A Man for All Seasons

I saw Charlton Heston and Roy Kinnear do this on stage in the UK in the 1980s and they were superb. Some of the intensity of the stage production is missing from this depiction, but it's still a formidable effort from a star out to prove that he didn't always need a tunic and an horse. Firstly, though, it's Roy Kinnear who introduces us to the principal characters and outlines the plot. Henry VIII (Martin Chamberlain) wants a divorce so he can marry Anne Boleyn. His long-serving Chancellor - Cardinal Wolsey (Sir John Gielgud) is on a slippery slope and Sir Thomas More (Heston) looks like he will take the top job. With the Pope increasingly unwilling to co-operate, the King is advised to break from the church and grant himself an annulment. This is where More has issues, and as the plot develops we see him facing a scenario that could cost him dearly. He's a shrewd man and tries to accommodate both his king and his conscience but with forces gathering against him, can he survive? This is a fine adaptation of Robert Bolt's story, and using the excellent Kinnear's "Common Man" as a conduit to keep us right, we follow a tale of political intrigue that becomes increasingly bereft of principle and more about survival - at any cost. It's not just the wrath of the King that More must deal with, but also that of his wife Alice (a powerful effort from Vanessa Redgrave) who is terrified of losing him to his beliefs (and an axe). There's a strong supporting cast to bolster the narrative - Richard Johnson's sympathetic Duke of Norfolk, Benjamin Whitrow's fiercely ambitious Thomas Cromwell and Jonathan Hackett's turn as the odiously climber of the greasy pole Richard Rich all help create an environment of sophisticated fear. The production design is effective and the costumes and sets augment well this story of integrity. Or not. Don't think of it as a remake of the Scofield/Shaw version (1966) - it's makes different emphasis and is more a reimagining of the original stage play. "Better a live rat than a dead lion"!

This made-for-TV version of "A Man for All Seasons" both wins and loses when compared to the more famous movie version of the show, which stars Paul Scofield as Thomas More. It wins, because it stays faithful to Mr. Bolt's original theatrical script, and so keeps much of the play's impact that was lost to "production values" in the big-budget movie release. It loses, in that the main characters, especially Mr. Heston's Thomas More, are weaker than those of the movie version. For example, Mr. Heston completely misses nuances of language that Mr. Scofield caught and used to great advantage; but the supporting actors in this version (Vanessa Redgrave as More's wife comes especially to mind) are far stronger than in the movie version. On the whole, though, I highly recommend that you see this version, mainly to watch Mr. Bolt's craftsmanship that was totally lost in the movie version.

I think most of the comments on IMDb (or Amazon) for this film are rather unfair. Unfair to the actor Charlton Heston and unfair to the film itself. Please let me explain:

It seems to me a sort of "England, England!" thing is standing in the way of a fair and objective comment on this film (as if I could give one...). Even though Charlton Heston has sunk very much in my esteem since "Bowling for Columbine" I feel I need to set the record straight (for my own peace of mind): This film is great, and believe you me, I am a Scofield fan (I simply adored him in the 1966 version of this film as well as in the 1994 Martin Chuzzlewit television film/mini-series).

But to do away with this 1988 version of Heston as a failed attempt to improve on Fred Zinneman is not only an unfair comparison but also a foolish one. To begin with: Heston's version is far closer and more true to Robert Bolt's play than is the Fred Zinneman version. In addition, Heston's performance, although more obviously dramatical than that of Scofield, is more passionate. The scene in which he thrashes Roper and stands for his daughter Meg is simply the greatest ("They put about too nimbly!!!"), as is his performance with the Duke of Norfolk when they discuss water spaniels. Next to Heston, the performance of his fellow actors should not be discarded.

Roy Kinnear, bless his soul, is brilliant as the common man (a Robert Bolt invention that stayed alive in this version but was left out of the 1966 Zinneman production)

In addition, the role of the king is played simply brilliantly by Martin Chamberlain. The scene in More's garden is a scene that will never be mastered.

Vanessa Redgrave gives one of her finest performances as More's wife. The scene in the Tower where they part for the last time is always tearing me apart! (Oh God, all these plain simple men!)

And of course the roles of the "two ugly ladies" Benjamin Withrow and Jonathan Hackett are delicious and not to be found anywhere so great in the 1966 Zinneman version.

So I beg you: Please be fair, enjoy the Zinneman version, but also take the time to (learn to) appreciate Heston's version. The man has his faults, but just appreciate that what he has done right!

While this television remake of "A Man For All Seasons' is closer to the script of the play,it falls far below the masterpiece original film version. The main problem is the miscasting of Charlton Heston as Thomas More. His performace ranges from Bombast to boredom. Never a strong actor all his flaws show here,especially when compared to Paul Scofield's masterfully poignant performance in the original film.Roy Kinear as Common Man holds best of show honors. He is a delightfully sly narrator and covers the role of Matthew with ease. Vanessa Redgrave is as strong as Wendy Hiller as More's wife Alice but Adrianne Thomas' Lady Margaret falls far short of Susanna York's memorable portayal.Even the great Sir John Gielgud is miscast here. As Cardinal Wolsey his voice is indeed imposing but his slight frame in no way conveys the "full fed prince of the church" that Wolsey was. Over all it is a good effort at preserving the play, but for emotional power,well developed relationships and emotional passion...see the original film.

