An early television broadcast of a stage play set during the final year of the Second World War.
Set in 1944 within the confines of a small Italian villa, this play captures a moment of crisis during the war in Europe. The setting is deliberately universal, intended to represent any number of occupied homes, from a French chateau to a Dutch farmhouse. The drama unfolds entirely within this single room, focusing on the inhabitants as they confront the realities of the conflict that has engulfed their lives.
Broadcast just months after the BBC Television Service resumed operations, All This Is Ended is a representative example of early post-war drama. The production was a direct transfer of a stage play from David Lambert’s Torch Theatre, a common practice when the new medium relied heavily on theatrical sources for material. Its single-room setting was a necessity dictated by the technical limitations of live studio production at Alexandra Palace. The play itself, set in 1944 but broadcast in 1946, offered audiences a timely and sombre reflection on the human cost of the recently concluded war, using a generic occupied location to give its story a universal resonance.
Broadcast: BBC, 2 Performances, 28 and 29 November 1946
From the Torch Theatre production by: David Lambert
Arranged and Produced for television by: Jan Bussell
Main Cast: Robert Webber (Private ‘Chalky’ White), Hector Ross (Corporal ‘Benny’ Marks), Arthur Lovegrove (Private ‘Lucky’ Jones), David Stringer (Private ‘Lenny’ Nichols), Kendrick Huxham (William), Brian Haines (Captain Pringle), Alan Goford (Lester Ratcliffe), Kent Walton (Pfc. Mike O’Brien), Michael Ashwin (Major Owen), Geoffrey Gomer (The Padre), George Parker (The German).
