|
In his original treatment, Trevor Preston complained that "It's difficult
putting an idea like Fox down in a few pages", and it's easy to see why. With
thirteen episodes totalling eleven hours, Fox is a sprawling epic of family
life, with a host of major characters and a large supporting cast of memorable
figures. Preston had previously worked with director Jim Goddard on Out (ITV,
1978) but unlike that tightly focussed revenge drama, Fox is expansive, and
Preston weaves numerous plotlines to create a depth that is seldom seen in
dramas of shorter length. Indeed, Goddard approached the series as if it were an
11-hour film, which was necessary for logistical reasons, but even so it took
over a year to plan, shoot and complete the series.
Although Fox is multi-faceted, it is essentially the story of the Fox family,
dominated by their patriarch Billy Fox, a retired Covent Garden market porter
who is regarded with awe by the residents of Clapham where most of the action
takes place. He has four sons by two marriages, and although he is a family man,
the sons struggle to form their own identity under his shadow. There is a
particular tension between Billy and his intellectual son, Phil, a left-wing
firebrand, which is exacerbated when Phil refuses to attend his youngest
brother's vital boxing match, the ramifications of which rumble on throughout
the series. When Billy dies, the family tries to hold itself together, but
individual trials and tribulations create division, and Phil departs to the US
in order to work through his feelings. The resolution of the series is
ambiguous, and although Phil returns, there is no real sense that the family
will ever be the same again.
Fox is quite a rarity on television, as it is unusual for a serial of the
time and of such length to have one author and one director. Preston described
it as "The Forsyte Saga in 13 episodes about somebody who lives in Clapham", and
few series of this length have such an attention to character development. There
are a number of storylines that include the criminal underworld familiar from
earlier Euston productions, but they support the underlying themes of loyalty
and trust within 'families', and avoid the familiar stereotypes. Fox, alongside
Out, embodies the best of Euston, both in terms of popular appeal, and
subsequent critical acclaim.
John Williams
|
1. University life (2:33)
