Harold Pinter

Writing

Harold Pinter

Born 1930-10-10 · Hackney, London, England, UK

Harold Pinter CH CBE (10 October 1930 – 24 December 2008) was a British playwright, screenwriter, director and actor. A Nobel Prize winner, Pinter was one of the most influential modern British dramatists with a writing career that spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party (1957), The Homecoming (1964), and Betrayal (1978), each of which he adapted for the screen. His screenplay adaptations of others' works include The Servant (1963), The Go-Between (1971), The French Lieutenant's Woman (1981), The Trial (1993), and Sleuth (2007). He also directed or acted in radio, stage, television, and film productions of his own and others' works. Pinter was born and raised in Hackney, east London, and educated at Hackney Downs School. He was a sprinter and a keen cricket player, acting in school plays and writing poetry. He attended the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art but did not complete the course. He was fined for refusing national service as a conscientious objector. Subsequently, he continued training at the Central School of Speech and Drama and worked in repertory theatre in Ireland and England. In 1956 he married actress Vivien Merchant and had a son, Daniel, born in 1958. He left Merchant in 1975 and married author Lady Antonia Fraser in 1980. Pinter's career as a playwright began with a production of The Room in 1957. His second play, The Birthday Party, closed after eight performances, but was enthusiastically reviewed by critic Harold Hobson. His early works were described by critics as "comedy of menace". Later plays such as No Man's Land (1975) and Betrayal (1978) became known as "memory plays". He appeared as an actor in productions of his own work on radio and film. He also undertook a number of roles in works by other writers. He directed nearly 50 productions for stage, theatre and screen. Pinter received over 50 awards, prizes, and other honours, including the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2005 and the French Légion d'honneur in 2007. Despite frail health after being diagnosed with oesophageal cancer in December 2001, Pinter continued to act on stage and screen, last performing the title role of Samuel Beckett's one-act monologue Krapp's Last Tape, for the 50th anniversary season of the Royal Court Theatre, in October 2006. He died from liver cancer on 24 December 2008. Description above from the Wikipedia article Harold Pinter, licensed under CC-BY-SA, full list of contributors on Wikipedia

Acting credits

The Tailor of Panama poster
6.0

A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a nefarious past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the Panamanian president and a huge debt. The mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Canal.

The Tailor of Panama

2001

Sleuth poster
6.3

Locked in a high-tech English manor, bound in a deadly duel of wits, Andrew Wyke and Milo Tindle come together as English gentlemen to discuss the matter of Wyke's wife: the woman both are sleeping with.

Sleuth

2007

Wit poster
7.3

A renowned professor is forced to reassess her life when she is diagnosed with terminal ovarian cancer.

Wit

2001

The Servant poster
7.6

An indolent aristocrat gets more than he bargained for when he hires a competent but silently devious manservant.

The Servant

1963

Mansfield Park poster
6.7

Fanny Price is sent to live with her wealthy relatives, the Bertrams, where she is treated poorly by most except her cousin Edmund. Her life is complicated by the arrival of the worldly Mary and Henry Crawford.

Mansfield Park

1999

Check the Gate: Putting Beckett on Film poster
10.0

Follows the "Beckett on Film" project, which produced film adaptations of writer Samuel Beckett's nineteen stage plays. The documentary features excerpts from the "Beckett on Film" versions of "Not I", "Krapp's Last Tape", "Endgame", "What Where", and "Waiting for Godot".

Check the Gate: Putting Beckett on Film

2003

Mad About the Boy: The Noël Coward Story poster
6.4

The extraordinary life of playwright, singer, actor, composer, and director Noël Coward, who rose from poverty to stardom while keeping his sexuality a secret. Featuring Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Frank Sinatra, Michael Caine and Lucille Ball. Narrated by Alan Cumming. With Rupert Everett as the voice of Noël Coward. Directed by Academy Award Nominee Barnaby Thompson.

