An Inspector Calls (1982)

In 1912 the wealthy industrial Birling family are celebrating daughter Sheila's engagement to Gerald Croft. Their son seems somewhat distracted and heavily drinking, but otherwise all is well. That is until the arrival of a police Inspector Goole, who interrupts the happy home to interview them. For a young woman called Eva Smith has died a couple of hours before having drunk disinfectant to kill herself, and it seems that the family all know her... Starring Bernard Hepton, Nigel Davenport, Margaret Tyzack, Simon Ward, Sarah Berger, David Sibley and Jane Leppard. This was originally broadcast on TV on August 17th 1982 and is a TV adaptation of J.B. Priestley's classic 1945 play. While not a patch on the 1954 film with Alastair Sim, and despite it's clear stage bound settings (there are no flashbacks of the actual victim, Eva Smith, sadly) it's a surprisingly absorbing adaptation, with Hepton playing the eponymous Inspector Goole, and Margaret Tyzack particularly effective at the matriarch of the family. I would of loved to of seen the twist that appears in the 1954 film here, but this is a faithful adaptation that remains intriguing and rarely repeated. This comes from a recording of mine from when it was repeated recently for the first time in years on BBC4. Astonishingly J.B. Priestley was still alive when they broadcast this in 1982; he didn't died until 1984, a month before his 90th birthday!