Winter's Promise
By CLIFFORD HANLEY
Now that the evenings are darkening, it's safe for the small screen to exploit its capacity for claustrophobia. I can't remem- ber anything more satisfactorily crushing to the spirit than the BBC's bold assault on Strind- berg last weekend. My cur- talcs were draWn, my feet were near the fire and my hair was standing straight out from the nape. The Father had me superbly trapped.
Unlike Strindberg, I quite like women, and the measure of this production was that the old boy had me muttering, Yes, yes, quite right, they're blood-drinking monsters, that's bang on the tar- get, for God's sake let me out of here.
The production in fact used plenty of space in that great rambling house, but the sensation of being closed in was quite palpable. It's also a long time since we've seen any performances more entirely mature than Robert Shaw's and Daphne Slater's as prey .and predator. Formid- able is the word.
There was a touch of claustrophobia too in the ATV Sunday evening piece, A Question of Pride, this time in the time-trap of adolescence' It was all about an American kid whose father tended to lose jobs, and who desperately needed a blue serge suit for graduation, and for a moment it looked as if it might turn out mawkish and disastrous; but the boy, played by Clive EndersbY, never surrendered to self-pity. So A Question of Pride was a sweet success. The dark evenings also promise the annual surge of jolly light entertainment, in which I include the whole range between Maigret and Harper's West One. I feel slightly apprehensive about Man of the World (ITV), yet another adventure series concerning a rugged photo- grapher chap, and melancholy about the return of Dr. Kildare, but I have great hopes for Bruce Forsyth, who starts his own show on SaturdaY. This performer has the stuff, if he gets the material. We'll also have the Black and White Minstrels, which will doubtless be almost monotonously good. In general. the cool dark evenings look like being good fun. Among current light shows, a sad aimlessness has afflicted Sidney James. Both James and hi.s partner Tafler have plenty to give, but their isn't easy. seem to have lost heart entirely. I knout easy. The old movies will always be with us' of course. I'm not complaining about this. For far- flung viewers, television performs the function of a high-class film museum. You can ahvaY skip the ones you've seen eight times, like P: trait of Jenny. In the past fortnight, I've had a_ orgy of nostalgia watching the young Errol FlY" and Joan Biondell in The Perfect Specime and n; the youngish Edward G. Robinson; and Wrllrate Powell, Given time, television will re create every tender memory of my filrn-g°.ft. pg young, I'll feel young too. I should gripe? child- hood, and when I see Charles Bickford looking
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