''Dinner with the Family'' is a 1959 Australian TV play. Australian TV drama was relatively rare at the time. It featured English star

Jessie Matthews Jessie Margaret Matthews (11 March 1907 – 19 August 1981) was an English actress, dancer and singer of the 1920s and 1930s, whose career continued into the post-war period. After a string of hit stage musicals and films in the mid-1930s, Ma ...

in her first Australian TV appearance - she was touring the country at the time - and was shot in Melbourne.

Plot

A young man, Georges, married for money and is unhappy because he has fallen in love with Isabelle. To escape from reality one night he hires actors to play his parents and a butler and invites over Isabelle. But George's parents are determined to save their son's marriage and turn up with George's worthless friend Jacques. Barbara is Jacques' wife.

Cast

*Tony Brown as Georges *Joy Mitchell as Isabelle *Alan Tobin as Jacques *

as Madam de Montrachet *Paul Bacon as Delmonte *June Brunelle as Barbara, wife of Georges' friend *Marcia Hart *Laurie Lange

Production

The play had recently been performed in Little Theatre in Melbourne starring Sheila Florence. It was announced in July 1959 that the ABC would film it with Jessie Matthews playing Florence's role. Star June Brunell had recently returned from England where she appeared in ''The Flying Doctors'' TV series.

Reception

'' The Sydney Morning Herald'' called it "a brave, but not really successful attempt to bridge the gap between quintessential theatre on the one hand, and the television screen on the other... Christopher Muir's production was precise, well-planned, and often Imaginative." ''The Age'' TV critic said "it was not the sort of play to set the Yarra on fire" but felt it was strong in the scenes in which Matthews appeared, although her role was relatively small.

References

External links

*
''Dinner with the Family''
at

National Film and Sound Archive The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), known as ScreenSound Australia from 1999 to 2004, is Australia's audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national co ...