In 1955, an hour-long live television play called A Man Is Ten Feet Tall was broadcast on Philco Television Playhouse with Sidney Poitier starring as stevedore Tommy Tyler.
The story was then expanded for Poitier as Edge of the City.
Drifter Axel North (John Cassavetes) arrives in New York and is given the name of Charlie Malick (Jack Warden) as a contact by an acquaintance and finds a job working as a railroad freight handler in Charlie’s gang on the dockyards.
Charlie is corrupt and brutally intimidates his gang to take a cut of their wages. He is also a racist and hates his fellow gang boss, a black man named Tommy Tyler (Poitier).
Tommy befriends Axel and takes him into his team to get him out from under Charlie’s thumb.
He gradually learns that Axel’s real surname is Nordmann, that he has deserted from the Army, that he is at odds with his police officer father, and that he has a guilt complex of being responsible for the death of his beloved older brother Andy in an automobile accident.
Tommy and his wife Lucy (Ruby Dee) try to set Axel up with their schoolteacher friend Ellen Wilson (Kathleen Maguire).
When Malick kills Tommy in a fierce fight with bailing hooks, Axel initially goes along with the other workers in refusing to admit anything to the police.
The finale sees Axel go into action – knowing perfectly well that he will go to prison as a deserter – proving that Tommy’s friendship had truly been a source of inner strength for him.
Axel North/Nordmann
John Cassavetes Tommy “TT” Tyler
Sidney Poitier Charlie Malick
Jack Warden Ellen Wilson
Kathleen Maguire Lucy Tyler
Ruby Dee Brother
Val Avery George Nordmann
Robert F. Simon Katherine Nordmann
Ruth White Davis
William A. Lee Detective
John Kellogg Wallace
David Clarke Mrs Price
Estelle Hemsley
Director
Martin Ritt
Video
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The story was then expanded for Poitier as Edge of the City. 
He gradually learns that Axel’s real surname is Nordmann, that he has deserted from the Army, that he is at odds with his police officer father, and that he has a guilt complex of being responsible for the death of his beloved older brother Andy in an automobile accident.
