Movie of the Week

Jesus of Nazareth is a 1977 Anglo–Italian television miniseries dramatizing the birth, life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus based on the accounts in the four New Testament Gospels. The miniseries was directed by Franco Zeffirelli, and produced by Lew Grade through his ITC Entertainment company. Zeffirelli co-wrote the screenplay with Anthony Burgess and Suso Cecchi d’Amico. It was filmed entirely on location in Tunisia and Morocco. The total runtime is nearly six hours, twenty minutes. The origin of the miniseries dates back to a conversation Zeffirelli, who is Roman Catholic, had with Pope Paul VI some time earlier in which the pope asked the director to make a film about the life of Jesus. Jesus of Nazareth premiered March 27, 1977 on British television on the ITV network courtesy of ITC’s parent company, Associated Television; it made its American premiere as an NBC Easter special, on April 3, 1977.
(From Wikipedia)