Otherwise Engaged (film)

Otherwise Engaged is a 1965 Australian television film which aired on ABC. Broadcast in a 60-minute time-slot, it was written by John Cameron and produced in Melbourne.[4]

"Otherwise Engaged"
Wednesday Theatre episode
Episode no.Season 1
Episode 21
Directed byOscar Whitbread
Teleplay byJohn Cameron
Original air date2 June 1965 (Sydney, Melbourne)[1][2]
Running time60 minutes[3]

It was part of Wednesday Theatre. Australian TV drama was relatively rare at the time. The story was similar to A Private Island.[5]

Plot

As a result of pressures of running a large business, Henry Williamson finds he has been neglecting his duties to his family, providing unlimited funds instead of a husband and father's guiding hand. His son is lazy and fails his uni exams, his daughter Pamela is spoilt and is about to be married to a troublesome man called Bevin, and his wife Dorothy spends time making metal sculptures.

In an attempt to have a better family relationship, he takes them - and an employee, Tom - up in a plane to look at a country property he is thinking of buying and winds up on a Pacific island. Williamson insists his family stay there.[6]

Cast

Production

The play was written exclusively for television. It was the third TV play by John Cameron, who had also written Outpost and The Teeth of Wind. It was described as "a play without a message" and was shot in Melbourne.[8]

Reception

The TV critic from the Sydney Morning Herald said "the play might have seemed more attractive in its corrective escapism if some of its palm-fringed, moon-visited settings had not been stirred so obviously by a studio breeze; and Oscar Whitbrcad's direction would have released more of the author's latent humour if his cast had been able to supply more than conventionally stiff realisations of conventional characters."[9]

See also
  • List of live television plays broadcast on Australian Broadcasting Corporation (1950s)

References
  1. "TV Guide". The Age. 27 May 1965. p. 26.
  2. "TV Guide". Sydney Morning Herald. 31 May 1965. p. 15.
  3. "WEDNESDAY". The Canberra Times. 39 (11, 169). Australian Capital Territory, Australia. 31 May 1965. p. 16. Retrieved 20 March 2017 – via National Library of Australia.
  4. https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=o64RAAAAIBAJ&sjid=l-YDAAAAIBAJ&pg=1944%2C477741
  5. Vagg, Stephen (18 February 2019). "60 Australian TV Plays of the 1950s & '60s". Filmink.
  6. "TV guide". Sydney Morning Herald. 31 May 1965. p. 15.
  7. "Untitled". The Age. 27 May 1965. p. 13.
  8. "Play Set in Sydney". Sydney Morning Herald. 31 May 1965. p. 14.
  9. "TELEVISION REVIEW Melbourne Production of "Otherwise Engaged"". Sydney Morning Herald. 3 June 1965. p. 8.
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