Profile

I teach Film Studies and British literature at the University of Missouri, and I’ve been a fan of MASTERPIECE ever since I was nine. In fact, I still remember sitting down with my mother to watch The Six Wives of Henry VIII when it aired during the brutally cold months of January and February 1972.  Drinking Ovaltine, we followed Henry week to week, wife to wife, and I remember wondering if a displeased wife had ever chopped off the head of her husband.  During graduate school, my friends and I got together every Sunday night for “Masterpiece” parties, where we drank lots of red wine and mooned over actors like Jeremy Irons. I still watch the show every Sunday night, sometimes with my mom (now 81), more often with friends, my own graduate students, and my nine-year-old son, who leaves the room whenever there’s a love scene.

It was out of this deeply personal connection that I decided to write a book on the show. Entitled England on Sundays: A Cultural History of Masterpiece Theatre, my book begins with the show’s founding in 1971 and goes up to the present. I set this history within the larger context of television’s evolution over the last forty years, looking at how Masterpiece Theatre has reflected—and helped shape—some of television’s most important trends and turning points. In the 1970s, for example, viewers watched series like Love for Lydia and I,Claudius, mainly because of the quality of the scripts and performances (Derek Jacobi playing Claudius still takes one’s breath away) rather than the cinematography; the technological limitations of television, especially public television, kept the camera indoors and immobile. It felt like theatre; indeed, the individual series were called “plays.” During the 1980s and 90s, as support for public television increased and TV cameras improved, the programs featured on Masterpiece Theatre went outdoors, showcasing some of the National Trust’s most impressive properties and landscapes. The series began to feel like films rather than plays.

Now, MASTERPIECE (note that the stodgier second half of the show’s name has been dropped) is a very different animal from what it once was. Formatted into three distinct categories—Classic, Mystery, and Contemporary—the program now features much hipper, sexier, and edgier series. The camera tends to move a lot faster, and the characters—even the ones wearing bonnets and britches—seem more modern, more like us.  Relative to those produced in the 1980s and early 90s, these adaptations make period detail much less of a fetish.  Rather, their interest is in presenting classic novels as what Erin Delaney, senior post-production editor at MASTERPIECE, calls “stories of the human heart.”

The book includes chapters on Alistair Cooke, the baronial host of the show for 22 years; Andrew Davies, the award-winning scriptwriter whose adaptation of Pride and Prejudice turned Colin Firth into England’s number #1 pin-up; the repertory of British actors most closely identified with the series; and the old Upstairs, Downstairs which was truly a cultural phenomenon.

Over the years, Masterpiece Theatre has been criticized for its middle-class conservativism and snob appeal. No doubt, there’s some truth in this. But in making so much of these issues, critics have ignored all the varied and particular pleasures the show has afforded viewers over the years. While my book certainly doesn’t shy away from these criticisms, it strives to give Masterpiece Theatre the credit it deserves.  It will also put the spotlight on viewers’ responses to the show. To this end, I hope to use this blog not only to include my commentary on the series but yours as well. So please write comments; I’ll respond to each individually and try to include as many as I can in the book itself. In the meantime, happy viewing!

— Nancy