Mad About the Boy: The Noël Coward Story

2023

Turtle Diary poster
6.3

Two separate people, a man and a woman, find something very stirring about the sea turtles in their tank at the London Zoo. They meet and form an odd, but sympathetic camaraderie as they plan to steal two of the turtles and free them into the ocean.

Turtle Diary

1985

Catastrophe poster
6.4

An autocratic Director (Harold Pinter) and his Assistant (Rebecca Pidgeon) put the final touches to the last scene of some kind of dramatic presentation, which consists entirely of a man (John Gielgud) standing still onstage.

Catastrophe

2001

Mojo poster
4.7

The sexual rivalries over a new, potentially great rock'n'roll singer between a nightclub owner and a local gangster cause unrest and eventually lead to murder.

Mojo

1997

Accident poster
6.4

Stephen is a professor at Oxford University who is caught in a rut and feels trapped by his life in both academia and marriage. One of his students, William, is engaged to the beautiful Anna, and Stephen becomes enamored of the younger woman. These three people become linked together by a horrible car crash, with flashbacks providing details into the lives of each person and their connection to the others in this brooding English drama.

Accident

1967

The Birthday Party poster
6.8

It is Stanley's birthday, but the party he is given is not quite what he expects. [A BBC production broadcast on the Theatre Night series.]

The Birthday Party

1987

The Caretaker poster
7.4

Aston, a quiet, reserved man, lives alone in a top-floor cluttered room of a small abandoned house in a poor London district. He befriends and takes in Mac Davies, an old derelict who has been fired from a menial job in a café. In time Aston offers him a job as caretaker of the house. Aston's brother, Mick - a taunting, quasi-sadist - harasses the derelict when his brother is away, countermanding his orders...

The Caretaker

1964

Rogue Male poster
6.5

In 1939, Sir Robert Thorndyke takes aim at Adolf Hitler with a high powered rifle, but the shot misses its mark. Captured and tortured by the Gestapo and left for dead, Sir Robert makes his way back to England where he discovers the Gestapo has followed him. Knowing that his government would turn him over to German authorities, Sir Robert goes underground in his battle with his pursuers.

Rogue Male

1976

Michael Redgrave: My Father poster
NR

Corin Redgrave presents a portrait of his father, Michael Redgrave, exploring his personality, nature and what he was like as a father. He uses family photographs and letters and his father's diaries and autobiography, and produces a picture of a complicated and troubled man who was bisexual, a heavy drinker and emotionally distant and cold as a father. Includes contributions from Vanessa and Lynn Redgrave and Rachel Kempson, as well as Harold Pinter and Diana Menuhin. Also contains clips from several of Michael Redgrave's films.

Michael Redgrave: My Father

1997

No artwork available
NR

A unique look into the creative process of playwright Harold Pinter, featuring unprecedented access to him rehearsing scenes with actors, giving masterclasses, and being interviewed by his friend Henry Woolf.

Working with Pinter

2007

Breaking the Code poster
5.6

A biography of the English mathematician Alan Turing, who was one of the inventors of the digital computer and one of the key figures in the breaking of the Enigma code, used by the Germans to send secret orders to their U-boats in World War II. Turing was also a homosexual in Britain at a time when this was illegal, besides being a security risk.

Breaking the Code

1996

Harold Pinter:  A Celebration poster
8.0

In June 2009, a group Britain's leading actors gathered for one night only to perform a celebration of the work of Harold Pinter at the National Theatre, directed by Ian Rickson. The team who made the acclaimed Harold Pinter documentaries for BBC's Arena was there to record this unique performance.

Harold Pinter: A Celebration

2010

Poets Against the Bomb poster
NR

An event organised by CND pits the bomb against poetry. Hear artists who hoped that words and rhymes could put an end to destructive times.

Poets Against the Bomb

1981

The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer poster
6.0

Fresh-faced young Michael Rimmer worms his way into an opinion poll company and is soon running the place. He uses this as a springboard to get into politics and in the mini-skirted flared-trousered world of 1970 Britain starts to rise through the Tory ranks.

