About this season
Sunday Night Theatre was a long-running series of televised live television plays screened by BBC Television from early 1950 until 1959. The productions for the first five years or so of the run were re-staged live the following Thursday, partly because of technical limitations in this era, and the theatrical basis of early television drama. Some of the earliest collaborations between Rudolph Cartier and Nigel Neale were produced for this series, including Arrow to the Heart and Nineteen Eighty-Four. The Sunday night drama slot was subsequently renamed The Sunday-Night Play which ran for four seasons between 1960 and 1963. ITV transmitted its own unrelated run of Sunday Night Theatre between 1971 and 1974.
Episodes (15)
1. A Phoenix Too Frequent
Aired 7 January 1951
2. The Scarlet Pimpernel
Aired 14 January 1951
During the French Revolution, a mysterious English nobleman known only as The Scarlet Pimpernel (a humble wayside flower), snatches French aristos from the jaws of the guillotine, while posing as the foppish Sir Percy Blakeney in society. Percy falls for and marries the beautiful actress Marguerite St. Just, but she is involved with Chauvelin and Robespierre, and Percy's marriage to her may endanger the Pimpernel's plans to save the little Dauphin.
3. David Garrick
Aired 21 January 1951
4. Release
Aired 28 January 1951
5. Counsellor at Law
Aired 4 February 1951
Successful attorney has his Jewish heritage and poverty-stricken background brought home to him when he learns his wife has been unfaithful.
6. The Skin Game
Aired 3 February 1951
Two forces battle over the future of an English village. On one side, a factory owner wants to move out the locals and turn it into a factory town. On the other, a member of the community wants to preserve the village as it is.
8. Julius Caesar
Aired 25 February 1951
The growing ambition of Julius Caesar is a source of major concern to his close friend Brutus. Cassius persuades him to participate in his plot to assassinate Caesar but they have both sorely underestimated Mark Antony.
9. Julius Caesar/II
Aired 1 March 1951
The growing ambition of Julius Caesar is a source of major concern to his close friend Brutus. Cassius persuades him to participate in his plot to assassinate Caesar but they have both sorely underestimated Mark Antony.
13. The Voysey Inheritance
Aired 1 April 1951
15. Shout Aloud Salvation
Aired 15 April 1951
16. The Life of King Henry V (Part One)
Aired 22 April 1951
In the midst of the Hundred Years' War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.
17. The Life of Henry V (Part Two)
Aired 29 April 1951
In the midst of the Hundred Years' War, the young King Henry V of England embarks on the conquest of France in 1415.
31. The Silent Village
Aired 5 August 1951
32. Albert
Aired 12 August 1951
A group of Allied prisoners of war use a dummy to cover their attempts to escape a German camp.
43. Escape
Aired 28 October 1951