Arena — Season 1, Episode 480: Theatre without Actors
Documentary • 90 min • 3 seasons, 689 episodes • ★ 7.2/10
Episode synopsis
In 1960 an American film called Primary changed the notion of what a documentary could be, using techniques never before seen on TV. It was made by Robert Drew , whose role in the movement that has become known as cinéma vérité has gone largely unrecognised. Tonight's programme tells his story.
About Arena
Arena is a British television documentary series, made and broadcast by the BBC. Voted by leading TV executives in Broadcast as one of the top 50 most influential programmes of all time, it has run since 1 October 1975 with over five hundred episodes made, directed by the likes of Martin Scorsese, Alan Yentob, Roly Keating, Frederick Baker, Volker Schlondorff and Vikram Jayanti. Arena's subjects are a roll-call of the world's best known cultural figures from the 20th and 21st centuries, from singers Bob Dylan and Amy Winehouse to academics Edward Said and Eric Hobsbawm, from writers Jean Genet and V S Naipaul to artists Francis Bacon and Louise Bourgeois. The current series editor is Anthony Wall.