Pennies From Heaven (1978 television drama)
| Pennies from Heaven | |
|---|---|
| Genre |
Dramatic programming Musical |
| Written by | Dennis Potter |
| Directed by | Piers Haggard |
| Starring |
Bob Hoskins Cheryl Campbell Gemma Craven |
| Country of origin | England |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of series | 1 |
| No. of episodes | 6 |
| Production | |
| Producer(s) | Kenith Trodd |
| Cinematography | Ken Westbury (film inserts) |
| Editor(s) | Howard Dell (video tape) David Martin (film inserts) |
| Production company(s) | BBC Television |
| Release | |
| Original network | BBC 1 |
Pennies From Heaven is a 1978 BBC musical drama serial written by Dennis Potter. The title is taken from the song "Pennies from Heaven" written by Johnny Burke and Arthur Johnston. It was one of several Potter serials (another being The Singing Detective) to mix the reality of the drama with a dark fantasy content, and the earliest of his works where the characters burst into extended performances of popular songs.
In the mid-1930s, Arthur and Joan Parker (Bob Hoskins and Gemma Craven) are an incompatible married couple living in the London suburbs. Arthur, a travelling sheet music salesman, is a passionate man who is frustrated by his wife's repressed nature. On a car journey to the Gloucester area he picks up 'the accordion man', a vagrant (Kenneth Colley) who invariably busks on the instrument in the vicinity of the other characters, but the signs of the man's mental illness soon lead Arthur to reject him after they spend several hours together. While trying to persuade a shopkeeper (Arnold Peters) to take some of his goods, Arthur notices a female customer with whom he immediately becomes besotted. Arthur and 'the accordion man' both manage to frighten the young woman. Before returning to London, Arthur has sex with Marjorie, a Gloucestershire prostitute (Rosemary Martin) in the back of his car.
Arthur's bank manager (Peter Cellier) refuses to give him a loan. Eileen Everson (Cheryl Campbell), the woman he encountered, is a junior school teacher in the Forest of Dean who lives with her widowed coal mining father and two brothers, also miners. Meanwhile, Arthur has returned to the area to trace the woman he is obsessed with. He finally encounters Eileen in a wood near the Eversons' cottage, and returns to their home where Arthur claims his wife has died in a motorcycle accident. He and Eileen eventually make love after the rest of the household have gone to bed.
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