"Warship" (1973) TV series 1973-1977

User Rating:

8.2/10   

Directors:

Jonathan Alwyn
Michael E. Briant

Writers:

John Armstrong (writer)
Ben Bassett (writer)

Seasons:

1 | 2 | 3 | 4

Release Date:

7 June 1973 (UK)

Genre:

Action | Drama

Plot Keywords:

Navy

Cast

David Savile	...	Lt. Cmdr. Beaumont (32 episodes, 1973-1976)
Andrew Burt	...	Lt. Peek (26 episodes, 1976-1977)
James Cosmo	...	L / ... (20 episodes, 1973-1977)
John Lee	...	Lt. Cmdr. Kiley (20 episodes, 1973-1977)
Donald Burton	...	Cmdr. Mark Nialls (20 episodes, 1973-1976)
Don Henderson	...	MAA Heron (18 episodes, 1973-1976)
Norman Eshley	...	Lt. Last (17 episodes, 1973-1974)
Graeme Eton	...	Lt. Wakelin (14 episodes, 1973-1977)
Bryan Marshall	...	Cmdr. Alan Glenn (13 episodes, 1976)
Derek Godfrey	...	Capt. Edward Holt (13 episodes, 1977)
Robert Morris	...	Lt. Cmdr. Napier (13 episodes, 1977)

Runtime:

50 min (45 episodes)

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Company:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC)

Did this really run for four years?

Stirring stuff opening titles with HMS 'Hero' plunging through the waves bow on to the camera, gave way to a fairly mundane 'soapy' drama about the crew of a destroyer in the Navy.

Being mainly exteriors and pre-dating electronic portability, most of this was shot on 16mm film, with a few studio based shots having completely different sound and picture quality. Very often the crash edits between the two media provided the only dramatic elements to these shows and would wake you from the slumbering state the script had left you in.

Standard plot vehicles were members of the crew smuggling drugs, affairs between crew members and each others wives, crew members resorting to crime to solve some financial crisis. Very occasionally there would be a rescue from some foreign shore, or a bit of gunboat diplomacy. You get the feeling though that being some time after the last 'high profile' navy engagement with Iceland in the Cod War and before the Falklands, the writers couldn't bring themselves to imagine the ship engaged in any kind of warfare. I think the only shots fired were warning ones from the Bofors machine gun in the bow.

Of course the appeal was the crew were all young and dashing, although none of that rescued this rather cheap looking series from its below par performance. Curiously some 30 years later the surviving cast are all turning up as old crocks on 'The Bill' 'Casualty' and all the other soaps that pervade the UK channels at present.

A much better treatment of life in the Navy was the documentary 'Sailor' made in the late seventies. Raw, and uncompromising this doco was a hit, but is puzzlingly absent from the IMDb's pages.