person or book cover
James Condon (left) as Jason Firbeck and Oliver Tobias (right) as Luke Firbeck in Jason's Kingdom
form y separately published work icon Luke's Kingdom series - publisher   film/TV   historical fiction  
Issue Details: First known date: 1976... 1976 Luke's Kingdom
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AbstractHistoryArchive Description

Set in early colonial Australia, Luke's Kingdom follows the various fortunes of Jason Firbeck, who emigrates to Australia with his three children, and his son Luke, who is far more suited to life in the new country.

According to Moran, in his Guide to Australian TV Series, the program 'is not only a drama concerned with a man's settlement in a savage, hostile wilderness but is also a psychological drama wherein the son displaces the father. Jason is shown to be ineffective in the new land in contrast to Luke, who is a down-to-earth pragmatist who takes what he wants.'

A British and Australian co-production--both financially and in terms of cast and crew--the program did well when it aired on the Nine Network.

Notes

  • According to Moran, the program begins 'in the present when a young woman finds the memoir of E V Timm's Pages from a Squatter's Diary, New South Wales 1829 to 1836.' Though E.V. Timms is a real author, this text appears to be fictional.
  • The series was novelised by prolific British novelist John Burke, who produced numerous such novelisations of film and television scripts.

Includes

1.1
form y separately published work icon A Sort of Gentleman Keith Raine , Sydney Yorkshire : Nine Network Trident Television , 1976 6675384 1976 single work film/TV historical fiction
— Appears in: Zoom In : Television Scripts of the Seventies 1977; (p. 47-87)

The first episode of the British-Australian co-production Luke's Kingdom.

 Sydney Yorkshire : Nine Network Trident Television , 1976

Publication Details of Only Known VersionEarliest 2 Known Versions of

    • Sydney, New South Wales,: Yorkshire,
      c
      England,
      c
      c
      United Kingdom (UK),
      c
      Western Europe, Europe,      :       Nine Network ; Trident Television ,       1976 .
      person or book cover
      British promotional title screen for Luke's Kingdom
      Extent: 13x60min. episodesp.
      Description: Produced on film; colour
VIEW PUBLICATION DETAILS FOR ALL VERSIONS ()

Works about this Work

'It's a Bastard of a Place - Takes a Bastard to Lick It' : Violence, Victimhood, and Nationalism on the Frontier in Luke's Kingdom (1976), and Against the Wind (1978) James Findlay , 2023 single work criticism
— Appears in: Writing Australian History On-screen : Television and Film Period Dramas “Down Under” 2023; (p. 29-48)
Reconciliation and the History Wars in Australian Cinema Felicity Collins , 2012 single work criticism
— Appears in: Exhuming Passions : The Pressure of the Past in Ireland and Australia 2012; (p. 207-222) 'When The Proposition ( a UK/Australia co-production, directed by John Hillcoat and scripted by Nick Cave) was released in 2005, film reviewers had no qualms about claiming this spectacular saga of colonial violence on the Queensland frontier as a 'history' film. A reviewer on BBC Radio 4 described The Proposition as 'a bushranger Western...set in violent 1880s Australian outback exposing the bitter racial tensions between English and Irish settlers. A Sunday Times review declared that 'Australia's brutal post-colonial history is stripped of all the lies in a bloody clash of cultures between the British police, the Irish bushrangers and the Aborigines.' Foregrounding the film's revisionist spectacle of colonial violence, an Australian reviewer predicted that, despite 'scenes of throat-cutting torture, rape and exploding heads...The Proposition could be the most accurate look at our national history yet'. (Author's introduction, 207)
Reconciliation and the History Wars in Australian Cinema Felicity Collins , 2012 single work criticism
— Appears in: Exhuming Passions : The Pressure of the Past in Ireland and Australia 2012; (p. 207-222) 'When The Proposition ( a UK/Australia co-production, directed by John Hillcoat and scripted by Nick Cave) was released in 2005, film reviewers had no qualms about claiming this spectacular saga of colonial violence on the Queensland frontier as a 'history' film. A reviewer on BBC Radio 4 described The Proposition as 'a bushranger Western...set in violent 1880s Australian outback exposing the bitter racial tensions between English and Irish settlers. A Sunday Times review declared that 'Australia's brutal post-colonial history is stripped of all the lies in a bloody clash of cultures between the British police, the Irish bushrangers and the Aborigines.' Foregrounding the film's revisionist spectacle of colonial violence, an Australian reviewer predicted that, despite 'scenes of throat-cutting torture, rape and exploding heads...The Proposition could be the most accurate look at our national history yet'. (Author's introduction, 207)
'It's a Bastard of a Place - Takes a Bastard to Lick It' : Violence, Victimhood, and Nationalism on the Frontier in Luke's Kingdom (1976), and Against the Wind (1978) James Findlay , 2023 single work criticism
— Appears in: Writing Australian History On-screen : Television and Film Period Dramas “Down Under” 2023; (p. 29-48)
VIEW ALL WORKS ABOUT (2)
Last amended 12 Dec 2014 12:46:06
Ken Hannam
Peter Weir
Peter Hammond
Gareth Davies
Hugh David
Subjects:
Settings:
  • New South Wales,
  • 1800-1899
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