The Spaces of Medieval Mystery Plays on British Television

Abstract

Medieval mystery plays have had a rich and also distinctive life on British television. These performance texts, drawn from the Bible's story of the universe from just before its Creation to its end on the Day of Judgment, have appealed to television practitioners not only for drama adaptations (from the 1938 presentation of the Chester Abraham and Isaac onwards) and the foundation stone for new dramatic writing (such as the BBC's 1959 The Hill by Paul Almond) but also as the focus of documentaries on contemporary civic, social and religious traditions within communities. Charles Parker, for example, cast his own mystery play from the people of York in a 1973 episode of BBC1's Omnibus, and the 2008 BBC1 Miracle on the Estate chronicled how a mystery play was made into a film by north Manchester residents. Indeed, because of television's interest in the rich web of meanings arising from and surrounding mystery play performance, especially with regard to their relationship with place and community, it is not always easy to make clear-cut distinctions between program genres-in particular, between programs that may be considered to be primarily dramatic productions of part or all of a mystery play and programs that contextualize dramatic performance within the overall form of documentary. The first recorded production of a mystery play in 1938 is itself described in Radio Times as a "reconstruction of the preparation and presentation" (Television Listings) of the Chester Abraham and Isaac, wording that strongly suggests that the program, titled Miracle at Chester, may have been part documentary ("preparation") and part performance ("presentation"), with both elements staged in the Alexandra Palace studios.