No room for Room at the Top?

Anyone turning on BBC Four last night expecting to watch the first episode of Room at the Top will, at least in part, have got what they were expecting: lashings of sex. Only one problem. It wasn't in Room at the Top. Owing to a late-blooming rights dispute, the BBC decided on the day of broadcast not to go ahead with their new adaptation of John Braine's 1957 novel. On the principle that if you would have liked that, then you'll like this, they had a rummage in the archives and produced a rabbit: their version of Fanny Hill, first broadcast in 2008.

It's a shame the BBC didn't get their legal ducks in a row any sooner. Room at the Top would have come hot on the heels of the festival of copulation that was Women in Love: another week, another northern novel about working-class libidos. Braine's debut novel remains his most widely read and best remembered work. It was lassooed into that loose formation of agitating works by the so-called Angry Young Men. The hopes for self-betterment of his aspirational hero Joe Lampton, a young accountant on the make, embodied those of an entire generation: having contributed to the war effort, they were now gagging for a piece of the action. That meant climbing the social ladder, and having a lot of sex on the way up.

Braine's novel went on touching a nerve for 15 years. Two years after publication the book became even better known for Jack Clayton's screen version. Laurence Harvey as Braine’s working-class hero got an Oscar nomination despite a northern accent that came via Lithuania and South Africa. As his married lover Alice, it famously featured the even more exotically miscast Franco-German Simone Signoret (see clip below).

Watch a clip from Jack Clayton's film Room at the Top

Braine revisited Joe Lampton in his third novel, Life at the Top (1962). By now his hero had clambered up the greasy pole to the eponymous heights but was still chancing his arm with the ladies. Harvey returned to the role in the 1965 film version, also starring Jean Simmons and Honor Blackman playing a script by the Canadian Jewish novelist Mordecai Richler. The screen rights were acquired by Thames in 1970 and resulted in Man at the Top, the sitcom version starring Kenneth Haigh which ran for 26 episodes (see clip below). There was a film spin-off in 1973, also starring Nanette Newman.

Watch a clip from TV sitcom Man at the Top

And that was it for Joe Lampton's long social and sexual odyssey. Braine died in 1986, aged 64. The BBC chose to return to the novel with a version written by Amanda Coe (previously responsible for TV biopics of Elizabeth David and Mary Whitehouse) and directed by Aisling Walsh (Wallander, Fingersmith). Pat Braine, the author's widow, gave the nod for the BBC adaptation. But the ownership of the screen rights have been claimed by another producer. Given Joe Lampton's complex and eventful back story, this is maybe less than surprising. A BBC spokesman has said this: "Transmission of Room at the Top has been postponed while we address a potential contractual issue which has emerged in the last few days."

For the record, I watched the first episode wondering if we really needed to hear yet more from Joe Lampton, whose battle for social advancement and sexual self-expression have long since stopped holding up a mirror to society. But I came away thinking that, yes, there’s certainly still room for Room at the Top. Just not on your TV. Or not yet.