Nicholas Nickleby (1977)

Nigel Havers stars as the young Nicholas Nickleby in the BBC’s triumphant adaptation of one of Charles Dickens’ most celebrated novels. Upon the death of his father Nicholas, along with his mother and sister, finds himself destitute and at the mercy of his stern Uncle Ralph. Ralph cruelly dispatches his niece to a dressmaking establishment, while Nicholas is sent to a vile and oppressive boarding school for unwanted and unloved children run by the sadistic Wackford Squeers. Darkly satirical, angry, funny and hugely entertaining, Nicholas Nickleby is filled with the richest assortment of oddball characters that could only have originated from the quill of Charles Dickens.