An ABC anthology television series that played single-episode television programs from overseas, but also produced and promoted new Australian works.
The individual works had no explicit thematic connection to one another, and the term 'theatre' was applied loosely: some instalments were adaptations of stage plays, but many appear to have been written directly as 'television plays'. The series also semi-regularly aired operas.
In some instances, the productions were imported wholesale from other countries: 'Collect Your Hand Luggage' (aired 20 October 1965), for example, is a re-titled broadcast of ITV Television Playhouse episode 'Collect Your Hand Baggage' (originally aired in 1963).
In other instances, the episodes are Australian productions of international works: 'Tartuffe' (aired 13 October 1965), for example, is an Australian production of the Moliere play, produced Henri Safran and with an Australian cast. These productions are only indexed individually on AustLit if there is a discernible Australian script-writer and/or localisation of the production.
Wednesday Theatre followed a common pattern for anthology series on early Australian television, in that the Australian content rapidly dropped away and the series became primarily re-screenings of British productions: see also Stuart Wagstaff's World Playhouse.
For a full listing of episodes and airdates, see under Film Details.
Rusty Bugles
( dir. John Matthews
)
1980
Australia
:
ABC Television
,
1980
Z1585695
1980
single work
film/TV
Adapted by Alan Burke from Sumner Locke Elliott's play and possibly influenced by the 1965 ABC television version that Burke directed, Rusty Bugles is set in an ordinance camp in the Northern Territory in 1944. The men are neither in nor out of the war. A cross-section of Australian soldiers experience boredom, the news of infidelities at home, endless hope for leave, all coloured by unquenchable humour and optimism.
