BBC 1980 Oppenheimer Mini Series

[bob012345]

There is a 1980 BBC eight part miniseries called Oppenheimer streaming on Tubi ( free) starring Sam Waterston as Oppenheimer and David Suchet as Teller.

 

[.Scott]

I saw it about 9 months ago

 

[Klystron]

There is a 1980 BBC eight part miniseries called Oppenheimer streaming on Tubi ( free) starring Sam Waterston as Oppenheimer and David Suchet as Teller.

Good information on a fascinating subject. I watched this series years ago on PBS. Although I have yet to see the recent movie "Oppenheimer", Sam Waterston's sensitive portrayal of Oppie lives as a truly great performance.

I watched the PBS series with university friends and roommates including a nurse who happened to be treating the actual Edward Teller at Stanford Medical Center. She thought David Suchet totally captured Teller's essence and urbanity.

Coincidentally. a sister PBS station was broadcasting an ambitious Indian production of the "Mahabharata" comprised, if memory serves, of over 70 episodes. I particularly enjoyed the "Bhagavad Ghita" chapters where Lord Vishnu taking on his aspect of a charioteer warns Prince Arjuna of the devastating finality of total war.

Oppie famously quotes this scripture while observing the first nuclear bomb detonation at Trinity in 1945. "Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds.".

Here is composer Jocelyn Pook's rendition in her album 'Flood', sampling Oppie's voice from a recorded interview juxtaposed with Latin prayers and Arab laments. (Note: YouTube may insert a commercial.)