To Serve Them All My Days | |
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Genre | Drama |
Based on | To Serve Them All My Days by R. F. Delderfield |
Written by | Andrew Davies |
Directed by |
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Starring | |
Country of origin | United Kingdom |
Original language | English |
No. of episodes | 13 |
Production | |
Producer | Ken Riddington |
Running time | 50 minutes |
Production companies | |
Original release | |
Network | BBC One |
Release | 17 October 1980 – 16 January 1981 |
To Serve Them All My Days is a British television drama series, adapted by Andrew Davies from R. F. Delderfield's 1972 novel To Serve Them All My Days . It was first broadcast by the BBC over 13 episodes in 1980 and 1981. It was broadcast in Australia in 1981 by the Australian Broadcasting Commission, and in 1982 by PBS in the United States as part of their Masterpiece Theatre anthology series.
David Powlett-Jones, a coal miner's son from South Wales, has risen from the ranks and been commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the First World War. In 1918, after being injured and shell-shocked, he is hired to teach modern history at Bamfylde School, a fictional public school in North Devon, in the southwest of England, where he wins the respect and acclaim of colleagues and pupils. He serves under headmaster Algy Herries, forms a friendship with Ian Howarth and marries Beth. He engages in a long bitter rivalry with the jingoistic science master Carter but the two of them later become friends. Powlett-Jones is eventually appointed headmaster.
The series was filmed over 11 months in 1980, [1] with Devon and Dorset locations [1] including Milton Abbey School in Dorset. [2] Besides the exterior filming, indoor scenes were filmed on a soundstage. [3]
Writing for The New York Times , John J. O'Connor described the production as "a richly textured tapestry crammed with the social details that were the speciality of Mr. Delderfield", [4] with "a steady flow of insightful and touching moments". [2] He praised the performances of the cast and that of Duttine in particular. [2] [4] People magazine called the series a "colorful chronicle of post-World War I England that never crosses over to the gooey side of sentiment." [5] In a review for the DVD release in 2011, PopMatters was less enthusiastic, calling Delderfield's material "inconsequential" and writing: "The action veers sluggishly from the mildly diverting to the excruciatingly dull." The review summarised the series as "basically a dated, dull, tiresome, tedious old drama by an author whose reputation is far from robust." [3]
The adaptation was nominated in the Best Drama Series category at the 1981 British Academy Television Awards and in the Outstanding Limited Series category at the 1983 Primetime Emmy Awards. [6]
All episodes of To Serve Them All My Days have been made available on DVD in the UK, Australia and the US.
Milton Abbey school is an independent school for day and boarding pupils in the village of Milton Abbas, near Blandford Forum in Dorset, in South West England. It has 224 pupils as of September 2023, in five houses: Athelstan, Damer, Hambro, Hodgkinson and Tregonwell. The school was founded in 1954 and is co-educational.
Ronald Frederick Delderfield was an English novelist and dramatist, some of whose works have been adapted for television and film.
Andrew Wynford Davies is a Welsh screenwriter and novelist, best known for his television adaptations of To Serve Them All My Days, House of Cards, Middlemarch, Pride and Prejudice, Bleak House, War & Peace, and his original serial A Very Peculiar Practice. He was made a BAFTA Fellow in 2002.
John Carroll O'Connor was an American actor whose television career spanned over four decades. O'Connor found widespread fame as Archie Bunker, the main character in the CBS television sitcoms All in the Family (1971–1979) and its continuation, Archie Bunker's Place (1979–1983). O'Connor later starred in the NBC/CBS television crime drama In the Heat of the Night (1988–1995), where he played the role of police chief William "Bill" Gillespie. In the late 1990s, he played Gus Stemple, the father of Jamie Buchman on Mad About You. In 1996, O'Connor was ranked number 38 on TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Stars of All Time. He won five Emmys and one Golden Globe Award.