The first filmed version of Robert Bolt's play "A Man for All Seasons" was made by Fred Zinnemann in 1966. The play tells the story of Sir Thomas More, the 16th-century writer, scholar, lawyer, philosopher and theologian who became Lord Chancellor of England and a confidant of Henry VIII, and about More's execution on false charges of treason after he fell out with the King over his divorce from Catherine of Aragon and his break with the Roman Catholic Church.

Charlton Heston was a great admirer of Bolt's play, in which he had starred a number of times on the stage, and had hoped to be chosen to play More in Zinnemann's film. He was, of course, disappointed in that ambition (the role went to Paul Scofield), but when, more than twenty years later, he was given the chance to direct and act in his own version for the TNT television network he eagerly accepted the opportunity.

Heston was not, however, (as his autobiography makes clear) a great admirer of Zinnemann's film or of Scofield's performance, which he regarded as too "astringent". He therefore sought to make his own performance here quite different from Scofield's, playing More as warmer, more humorous and less ascetic and intellectual. Personally, I felt that Scofield set a standard which it would be difficult for anyone, even an actor of Heston's stature, to better, but I felt that Heston's performance in this film represented a quite valid and praiseworthy attempt to find an alternative interpretation.

And yet, this film is not in the same class as Zinnemann's- indeed, in my view comes nowhere near it. There are several reasons for this. Heston's film is considerably longer than the original- indeed, it was recently shown on British television as a two-part miniseries. For the purposes of Zinnemann's film, Bolt (who wrote the screenplay) pared down his original text, omitting altogether one major character (the Spanish Ambassador), to produce something more suited to the cinema than the stage. Heston's film restores these cuts, presumably to produce something of the regulation length required by the American TV schedules, and the result is a film which flows less easily and lacks the dramatic urgency of the first film.

Another change Bolt made for the 1966 film was to abandon the Brechtian device of the "Common Man", the character who acts as the narrator in the play. Again, this character is restored in Heston's version, and again I do not think that the change is for the better. The character played by Roy Kinnear, a wily, self-interested comic rogue, seems out of place in the tragic drama of More. Brecht's "alienation effect" may be a valid technique in the theatre (although critics and dramatic theorists are divided on this point), but for me it certainly does not work in the different media of television and the cinema.

In the original film all the cast were excellent without a single poor performance. Here, few really stand out. Apart from Sir John Gielgud as Cardinal Wolsey, in a cameo appearance even briefer than that of Orson Welles. The only one of the cast who can stand comparison with the earlier film is Richard Johnson as the Duke of Norfolk. The role of Norfolk is played in a quite different way in the two films. In the earlier version, Norfolk, as played by Nigel Davenport, was a basically decent if intellectually undistinguished man who did his best to protect his friend More. Here, the character played by Johnson is a fundamentally more unpleasant character, who hides his moral cowardice beneath a show of hearty friendship. Despite claiming to be More's friend, he eventually acts as the presiding judge at his show trial and in that capacity sentences him to death. (In Zinnemann's film this was done by another character, the Lord Chief Justice).

None of the other actors stand out. Martin Chamberlain's King Henry VIII is a pale copy of Robert Shaw's. Even an actress as talented as Vanessa Redgrave was not as authoritative as Wendy Hiller as More's wife Alice. (Redgrave had a cameo appearance as Anne Boleyn in the 1966 version). According to Heston, Redgrave originally intended to give Alice a (historically correct) West Country accent, but this was changed because it was feared that American audiences would find it difficult to understand. In the final version of the film, Alice speaks with a Northern accent, although I wonder if Americans found this any easier to cope with.

The two interpretations I did not like in this version were from Benjamin Whitrow as Thomas Cromwell and Jonathan Hackett as Richard Rich. Whitrow's Cromwell had too much the smooth, silky politician about him and not enough of the thug. At one point More compares Cromwell to a dockside bully; a description which admirably fits Leo McKern's blustering character but which seems lost on Whitrow's. The mistake Hackett makes is to confuse moral weakness with cowardice. John Hurt's character is weak, but only in the sense that he lacks the moral strength to put his principles before his ambitions. Where those ambitions are concerned he can be steely and ruthless in pursuit of them. Hackett's Rich is too much of a physical coward to take any risks; he comes across as the sort of man who would do anything for a quiet life, even exchanging the life of a courtier for that of a schoolmaster (which is the choice More offers him).

As an actor, Heston gives a perfectly respectable performance in this film (even though personally I would prefer Scofield's). He was not, however, a particularly experienced director (this was the last of only three films that he directed during his career) and the weakness of his version is that he was not able to bring out great performances from his supporting cast in the way that Zinnemann had done. 7/10, compared to 10/10 for Zinnemann's film.