Film theatre revisits the golden era of the television play

ITV once commissioned a young Harold Pinter to write a television play even though his theatrical debut, The Birthday Party, had recently been panned by critics.

The Lover, the work Pinter produced for ITV in 1963 (or Associated-Rediffusion as it was known), is one of the highlights of a new season at the National Film Theatre, London, dedicated to the glory days of the television play. The season will include work from a roll-call of writers, including John Osborne and Dennis Potter; actors, including Glenda Jackson and Juliet Stevenson; and directors, including Stephen Frears and Richard Eyre. Most are better known for work on film or stage, and many made clear at the launch of the season that they thought the golden era of Armchair Theatre and the Wednesday Play in the 1960s and 1970s was over.

About four years ago, when Pinter offered the BBC his latest work, Ashes to Ashes, the corporation didn't even call back. "I have a good record with the BBC. But these were totally different people [from ones I dealt with before]," he said.

David Hare, who is riding high with his film adaptation of The Hours, spoke of the days when television plays could attract eight million viewers and everybody talked about them the next day. "[Plays] galvanised people in the most extraordinary way," he said. "Now when you see drama on TV, it's nervous ... There's no individual voice." Truly Madly Deeply, Enchanted April and Priest all started out on television.

But Stephen Poliakoff, whose The Lost Prince was watched by eight million viewers this year, said: "It's all to do with fashion. Things go in cycles." Dick Fiddy, the organiser of the season, said the launch of BBC4 – which has broadcast a season of other Pinter works – and BBC1's recent experiment with afternoon plays suggested hope was not lost.

The National Film Theatre season runs until summer. It includes A Subject of Scandal and Concern, Osborne's first TV play, Poliakoff's first television work, Stronger than the Sun and Mike Leigh's Nuts in May.