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15 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
Would love to see it again, 7 May 2004
Author: cronin_clare from london, england

Like all the other commenters, I would love to see this - I found it gripping, one of the consistently best dramatisations I've seen on television, and as one person said, it followed the books very closely. Acting, atmosphere, pace, costumes and settings were all superb. I thought Michael Bryant in the lead role was particularly good - he had the right air of worried intelligence. Rosemary Leach, too was good - earthy and vulnerable, and Daniel Massey - tortured and irritable. I've heard the BBC deleted a lot of their old television tapes so unless a private individual has recorded it we're all doomed.

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15 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
A very serious but grippingly entertaining TV series, 8 March 2002
Author: charmech from Pasadena, California

I watched every episode of this wonderful serial (13 weeks) as it was broadcast. It was one of the best dramatizations the BBC ever did, and although the book it was based on was a classic of French literature and political thought(likely to be dull and stuffy and utterly boring I would have guessed), the brilliance of the script, direction and acting brought it to life in a most enthralling manner. I wish they would show it again on one of the cable channels. Superb TV drama.

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13 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
Roads to Freedom, 23 December 2004
Author: yateslawrence from Manchester, England

The Roads to Freedom was one of those few television series which had a profound effect upon me when I watched them as a teenager on my grandfather's television. I had never heard of Sartre and it was only later that I realised how closely the series followed the books. The atmosphere set was gripping, a nervous world with the threat of war and a world over which they had no control echoed in the lives of the characters. Michael Bryant was magnificent as Mathieu, but there was Ivich (I forget the name of the actress) too. Another writer has mentioned Daniel Massey. In particular, the death of Mathieu haunts me to this day.

This and "Man of Straw" with Derek Jacobi which I believe has been deleted by the BBC I believe to be two of the finest series the BBC has ever shown and I am greatly saddened that I will never see them again.

In response to another's comment - the theme song, "La route est Dur" I am sure was not unaccompanied but had at least a cello accompaniment and maybe an oboe too. I haven't heard it since the last episode of the series (alas, no video recorders in those days!) but would love to find a copy.

Update July 2007 A copy of Georgia Brown singing "La Route est Dur" is available here:

http://www.olimu.com/Readings/LaRouteEstDure.htm

Now we just need to find the lost tapes of the series itself!

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13 out of 13 people found the following comment useful :-
Where are the tapes, BBC?, 29 March 2003
Author: (jogardiner@macunlimited.net) from UK

The BBC's adaptation of Sartre's trilogy was a work of art (not a label I would often attach to a TV series). It was repeated in 1976/77, which is when I saw it . A long time ago, but hardly ancient history in TV terms - for example, I saw that 'Elizabeth R', which was first broadcast around the same time as The Roads to Freedom, is currently getting a re-run on one of the digital channels.

So where are the tapes? What has the BBC done with them? Why has the best TV drama ever made not been seen for nearly 30 years? I think we should be told.

If anyone, anywhere, managed to tape the series, they should make a fortune, as there are so many people I know who are desperate to see it again, having been powerfully affected by it in their youth.

Would it have dated if shown again now? I don't think so. Quality lasts. And think of the subject matter - commitment versus freedom, abortion, homosexuality, politics, sex, nightlife, the passions and preoccupations of individuals overshadowed by a looming war. How dated is that?

If anyone knows anything about what happened to the tapes of this series, or would be interested in joining me in forcing the BBC to give us some sensible answers, please email me.

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7 out of 7 people found the following comment useful :-
excellent version will we ever see it again?, 7 September 2001
Author: (boughrood@yahoo.com) from Brecon

This film seemed to me to be very close to the atmosphere of the books. The film characters of Mathieu, Daniel, Lola etc all seem practically perfect renditions of the book characters. The wretched TV company says it has no plans to repeat it.

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6 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Theme Song (amendment), 27 February 2003
Author: (h.simmonds@btinternet.com) from Yorkshire, England

Memory plays tricks! The title of the song is in fact "La route est dure" - based on a song of the French Resistance (So ignore my previous nonsense). I came across a copy on 7" vinyl. The performance by Georgia Brown is every bit as vivid as I had remembered, raw and impassioned, and way ahead of it's time as TV theme music.

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6 out of 6 people found the following comment useful :-
Excellent B/W series of Satre Trilogy, 29 September 1998
Author: Paul Downing (paul.downing@ecsoft.co.uk) from London

I saw this series after reading the first book and found the whole series to be a wonderful viewing experience.

The theme song is excellent and I have wanted to find a recording for years.

If you are luck enough to see any episodes or hear the theme song then take the opportunity.

If anyone knows of video or CD recordings of the series or title song then I would be most interested. Paul Downing (paul.downing@ecsoft.co.uk)

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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
I thought it was just me, 13 May 2008
10/10
Author: mark-kimber from United Kingdom

it's pretty strange reading these remarks, something of an 'I thought it was just me' moment.

I saw the series as a teenager, had never even heard of Sartre, but the series just captivated me.

I still sing the theme music to myself and remember little snippets of action and dialogue - the knife through the hand, the wrestling match between a man and his teenage lover.

anyhow, the BFI definitely have a copy in their archive goodness only knows how that helps

maybe we should try to lobby BBC4 or something

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5 out of 5 people found the following comment useful :-
This series hit me between the eyes!, 22 March 2006
Author: diskodave from United Kingdom

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

I too remember watching this when I was about 17. It had a profound impact. Recently I mentioned it when talking to a bunch of teenagers about how I came to be a Christian; and thinking back I realised that this more than the book 'The Age of Reason' (in Penguin with Picasso's Gurnica on the cover) just seemed so much to sum up what was true about the world. I especially remember the scene in the café where Yvitch and Matthieu cut their hands. That was very powerfully done; slightly different to the way it happens in the book. Daniel was also a wonderfully real person. I remember his castration scene (Did he go through with it or not?) and his 'conversion' to Christianity where he sings 'I'm as queer as a coot' to the tune of the liturgy. Finally the very end where Matthieu dies still philosophising. You must see this all you exis!

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4 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
Roads to Freedom, 30 June 2007
10/10
Author: (WESTSTORM@GMAIL.COM) from United Kingdom

I was 15 at the time and living with my ex-pat family from England in California, where I watched Roads to Freedom via Masterpiece Theatre on PBS television.

This show used to draw conversation with my friends and myself at our high school art class each week; to whether or not we saw the current episode, and to what we thought of it. My family only had a black and white TV at the time; however, I remember watching it in colour also at my best friends home; whom also, by the way, remembers the show and it's theme.

The theme, believe it or not, I still have on an old audio tape somewhere in a cluttered draw. When the first tape cassette recorders came out, I got one for Christmas, and I taped the theme to Roads to Freedom by holding up a microphone in front of the television speaker.

Home video recorders were not readily available to most consumers back in 1970/71, and if there were any obscure models about, they would have been unaffordable for most people, and probably technically crude in their quality of recording. Still, however, I believe that there may still be some hope in the recovery of all of those lost episodes from Roads to Freedom; even if the BBC did in fact erase them from their archives forever. The reason for this assumption, is because the BBC exported copies of this production abroad, as I was indeed a regular viewer when I resided in the US as a teenager, so I know this for a fact; and I would suspect that the programme would have been exported to other countries also, So, if the BBC did delete this programme; the possibility still stands that their could be copies elsewhere in the world in some archive vault; PBS, perhaps.

Before I close, I would like to make a comment about EwanScott's entry about Roads to Freedom being the flagship programme which announced the start of BBC 2. BBC 2 was launched in 1964, not in 1970/71 Or could it be that he was referring to the first show to start the evening broadcast?

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