The Naked Civil Servant is the first volume of autobiography by the gay icon Quentin Crisp and a television drama based on the book. The book started life as a radio interview with Crisp in 1964 conducted by his friend and fellow eccentric, Philip O'Connor, which was heard by the then managing director of Jonathan Cape commissioned by him and appeared in 1968.
The television version was a British television drama, 90 minutes long and produced by Thames Television for the ITV network, with John Hurt playing Crisp from youth to middle age. It was directed by Jack Gold, written by Philip Mackie and produced by Verity Lambert, and was originally transmitted on December 17 1975.
For his performance, Hurt won the British Academy Television Award for Best Actor in 1976. The production won the 1976 Prix Italia and in 2000 was placed fourth in a poll of industry professionals conducted by the British Film Institute to find the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century.
The life and times of Quentin Crisp, an outrageous and flamboyant homosexual, coming of age and growing into old age in conservative England. Written by Chris Abbenhuis
