Denis Shaw Season: Two Period Dramas
Content warning: a white actor 'blacking up' to play a person of colour.
Next up in this series of posts about shows in which the actor Denis Shaw has a role, we have two period dramas. This exercise in focusing on an actor is taking me into some quite unaccustomed territory; generally I don't tend to take to period dramas, and also in this post you might see why there are some shows which just don't appear on the blog!
The Adventures of Robin Hood: A Guest for the Gallows
This is of course the 1955 to 1959 ITC series about the legendary figure, many of the stories being new ones not based on the original legends. I see that its 143 episodes were also broadcast in the USA, Australia, Malaysia, France, Canada and the Philippines, It is actually still being broadcast in the UK and I see that on first broadcasting it had 32 million viewers weekly (in the US and UK). Imagine that now!
It shows how wildly popular the show was that it had a whole range of merchandise, including a range of Robin Hood shoes, advertised by the picture of Richard Greene, who played Robin Hood. I'm sure it's me, but the show really isn't doing that much for me, although I don't have any huge criticism; this sort of semi-historical drama just doesn't grab my interest and I would rather watch historical documentaries.
Shaw's role in this is limited to the role of a butcher whose clothing Robin Hood commandeers as a disguise.
Virgin of the Secret Service: Dark Deeds on the Northwest Frontier
I'm not sure 'period drama' is the correct description for the next show, whatever Virgin of the Secret Service is. I see that I wrote an introductory post about this show on the original blogspot version of this blog some years ago, and in fact subsequently sold the DVDs and haven't seen any episodes since. On watching this one I have not had any cause to change my impression of the show I originally formed, namely that it can't really make up its mind what it is. It's not a straightforward historical drama but is obviously trying to ape the success of shows like Adam Adamant and The Avengers. I'm afraid it largely fails to do this, although it does have some very good reviews, so clearly does make a hit with some viewers.
Shaw appears in the first episode of the whole series, blacked up as a wasir.
I'm going to have to be my usual over-frank self about this and admit that I can't make head nor tail of this episode. I am not even sure what country it is set in, since it is apparently in British India but somehow involves a Russian princess and black servants. I have now watched the episode all the way through three times and am still no clearer on the role of the wasir.
And this is why some shows never appear on this blog at all!
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