NET Playhouse Biography; Harriet Beecher Stowe
- Series
- NET Playhouse Biography
- Episode
- Harriet Beecher Stowe
- Producing Organization
- Educational Broadcasting Corporation. NET Division
- Contributing Organization
- Library of Congress (Washington, District of Columbia)
- AAPB ID
- cpb-aacip/512-jw86h4dq1d
- NOLA Code
- NPBH
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- Description
- Episode Description
- 90 minute piece, produced by NET Division, Educational Broadcasting Corporation and initially distributed by NET in 1972. It was originally shot in color.
- Episode Description
- Cannes Film Festival award-winner Kitty Winn plays the title role in this NET adaptation of the 1943 Broadway drama Harriet, based on the life of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of the momentous novel Uncle Toms Cabin. Co-starring are Richard Dysart as Harriets husband, the scholarly Calvin Stowe, and Madeleine Sherwood as her benevolent but domineering sister, Catherine, along with Barnard Hughes, Paul Hecht, Kendall March, and Gretchen Corbett. Miss Winn, named best actress at Cannes last year as co-star of Panic in Needle Park, fills a demanding role that requires the 27-year-old star to portray her subject as a young, middle-aged, and elderly woman. The same role afforded Helen Hayes one of her greatest triumphs in the Broadway production, directed by Eliz Kazan. Uncle Toms Cabin, published as installments in an anti-slavery paper in 1851 and as a separate volume a short time later, is perhaps unrivaled in its impact on the American people. As a graphic depiction of the tragedies of slavery, the story fired up an era already made turbulent by the slavery issue, and its publication is sometimes described as an important step toward the Civil War. Harriet centers its drama upon the long-standing inner conflict which had preceded and accompanied Mrs. Stowes writing of Uncle Toms Cabin. By nature a woman who dreaded controversy and public censure, she finally undertook the novel after her own terrifying encounter with slavers who wrenched a runaway Black woman from her home. Harriet has been adapted for television by Peabody Award-winning producer Jacqueline Babbin from the original script by Florence Ryerson and Colin Clements. Directing for TV is Tom Donovan. Miss Babbin last year produced Arthur Millers A Memory of Two Mondays for the NET Playhouse on the Thirties series. She won a Peabody Award as producer of Outpost in the Dupont Show of the Week series, and in 1970 her production of JT, a CBS Childrens Hour special, won a Peabody for its screenplay by Jane Wagner. Harriet is a production of NET Division, Educational Broadcasting Corporation. NET Playhouse Biography is made possible in part by grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Transmitted nationally by PBS, the Public Broadcasting Service. (Description adapted from documents in the NET Microfiche)
- Broadcast Date
- 1972-02-03
- Asset type
- Episode
- Genres
- Drama
- Topics
- Biography
- Media type
- Moving Image
- Credits
-
-
Actor:
Hecht, Paul
Actor: Hughes, Barnard
Actor: Roerick, William
Actor: Harkins, John
Actor: March, Kendall
Actor: Winn, Kitty
Actor: Corbett, Gretchen
Actor: Sweet, Dolph
Actor: Dysart, Richard
Actor: Sherwood, Madeleine
Actor: Kohane, Lisa
Actor: Bethea, Juanita
Actor: Bellaran, Ray
Actor: Davis, Daniel
Actor: Germain, Stuart
Director: Donovan, Tom
Executive Producer: Venza, Jac
Producer: Babbin, Jacqueline
Producing Organization: Educational Broadcasting Corporation. NET Division
Writer: Ryerson, Florence
Writer: Clements, Colin, 1894-1948
- AAPB Contributor Holdings
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2275749-1 (MAVIS Item ID)
Format: 2 inch videotape
Generation: Master
Color: Color
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2275749-2 (MAVIS Item ID)
Generation: Master
-
Library of Congress
Identifier: 2275749-3 (MAVIS Item ID)
Generation: Copy: Access
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- Citations
- Chicago: “NET Playhouse Biography; Harriet Beecher Stowe,” 1972-02-03, Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC, accessed April 29, 2026, http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-jw86h4dq1d.
- MLA: “NET Playhouse Biography; Harriet Beecher Stowe.” 1972-02-03. Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Web. April 29, 2026. <http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-jw86h4dq1d>.
- APA: NET Playhouse Biography; Harriet Beecher Stowe. Boston, MA: Library of Congress, American Archive of Public Broadcasting (GBH and the Library of Congress), Boston, MA and Washington, DC. Retrieved from http://americanarchive.org/catalog/cpb-aacip-512-jw86h4dq1d