The Big Day (film)
| "The Big Day" | |
|---|---|
| Shell Presents episode | |
| Episode no. | Season 1 Episode 5 |
| Directed by | Rod Kinnear |
| Teleplay by | John Ford |
| Original air date | 11 July 1959 (Melbourne, live) 25 July 1959 (Sydney, taped) |
| Running time | 60 mins |
The Big Day is an Australian television film, or rather a live television play, which aired in 1959. The fifth episode of the Shell Presents presentations of standalone television dramas, it originally aired 11 July 1959 on Melbourne station GTV-9, a video-tape was made of the broadcast and shown on Sydney station ATN-7 on 25 July 1959 (this was prior to the formation of the Nine Network and Seven Network).
Shell Presents was a monthly series presenting locally produced television dramas and comedies. Most of these were adaptations of overseas dramas such as Johnny Belinda and One Bright Day, but a few were locally-written.
Archival status of the program is unknown.
The last day at work of Hector Skeats, a costing clerk in a city office, who is rewiting after many years. He is a father of two, a girl in her early twenties and a boy in his late teens. When his retirement is officially recognised by his boss, his son is arrested.
The play was written by John Ford, a Sydney journalist.
It was the second original Australian episode of Shell Presents, following They Were Big, They Were Blue, They Were Beautiful. That play had come third in a Shell-sponsored competition for new Australian TV plays. Ford wrote The Big Day for this competition but was unable to submit it in time. However it was picked up for production. His writing style was compared with Paddy Chayefsky but Ford said, "I wasn't conscious of writing in any particular style when I started the play. All I have tried to do is portray a day in the life of an extremely ordinary little bloke, the kind of person who lives a dull existence from one week to the next."
The TV critic for the Woman's Weekly called it "beautifully done, well acted and produced... an hour of very real and moving entertainment. All the Australians in it were just ordinary people, not the usual well-known theatrical Australian types but the kind of people you'd find any- where in the world."
The critic for the Sydney Morning Herald thought the play demonstrated "television 's ability to make dramatic entertainment of undramatic people and events... except for about 45 seconds of gross overstatement in the middle of the play, and a sentimental twist at the end which weakens its main argument" the main conflict was "cleverly conducted and neatly contrived". He thought Kinnear's "direction was generally efficient, and, in one or two scenes and the opening documentary titles, more imaginative than in some previous unlively live productions."
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