The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer

1970

Langrishe, Go Down poster
4.4

In the late 1930s, three reclusive middle-aged spinster sisters live on their run down family estate in Ireland. Otto Beck, a perpetual graduate student from Bavaria with a habit of making pompous declamations, rents the back lodge to work on his esoteric thesis. Imogen Langrishe, the least repressed of the sisters, begins an affair with Otto. Imogen takes the love affair seriously, but Otto just enjoys the cheap lodging and the comfort of Imogen.

Langrishe, Go Down

1978

The Basement poster
NR

An uneasy friendship between an introspective loner and a more gregarious man is renewed when the latter turns up at the former's basement flat one rainy night accompanied by an enigmatic, beautiful, mostly silent, girlfriend.

The Basement

1967

In Camera poster
5.6

A 1964 BBC adaptation of Sartre's "No Exit."

In Camera

1964

A Night Out poster
7.0

Against the wishes of his domineering mother, Albert Stokes attends a work party. But the evening is not the escape he was hoping for.

A Night Out

1960

Behind the camera

The Handmaid's Tale poster
6.1

In a dystopian, polluted right-wing religious tyranny, a young woman is put in sexual slavery on account of her now rare fertility.

The Handmaid's Tale

1990

Sleuth poster
6.3

Locked in a high-tech English manor, bound in a deadly duel of wits, Andrew Wyke and Milo Tindle come together as English gentlemen to discuss the matter of Wyke's wife: the woman both are sleeping with.

Sleuth

2007

The Comfort of Strangers poster
5.9

An Italian diplomat's son follows and seduces English lovers in Venice.

The Comfort of Strangers

1990

The French Lieutenant's Woman poster
6.5

In this story-within-a-story, Anna is an actress starring opposite Mike in a period piece about the forbidden love between their respective characters, Sarah and Charles. Both actors are involved in serious relationships, but the passionate nature of the script leads to an off-camera love affair as well. While attempting to maintain their composure and professionalism, Anna and Mike struggle to come to terms with their infidelity.

The French Lieutenant's Woman

1981

The Servant poster
7.6

An indolent aristocrat gets more than he bargained for when he hires a competent but silently devious manservant.

The Servant

1963

The Go-Between poster
6.8

British teenager Leo Colston spends a summer in the countryside, where he develops a crush on the beautiful young aristocrat Marian. Eager to impress her, Leo becomes the "go-between" for Marian, delivering secret romantic letters to Ted Burgess, a handsome neighboring farmer.

The Go-Between

1971

The Last Tycoon poster
6.3

Monroe Stahr, a successful movie producer, pursues a beautiful and elusive young woman — all the while working himself to death.

The Last Tycoon

1976

The Trial poster
6.0

Joseph K. awakes one morning, to find two strange men in his room, telling him he has been arrested. Joseph is not told what he is charged with, and despite being "arrested," is allowed to remain free and go to work. But despite the strange nature of his arrest, Joseph soon learns that his trial, however odd, is very real, and tries desperately to spare himself from the court's judgement.

The Trial

1993

Turtle Diary poster
6.3

Two separate people, a man and a woman, find something very stirring about the sea turtles in their tank at the London Zoo. They meet and form an odd, but sympathetic camaraderie as they plan to steal two of the turtles and free them into the ocean.

Turtle Diary

1985

The Quiller Memorandum poster
5.9

After two British Secret Intelligence Service agents are murdered at the hands of a cryptic neo-Nazi group known as Phoenix, the suave agent Quiller is sent to Berlin to investigate.

The Quiller Memorandum

1966

Accident poster
6.4

Stephen is a professor at Oxford University who is caught in a rut and feels trapped by his life in both academia and marriage. One of his students, William, is engaged to the beautiful Anna, and Stephen becomes enamored of the younger woman. These three people become linked together by a horrible car crash, with flashbacks providing details into the lives of each person and their connection to the others in this brooding English drama.

