at the Top by John Braine, and is a sequel to the film Room at the Top (1959). It was directed by Ted Kotcheff and produced by James Woolf, with William Kirby as associate producer. The music score was by Richard Addinsell and the cinematography by Oswald Morris. The film's art director, Edward Marshall, received a 1966 BAFTA Award nomination.
Robert Frank Simon was an American character actor.
Twice Round the Daffodils is a 1962 British comedy film directed by Gerald Thomas and starring Juliet Mills, Donald Sinden, Donald Houston, Kenneth Williams, Ronald Lewis, Andrew Ray, Joan Sims and Jill Ireland. The film was adapted from the play Ring for Catty by Patrick Cargill and Jack Beale. Carry On Nurse (1959) was based on the same play.
Man at the Top was a British drama television series that originally aired on ITV, lasting for 23 episodes between 1970 and 1972. The series depicted the character of Joe Lampton, the protagonist of John Braine's novels Room at the Top (1957) and Life at the Top (1962), and of the films based on those novels. In 1973, a spin-off film from the series, Man at the Top, was released.
Companions in Crime is a 1954 British crime film directed by John Krish and starring Clifford Evans, George Woodbridge and Kenneth Haigh. It was written by Kenneth Hayles, Patricia Lathan and Lester Powell, as a spin-off from the television series Stryker of the Yard, and features two cases originally transmitted as separate episodes: "The Case of the Two Brothers" and "The Case of the Black Falcon".
Barnaby Rudge is a British drama television series which originally aired on the BBC in thirteen episodes between 30 September and 23 December 1960. It was an adaptation of the 1841 novel Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens set against the backdrop of the 1780 Gordon Riots. The series survived the BBC's purge of the archives and was released on DVD in the USA around 2010, and later in the UK in 2017 by Simply Media. As well as being the only BBC adaptation, it remains the latest on-screen adaptation of the novel on film or television to date.
My Teenage Daughter is a 1956 British drama film directed by Herbert Wilcox and starring Anna Neagle, Sylvia Syms and Norman Wooland. The screenplay concerns a mother who tries to deal with her teenage daughter's descent into delinquency. It was intended as a British response to Rebel Without a Cause (1955). It was the last commercially successful film made by Wilcox.
The Love Ban is a 1973 British comedy film directed by Ralph Thomas and starring Hywel Bennett, Nanette Newman and Milo O'Shea. It was written by Kevin Laffan based on his 1969 play It's a 2'6" Above the Ground World. Laffan was one of 14 children from a devout Roman Catholic family and his critical view on the Church's stance on birth control was a recurring theme of his work.
Vengeance Is Mine is a 1949 British second feature crime drama film directed by Alan Cullimore and starring Valentine Dyall, Anne Firth and Richard Goolden.