The late seventies and early eighties were the heyday of the TV ‘mini series’. What is a mini series I hear you asking? Well, they were short TV series with only a few episodes. You rarely hear the name ‘mini series’ these days but they are still about. I mentioned some time ago about the series ‘Until I Kill You’ about a girl, Delia Dahmer, who unwittingly invited her lover to move in with her, not knowing that he was actually a serial killer. I started off this post as usual writing from memory, firmly convinced that the mini series was an eighties phenomenon. So, imagine my surprise to find that the first series on my list was broadcast back in 1974. OK, hasty change of this week’s blog post title from Mini series of the Eighties to Seventies and Eighties and here we go.
QB VII
Image via listal.com
QB VII was one of those huge television mini series that really felt like a major event when it was broadcast. It was based on Leon Uris’s bestselling novel and came out in 1974, with Ben Gazzara and a young Anthony Hopkins in the starring roles. The story kicks off with a libel case brought by a very respected Polish-born doctor who insists he’s been wrongly accused of being a Nazi collaborator. Anthony Hopkins plays the doctor and Ben Gazzara plays author Abraham Cady who feels it’s time to write about the holocaust. Adam Kelno, the doctor played by Hopkins, is only mentioned in a short segment of Cady’s book but as he has already been cleared of any war crimes by an earlier court, he feels free to sue the author.
The story starts in the courtroom, in Queen’s Bench VII but as things go on, the story keeps slipping back into flashbacks of the Second World War and that’s where the real core of the story is to be found. Anthony Hopkins, still fairly early in his career at that point, is especially good, as is Ben Gazzara.
Ben Gazzara was a graduate of the Actors’ Studio, the New York acting school that taught ‘the method’ to actors like Brando, Dean and Montgomery Clift, although at the time I only knew him from the TV series Run For Your Life about a terminally ill man trying to get the best out of the last years of his life.
Anthony Hopkins went on to star in many classic films and is perhaps most well known for his portrayal of Hannibal Lector in Silence of the Lambs.
QB VII had a big, serious, slightly grand feel that so many 1970s TV series lacked, like here was a really important story to tell. It was the kind of show you’d settle in to watch properly, knowing you were in for some real epic TV and out of all the mini series here, I think this was my favourite.
Rich Man, Poor Man
Based on Irwin Shaw’s bestselling novel, it followed the very different fortunes of the Jordache brothers, Rudy and Tom, played by Peter Strauss and Nick Nolte. Set against the backdrop of post-war America, it had a bit of everything: ambition, money, family feuds, romance, betrayal and more than its fair share of trouble. Rudy becomes a wealthy, ambitious businessman and politician, while Tom is a rebellious, tough-minded drifter who pursues a career in boxing. Their rivalry, romances, family troubles and contrasting fortunes unfold over several decades, making it as much a story about family as it is about wealth, ambition and class.
Nick Nolte played Tom; rough around the edges, unpredictable and forever getting himself into scrapes while Peter Strauss’s Rudy took a rather more respectable route to success. What made the series so addictive was that it wasn’t simply about getting rich; it was about two brothers taking completely different paths through life and discovering, rather painfully, that money doesn’t necessarily buy happiness. It was classic 1970s television at its most gloriously melodramatic and millions of viewers were hooked. Fifty years later, I can still remember the sad ending which I won’t give away here.
The series was broadcast in nine parts in 1976.
Captains and the Kings
Captains and the Kings is another wonderfully grand example of the television mini series at its most ambitious. Based on Taylor Caldwell’s novel, this 1976 series follows the fortunes of the Armagh family, Irish immigrants who arrive in America with very little and gradually build a huge fortune and political influence. Perry King, Richard Jordan and Jane Seymour were among the impressive cast and the story has all the ingredients you could want from a sprawling family saga; poverty, ambition, romance, betrayal, politics and plenty of money. Like Rich Man, Poor Man, it’s really a story about the American dream, although here the journey from humble beginnings to wealth and power comes with a darker side.
I’m tempted to think the story was based on the Kennedy family or at least inspired by them. The parallels are pretty striking. The Armaghs are Irish immigrants who arrive in America with very little, build a huge fortune and then use their wealth to enter politics. The family eventually produces a charismatic young politician with presidential ambitions. That certainly sounds familiar. There are also elements involving political influence, wealth, family loyalty and the pursuit of the White House that inevitably bring the Kennedys to mind.
However, Caldwell’s story is much darker and more conspiratorial than the Kennedy saga.
I remember reading the book which was a very enjoyable read. The book opens with an introduction telling us about a meeting of very important people who get together to decide the political direction the USA is about to take. The members of the group are not politicians but a group of very rich men and the author mentioned they were a real group of people and they clearly inspired the story the author is about to tell.
Richard Jordan plays Rory Armagh, the ambitious Irish immigrant who claws his way from poverty to wealth and political power. The performance won him a Golden Globe and made him a familiar face to TV audiences.
He appeared in many films including Raise the Titanic and the sci-fi classic Logan’s Run. His career was cut short when he developed a brain tumour and he died aged only 39 in 1993.
Kane and Abel
Kane and Abel was another of those sprawling television dramas that seemed to arrive with the promise of several evenings of proper escapism. Based on Jeffrey Archer’s bestselling novel, this 1985 mini series starred Peter Strauss and Sam Neill as two men born on opposite sides of the world and into completely different circumstances, whose lives become increasingly intertwined through ambition, wealth and rivalry. Strauss plays William Kane, the privileged American banker, while Neill is Abel Rosnovski, a Polish immigrant who rises from poverty to build his own business empire. The two were born on the same day and their lives take dramatically different paths but an early encounter sets them on a lifelong collision course. As both men build powerful business empires, their rivalry becomes increasingly bitter, driven by ambition, pride, revenge and a determination to outdo the other.
It’s big, glossy and unabashedly melodramatic story, with fortunes made and lost, family feuds, business battles and enough twists and turns to keep you coming back for the next episode.
There is something wonderfully nostalgic about these old mini series; they knew how to tell a big story and more importantly, how to make you wait until the following week to find out what happened next. In today’s digital age, viewers would probably binge watch the whole series in one go.
Those are my four US mini series. There are probably more but they were the ones which have remained firmly stuck in my memory. All were adaptations of successful novels and perhaps their secret is that they were too long to be made into a film but not long enough for further seasons.
Which one is ripe for a re run on one of today’s many digital TV channels I wonder?
Letters from an Unknown Author! 