Michael Gill
Production
Biography
Michael Gill was born on December 10, 1923 in Winchester, Hampshire, England as George Michael Gill. He was a producer and director. Gill was born in Winchester, Hampshire but was brought up in Canterbury. He contracted tuberculosis as a child which disrupted his education severely; he spent four years in a spinal chair. He served in the RAF in Intelligence during the war. One of his most memorable debriefings was interrogating a German who had survived a 20,000 feet (6,100 m) fall over the Netherlands without his parachute having opened. His memoir of the war years, Growing into War, was published in 2005. After the war he studied philosophy and psychology at the University of Edinburgh. After a period as a sub-editor and arts reviewer on The Scotsman, he joined the BBC in 1954. He worked first on radio but soon moved to television. He is chiefly remembered for Civilisation: A Personal View by Kenneth Clark (1969) (director and co-producer) and Alistair Cooke's America (1973) (director and producer). Although the idea for Civilisation and its presenter, Kenneth Clark, were given to Gill, 'America', and the choice of presenter were entirely Gill's idea. In total Gill made more than 150 films for television and cinema, and won more than 40 major international awards.
Known For
Sir Kenneth Clark guides us through the ages exploring the glorious rise of civilisation in western man. Beginning with the bleakness of the dark ages to the present day, we consider civilisation's articulations and expressions in some of man's finest works of art.
Civilisation
A sheep-rancher's son aspires to win a music conservatory scholarship, but to apply he needs musicians who can play his music. Circumstances lead him to form a band out of prison inmates.
Broken Hill
Nathan Zuckerman, a budding 23 year old writer infatuated with the Great Books, discovers the contradictory claims of literature and experience while an overnight guest in the secluded New England farmhouse of his idol, E. I. Lonoff. Also staying is Amy Bellette, a young woman with a vague past.
The Ghost Writer
A film fantasy concerning the adventures of a modern girl whose passion for peaches is eventually replaced by a very different type of passion.
The Peaches
First transmitted in 1972, Alistair Cooke's America was a series of thirteen, fifty-minute films in colour, written and narrated by Alistair Cooke. The programmes trace the history of the United States from the early voyages of discovery to the present.
America: A Personal History of the United States
Back in 1977, Dillon filmed Hillary and crew (including son Peter Hillary) as they jet boated from the mouth of the Ganges to the base of the Himalayas, then set out to climb peak Akash Parbat. Dillon has remastered existing and unseen footage, and interviewed crew members about Hillary's last big expedition.