Where Adam Stood

Where Adam Stood (1976)

Based on the 1907 autobiography "Father and Son" by Christian fundamentalist and naturalist Edmund Gosse, but Dennis Potter adapted only one section of the book, adding much material of his own invention. With a literal belief in the Old Testament, Philip Gosse is opposed to the new theories of Charles Darwin, espoused here by biologist Brackley. Assuming "the Lord's will" determines the fate of his ailing son Edmund, Philip Gosse creates a life-threatening situation, even suggesting the illness is God's punishment because of Edmund's desire for a toy ship.

Date of release
1976-04-21
TMDB
6.8 / 10 (5)
Runtime
1h 17m
Genres
Drama, TV Movie
Director
Brian Gibson

Casting

Interesting facts

Where Adam Stood is a television play by Dennis Potter, first broadcast on BBC 2 in 1976. It is a free adaptation, wholly shot on film, of Edmund Gosse's autobiographical book Father and Son (1907).

Production

As with Potter's 1971 serial about the life of Giacomo Casanova, Where Adam Stood is a loose adaptation of original source material set within a fictional framework. In Potter on Potter, the author told editor Graham Fuller that he used only a few pages of Father and Son as his starting point, and rejected the resultant play's status as a straight adaptation.

Where Adam Stood, however, was written at a very difficult time for Potter. In 1974, his father died and this, coupled with a severe bout of psoriatic arthropathy, led to Potter developing writer's block. Double Dare was a reflection on the problems he was having writing, while Brimstone was written in response to the ravages of his debilitating illness; Where Adam Stood was Potter's reflection on the communication problems he faced in his relati…

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