Accident

1967

Tea Party poster
7.0

Mysteries abound. What is going on between the wife and her brother? Are they indeed brother and sister? Sisson has his doubts about that … . Why does Sisson feel that there must be something wrong with his eyes, although he knows that he can see clearly and his eye doctor has assured him that his vision is perfect? He forces his secretary to tie a chiffon scarf over his eyes, and then he is able to make a pass at her, in response to one of her many come-ons. Ordinary events assume a sinister tinge. Sisson's two sons, giving him the deadpan treatment that little boys have been inflicting on their elders from time immemorial, seem as eerie as characters out of a ghost story. Always the questions remain. Is there a conspiracy against Sisson. Wikipedia

Tea Party

1965

The Pumpkin Eater poster
6.7

Jo, the mother of seven children, divorces her second husband in order to marry Jake, a successful but promiscuous screenwriter. Though they are physically and emotionally compatible, they are slowly torn apart.

The Pumpkin Eater

1964

The Birthday Party poster
6.8

It is Stanley's birthday, but the party he is given is not quite what he expects. [A BBC production broadcast on the Theatre Night series.]

The Birthday Party

1987

The Dwarfs poster
4.7

A young actor and an angst-ridden city worker fight over a girl watched over by a disturbed chum. The play is concerned with three young men, Len, Pete and Mark, and the scene of action shifts back and forth between Len's house and Mark's. Sometimes all three come together, sometimes only two, and often Len is on stage alone. There are conversations and soliloquies filled with the brilliant convolutions of thought, the sudden flashes of truth which distinguish Pinter's unique style, with the mood ranging from calm introspection to explosive outpouring. Much of what is said hints at deeper thoughts left unspoken, and the sense of horror and alienation which often emerges is a searing indictment of our life and times. We meet, we talk, we tear at each other, but our insularity is seldom penetrated. We are together but alone, as though life were a mirror which reflects only our own image.

The Dwarfs

2002

The Collection poster
4.4

Set in the rarefied world of West End boutique owners and fashion designers, The Collection takes as its departure point the moment when four elegant lives are suddenly shaken by the suggestion of infidelity. The sinister anonymous phone call that disturbs Harry Kane at four o'clock in the morning becomes increasingly hard to establish...

The Collection

1976

No artwork available
NR

An elderly homosexual and a married woman are both intrigued by the same man.

The Collection

Betrayal poster
6.1

An affair between a literary agent and his best friend's wife, unfolding in reverse-chronological order.

Betrayal

1983

The Caretaker poster
7.4

Aston, a quiet, reserved man, lives alone in a top-floor cluttered room of a small abandoned house in a poor London district. He befriends and takes in Mac Davies, an old derelict who has been fired from a menial job in a café. In time Aston offers him a job as caretaker of the house. Aston's brother, Mick - a taunting, quasi-sadist - harasses the derelict when his brother is away, countermanding his orders...

The Caretaker

1964

The Dumb Waiter poster
9.0

Two hit-men, Ben and Gus, are waiting in a basement room for their assignment. As the play begins, Ben, the senior member of the team, is reading a newspaper, and Gus, the junior member, is tying his shoes. Gus asks Ben many questions as he gets ready for their job and tries to make tea.

The Dumb Waiter

1999

The Caretaker poster
NR

The story of two brothers and a tramp. Harold Pinter's first major success as a dramatist.

The Caretaker

1981

Reunion poster
6.7

Attorney Henry Strauss grew up in Germany, but left the country with his Jewish family during the rise of the Third Reich. Still wondering about what happened to his boyhood friend Konradin Von Lohenburg, Strauss travels back to Germany for the first time since he was a young man, bringing up some painful memories.

Reunion

1989

Basements poster
6.8

Basements is the title for the omnibus film that brings together two plays by Harold Pinter – The Dumb Waiter and The Room – each, once again, set in a single location.

Basements

1987

No Man's Land poster
7.0

'No Man's Land' is a play by Harold Pinter written in 1974 and first performed in 1975. In this 1978, TV adaptation, a seedy poet shows up at the home of a rich writer and they start reminiscing about the 'past,' in a menacing, Pinteresque fashion.

No Man's Land

1978