The Glittering Prizes

None of the British mini-series that found their way across the Atlantic stand as a greater achievement than "The Glittering Prizes." Not "I: Claudius," not "Brideshead Revisited," none of them.

Frederic Raphael's script strikes just the right combination of warmth and acidity with a note of genuineness that we don't always associate with this writer. The performances are uniformly apt. Many of the young cast would go on to solid careers, yet few of them would ever give greater performances than they do here.

Undoubtedly the TV technology of the period may appear quaint, but that certainly hasn't held back "I, Claudius." I have seen this series again since the first American run in 1977, so I'm not relying only on dim memory. The writing and acting still hold up.

So many of these mini-series are really second-rate, sometimes dreary, but that's what average means, average. "The Glittering Prizes" is among a handful of really great pieces of television, and we are waiting impatiently for the BBC to complete excavation of the archives and place this wondrous series before a new generation of viewers.