The 1905 children’s novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett was initially adapted for BBC1 for a six-part Sunday teatime series in 1973, starring Deborah Makepeace as Sara Crewe and Ruth Dunning as Miss Minchin.
This six-part 1986 adaptation from London Weekend Television starred Amelia Shankley as the sensitive and imaginative Sara, a 10-year-old girl who is brought to London by her father, a wealthy young captain in the Indian army.
He places her in a girls boarding school – Miss Minchin’s Select Seminary for Young Ladies – where the principal, Miss Minchin (Maureen Lipman), is a shallow, ignorant, two-faced woman, easily impressed by money and rank. Her sister, Miss Amelia (Miriam Margolyes), is no better.
Sara’s pampered life (a wardrobe full of furs and silks and a French maid) suddenly vanishes when her father dies, having lost his entire fortune in a speculative diamond mine investment.
Without any family to turn to, Sara must sleep in a cold attic and endure cruelty and hardship as an overworked maidservant at the school, serving the girls who used to envy her.
Carrisford (Nigel Havers) is the only one who can save Sara from a life of misery.
An inferior 1995 feature film version from Warner Bros. (with Liesel Matthews as Sara and Eleanor Bron as Miss Minchin) transferred the setting from London to New York and changed the story to include a police chase, a musical number, and Sara’s father returning from the dead with amnesia!
Sara Crewe
Amelia Shankley Miss Minchin
Maureen Lipman Miss Amelia
Miriam Margolyes Cook
Annette Badland Becky
Natalie Abbott Ermengarde
Alison Reynolds Lavinia
Katrina Heath Jessie
Joanna Dukes Henrietta
Johanna Hargreaves Lottie
Jessica Simpson Carrisford
Nigel Havers Captain Ralph Crewe
David Yelland Mr Carmichael
John Bird Mrs Carmichael
Annie Lambert Ram Dass
Antony Zaki Anna
Meera Syal Donald
Christopher Haley Janet
Zoe Mair Nora
Alessia Gwyther
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He places her in a girls boarding school – Miss Minchin’s Select Seminary for Young Ladies – where the principal, Miss Minchin (Maureen Lipman), is a shallow, ignorant, two-faced woman, easily impressed by money and rank. Her sister, Miss Amelia (Miriam Margolyes), is no better.
Sara Crewe
Lavinia
