The Golden Year (TV play)

The Golden Year
Written by
Starring
Country of originUnited Kingdom
Production
Producers
Original release
Release23 June 1951 (1951-06-23)
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The Golden Year is a musical play by Jack Hulbert and Barry Baker written for BBC Television, starring Hulbert with Sally Ann Howes and Peter Graves, with original music by Harry S. Pepper. It was first broadcast on 23 June and 2 July 1951. The musical is set at Hyde Park, London during the Great Exhibition of 1851.

A contribution to the Festival of Britain, the claim was made that the play was the first musical comedy ever produced for television.[1] The BBC Year Book commented that "Jack Hulbert was featured in Festival style".[2] Filmed in black and white, the musical has a length of 104 minutes.

Jack Hulbert, Walton Anderson, Eric Robinson, Eunice Crowther, and the George Mitchell Choir had previously worked together for BBC Television on a production of Cinderella first broadcast on 27 December 1947,[3] and most of them came together for a new Cinderella in 1950 which like The Golden Year starred Sally Ann Howes.[4]

  1. ^ The Annual Register of World Events: A Review of the Year, Volume 193 (Longmans, Green, 1952), p. 400
  2. ^ BBC Year Book 1952 (British Broadcasting Corporation, 1952), p. 107
  3. ^ Chris Perry, The Kaleidoscope British Christmas Television Guide 1937-2013, p. 140
  4. ^ John Wyver, A tale of six Cinders, part 2: Cinderella (BBC, 1938, 1948, 1950) at screenplaystv.wordpress.com, accessed 27 July 2016