Celebrated play by Rattigan

Press, 12 September 1987, Page 23

Celebrated play by Rattigan

lan Holm and Judl Dench star in the Play of the Week tomorrow (Sunday), “The Browning Version” (8.30 p.m. on One). A production of Terence Rattigan’s celebrated stage play, it tells the story of a downtrodden schoolmaster who, after years of professional and personal disappointment decides the time has come to assert himself.

For 18 years Andrew Crocker Harris (lan Holm) has been the classics master at a minor public school. A brilliant classical scholar of great promise in his youth, he is now in his fifties and facing early retirement as the result of a heart condition.

A man of quiet and serious disposition, he is popular neither with his pupils nor his colleagues. The headmaster, an ambitious, scheming man, is not sorry to see him go, and has not even afforded him a reduced pension. Furthermore, the headmaster has denied him the right to speak last at the end-of-term leaving ceremony, and his passing looks certain to go almost completely unnoticed. Crocker Harris’s personal life is equally unsatisfactory. His wife, Millie (Judi Dench), despises

him for his lack of success and fulfilment, and has become embittered and frustrated.

lan Holm and Judi Dench number among Britain’s most accomplished actors with many leading roles to their credit

“The Browning Version” is not the only production in which they have appeared together as man and wife; they took the title roles in the 8.8. C. adaptation of Noel Coward’s celebrated period drama, “Mr and Mrs Edgehill,” and appeared as husband and wife in the feature film, “Wetherby,” written and directed by David Hare.