Oct 17, 2019
Armchair Theatre: Dead Silence (ABC, 1966)
"You don't seriously expect me to make a contribution?"
"Look, after thirty years in the force he deserves something besides a pension."
"And he'll get it, too - my undying gratitude for resigning."
#Armchair Theatre#dead silence#1966#Single play#classic tv#patrick allen#Glynn Edwards#ronald lacey#Anne Blake#Jeremy longhurst#John bryans#Joanne dainton#Michael gaunt#Hamilton Dyce#Donald layne Smith#Monte Doyle#Leonard White#John Llewelyn moxey#I like all eras of armchair Theatre but I must say I have a special soft spot for the middle years under Leonard White's tenure as producer#This is when the anthology became less self consciously stagey and theatrical and began to emulate cinema as much as the theatre but#Without compromising the scripts. This is a perfect example: the first seven or eight minutes would be impossible to recreate live onstage#As a peeping Tom follows a woman's progress home from various vantage points and the camera follows him through doors up ladders and onto#A roof. This whole section is probably the best in the play: dialogue free and full of tension and menace. Strong lights and dark shadows#And the only sound a persistent disturbing drumbeat. It's pure visual art and could only work onscreen not in a theatre. The rest of the#Episode is still quite a strong whodunit although I guessed the twist almost immediately and the final scene is incredibly frustrating (why#Would the Detective throw away his career to protect his friend from a horrible truth only to then tell him at the very end purely for the#Purpose of exposition. Bad bad. Very annoying). Old square jaw himself pat Allen gives a terrific performance as the morally grey policeman#Whose methods seem to be slipping into the unacceptable as he approaches retirement. That lone drum score is highly effective too#A very strong episode but marred by that bad lapse of scripting at the very end. Oh and sadly it's in black and white so we don't get the#Full effect of Ron Lacey's outfit pictured above