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Margaret JoBeth Williams is an American actress. She rose to prominence appearing in such films as Kramer vs. Kramer (1979), Stir Crazy (1980), Poltergeist (1982), The Big Chill (1983), The Day After (1983), Teachers (1984), and Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986). A three-time Emmy Award nominee, she was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Miniseries or a Movie for her work in the TV movie Adam (1983) and the TV miniseries Baby M (1988). Her third nomination was for her guest role in the sitcom Frasier (1994). She also starred in the TV series The Client (1995–96) and had recurring roles in the TV series Dexter (2007) and Private Practice (2009–11).
Grant Aleksander Kunkowski, better known as Grant Aleksander, is an American actor.
The 12th Daytime Emmy Awards were held on Thursday, August 1, 1985, on CBS to commemorate excellence in daytime programming from March 6, 1984, to March 5, 1985. Two new categories were added: Outstanding Young Man in a Daytime Drama Series and Outstanding Ingenue in a Daytime Drama Series. Of the 13 categories available that year, the broadcast showed the presentation of awards in seven categories.
The 31st Daytime Emmy Awards, commemorating excellence in American daytime programming from 2003, was held on May 21, 2004 at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, Vanessa Marcil hosted. Creative Arts Emmy Awards were presented on May 15, 2004. As of 2013, it is the last Daytime Emmy Awards ceremony to have aired on NBC. The nominees were announced on May 4, 2004.
West Buckland School is a private co-educational day and boarding school in West Buckland, Devon in the English public school tradition. It comprises a senior school, preparatory school, and a nursery. It is a relatively high performing school in Devon. It was one of eight schools shortlisted for 'Boarding School of the Year' in the TES Independent School Awards 2019, a category won by Cottesmore School.
The 26th Daytime Emmy Awards were held in 1999 to commemorate excellence in daytime television programming from the previous year (1998). The main ceremonies were held May 21, 1999, at The Theater in Madison Square Garden in New York City and were televised live by CBS. Memorable moments that occurred at the ceremonies included the ABC soap opera General Hospital winning a record number of Daytime Emmys with a total of eight, and Susan Lucci's first-ever win in the Outstanding Lead Actress category after losing a total of 18 times. Winners in each category are in bold.
Prideaux Place is a grade I listed Elizabethan country house in the parish of Padstow, Cornwall, England. It has been the home of the Prideaux family for over 400 years. The house was built in 1592 by Sir Nicholas Prideaux (1550–1627), a distinguished lawyer, and was enlarged and modified by successive generations, most notably by his great-great-grandson Edmund Prideaux (1693–1745) and by the latter's grandson Rev. Charles Prideaux-Brune (1760–1833). The present building, containing 81 rooms, combines the traditional E-shape of Elizabethan architecture with the 18th-century exuberance of Horace Walpole’s Strawberry Hill Gothic.
Francis George Middlemass was an English actor, who even in his early career played older roles. He is best remembered for his television roles as Rocky Hardcastle in As Time Goes By, Algy Herries in To Serve Them All My Days and Dr. Alex Ferrenby in 20 episodes of Heartbeat. Middlemass was also active in the Royal Shakespeare Company and was the fourth and final actor to play Dan Archer in The Archers.
To Serve Them All My Days is a novel by British author R. F. Delderfield.
Patricia Lawrence was a British actress.
John Arthur Duttine is an English actor noted for his roles on stage, films and television. He is well known for his role as Sgt George Miller in Heartbeat and also Bill Masen in the TV series The Day of the Triffids.
Tom Brown's Schooldays is a 1971 television serial adaptation of the 1857 Thomas Hughes novel Tom Brown's Schooldays. Consisting of five one hour long episodes, the series was directed by Gareth Davies and used a screenplay by Anthony Steven.
A Horseman Riding By is a sequence of 3 novels by R. F. Delderfield written between 1966 and 1968. It starts in 1902 at the tail end of the Boer War and is continued in the sequels to end in 1965. The first book is set in Devon in the early 20th century. It was to some extent an elegy for the traditional society which was blown apart by the First World War.
Staverton railway station is situated on the South Devon Railway, a heritage railway in Devon, England. It serves the village of Staverton.
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