So farewell to Richard Chamberlain. Dr Kildare and pioneer of the blockbuster TV miniseries - particularly Shogun. He also had to pretend to be straight for decades as Hollywood, and the public, could not tolerate its leading men being gay. But I will always love him as Aramis in Richard Lester’s ‘The Three Musketeers’ and ‘Four Musketeers’ from 1973 and 1974 (although they were actually shot together in 1973). As a 9 and 10 yr old when these films came out, I thought that Richard Chamberlain, Frank Findlay, Oli Reed and Michael York were just the coolest actors around - and I still do. I love these films far more than they deserve but hey.
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Thorn Birds, although not for Richard Chamberlain if I’m honest.
RIP.
G
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I remember Shogun with affection. Dr Kildare is a childhood memory but only because I think my Mum watched it for the handsome Dr.
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I remember Shogun with many cringe moments. 
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Yes, I loved that series. I bought it on DVD a few years ago but haven’t fully viewed it with a more modern outlook.
How so, lack of authenticity or something else?
In 2014 he returned to the stage for a play presented by the theater company I am involved with. I got to meet him. He seemed a true gentleman. Here he is with Bill Pullman and Holly Hunter.
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Loved his distasteful character in The Towering Inferno.
I remember that film being featured on ‘Clapperboard’ on kids TV !
ps @crispyduck - I also met Michael York.
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I blame the script writer mostly. The whole production did not look genuine.
It was the 1970’s - of course it didn’t look authentic!
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I very much liked his performance in Shogun, as well as The thorn birds. RIP.
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I am curious. Did you see the 2024 version of Shogun? Did you like it?
I was young when I saw it, just really enjoyed it at the time and no benchmark to form critical opinions. Like many older things they don’t live up to modern production standards but many were a lot more fun.
It was released in 1980.
For the same era Kurosawa’s Ran felt more genuine even tho it was highly stylised visually and script for sure was more authentic than a poor English translated dialogue.
Yep! I have them both on DVD. Cracking movies.
Also have the Shogun series!
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Thanks for the pedantic correction. I think that comparing a US made miniseries with a Japanese made film from the greatest Japanese director is a bit of an unfair fight - no?
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I have a lot of Kurosawa DVDs….and Toshiro Mishune!
(By order of the management, I have to reduce my DVD collection by half……but certain sets are sacrosanct…. Star Wars, LoTR/Hobbit, Kurosawa, Toshiro……. 
)
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Whatever the merits or otherwise of the TV Show it really made me as a teenager very interested in the culture, something which has remained with me for years even if I can’t comment on authenticity as an ‘outsider’.
There is so much we can learn from different cultures, it saddens me how little we all generally embrace these things. Or so it seems…
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