Private Schulz (TV series)

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''Private Schulz'' is a 1981

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television comedy drama serial set mostly in Germany, during and immediately after

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

. It stars

Michael Elphick Michael John Elphick (19 September 1946 – 7 September 2002) was an English film and television actor. He played the eponymous private investigator in the ITV series ''Boon'' and Harry Slater in BBC's ''EastEnders''. He was nominated for ...

in the title role and

Ian Richardson Ian William Richardson (7 April 19349 February 2007) was a Scottish actor. He portrayed the Machiavellian Tory politician Francis Urquhart in the BBC's '' House of Cards'' (1990–1995) television trilogy. Richardson was also a leading S ...

playing various parts. Other notable actors included

Tony Caunter Anthony Patrick Caunter (born 22 September 1937) is a Retired British actor best known for his role as Jack Shepherd in the Yorkshire TV sitcom ''Queenie's Castle'' and also his portrayal of Roy Evans in ''EastEnders'' from 1994 to 2003. The s ...

, Billie Whitelaw, Billy Murray and

Mark Wingett Mark Christopher Wingett (born 1 January 1961) is an English actor. He is best known for his roles as PC/DC Jim Carver in ''The Bill'' and '' EastEnders'' as Mike Swann, '' Hollyoaks'' as Frank Symons and '' Heartbeat'' as Terry Molloy. His fi ...

. It was shown on ''

Masterpiece Theatre ''Masterpiece'' (formerly known as ''Masterpiece Theatre'') is a drama anthology television series produced by WGBH Boston. It premiered on Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) on January 10, 1971. The series has presented numerous acclaimed Briti ...

'' in the US.

Plot summary

Over six one-hour episodes, it tells the story of Gerhard Schulz, a German fraudster and petty criminal who is forced against his will to serve in the SS. In a story based on the real, though unrealised, plot by the Germans known as

Operation Bernhard Operation Bernhard was an exercise by Nazi Germany to forge British bank notes. The initial plan was to drop the notes over Britain to bring about a collapse of the British economy during the Second World War. The first phase was run from early ...

, he persuades his superiors to authorise a project to print counterfeit British five pound notes for the purpose of destroying the British economy.Screenonline – Private Schulz
/ref> Schulz has little interest in the defeat of Britain, and simply wants to steal the forged notes, although he is also strongly motivated to help a former criminal colleague, a Jewish master forger imprisoned in a concentration camp. Other elements of the story based on the history of the period, include the Venlo incident, when two British intelligence officers were abducted from the Netherlands at the start of the war.

Salon Kitty Salon Kitty was a high-class Berlin brothel used by the Nazi intelligence service, the ''Sicherheitsdienst'' (SD), for espionage purposes during . Created in the early 1930s, the salon was taken over by SS general Reinhard Heydrich and his sub ...

was a Berlin brothel, secretly run by the ''

Sicherheitsdienst ' (, ''Security Service''), full title ' (Security Service of the '' Reichsführer-SS''), or SD, was the intelligence agency of the SS and the Nazi Party in Nazi Germany. Established in 1931, the SD was the first Nazi intelligence organization ...

'' (the intelligence agency of the SS) to spy on its clientele, who were often prominent German government officials or military officers.

Production

Many of the main characters are based on real people (though some of the characters carry different names). Dialogue in the series is in English and in situations where Schulz interacts with English characters, his delivery is deliberate, like that of a non-native speaker not used to speaking English, or attempting to conceal his native accent. Billie Whitelaw played the role of a prostitute working at Salon Kitty, where German officers were secretly recorded by the SS. Her character claims to have a psychological block that prevents her having sex with any soldier below the rank of major. The screenplay was by Jack Pulman, who died in 1979 before any filming had taken place. In 1982, he was posthumously awarded a writer's award by The Royal Television Society for his work on ''Private Schulz''.The Medium is Not Enough
/ref> Other notable names involved in the show include composer

Carl Davis Carl Davis, (born October 28, 1936) is an American-born conductor and composer who has lived in the United Kingdom since 1961. He has written music for more than 100 television programmes, but is best known for creating music to accompany si ...

and producer

Philip Hinchcliffe Philip Michael Hinchcliffe (born October 1944) is a retired English television producer, screenwriter and script editor. After graduating from Cambridge University, he began his career as a writer and script editor at Associated Television befo ...

Cast

* Private Gerhard Schulz –

* Major Neuheim, Gerald Melfort, Stanley Kemp –

* Bertha Freya – Billie Whitelaw * Gertrude Steiner –

Rula Lenska Rula Lenska (born Róża Maria Leopoldyna Łubieńska, 30 September 1947) is a British actress. She mainly appears in British stage and television productions and is known in the United States for a series of television advertisements in the 19 ...

* Iphraim "Solly" Solikoff –

Cyril Shaps Cyril Leonard Shaps (13 October 1923 – 1 January 2003) was an English actor of radio, television and film, with a career spanning over seven decades. Early radio Shaps was born in the East End of London to Polish-Jewish parents; his father ...

* Schumacher – Terence Suffolk * Professor Bodelschwingh – David Swift * Herr Krauss – Ken Campbell

Episodes

Reception

Michael Elphick's performance was praised in a 1983 review in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' and noted the script by the late Jack Pulman "manages to be almost wickedly clever as it hones in on the foibles of not only the Germans but also of the British."

Novelization

Concurrent with the airing of the miniseries,

New English Library The New English Library was a United Kingdom book publishing company, which became an imprint of Hodder Headline. History New English Library (NEL) was created in 1961 by the Times Mirror Company of Los Angeles, with the takeover of two small ...

issued a prose adaptation of Pulman's scripts by career novelizer Martin Noble, under the title Jack Pulman's Private Schulz, with Noble by-lined on the title page, but not the cover. An unusually expansive and stylish adaptation, it contains additional plot twists, characters and historical context; notes left by Pulman indicate that the latter was especially important to him: he thought it vital to particularize the backdrop against which the outlandish forgery scheme (based on actual events) could have been conceived and carried out. It would have figured into his own novelization, but he had completed only a few chapters before he died. The original edition of Noble's novel was very well received and became a

London Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper ''The Sunday Times'' (f ...

bestseller. In 2015, Noble, through his own publishing company, Aesop Modern, released a newly revised and expanded edition of the novelization, this time with his novelist by-line prominently displayed on the front, in hardcover, trade paperback and ebook format. It remains in print.

References

External links

Classic 80's TV – Private Schulz

BBC4 page on Private Schulz

Operation Bernard – Background Information
* {{IMDb title, 0081919 British television miniseries 1980s British drama television series English-language television shows BBC television dramas World War II television drama series