RADIO PLAYS, READINGS & INTERVIEWS

The Wonderful Year: 1851

Broadcast: Sunday, 4th February, 1951 and Friday, 2nd November, 1951

The Noble Spaniard

Character: The Duke of Hermances (a Spaniard)

The play takes place in the dining room of the Proudfoot family’s villa in Boulogne in 1950

Broadcast: 4th August, 1953

Artists In Crime

Character: Nigel Bathgate

A serial in five episodes, dramatised by Giles Cooper from the novel by Ngaio Marsh

The action of the play takes place during the late 1920s.

Part 1: Broadcast: 11th August, 1953 at 20.30

Part 2: Broadcast: 18th August, 1953 at 20.30

Part 3: ‘Question and Answer’ – Broadcast: 24th August, 1953 at 20.30

Part 4: ‘The Man at the Table’ – Broadcast: 31st August, 1953 at 20.30

Part 5: ‘The Final Touches’ – Broadcast: 7th September, 1953 at 20.30

Léocadia

Character: Prince Albert Troubiscoi

A comedy by Jean Anouilh Translated by Patricia Moyes Radio production by Raymond Raikes

Broadcast by the BBC Home Service – 1^st August, 1954 at 16.30

Story Synopsis: The story deals with a Prince (Peter Wyngarde) who mourns a dead opera singer Léocadia, and spends his time loitering in the park where his aunt, the Duchess (Gladys Young), has reconstructed the places linked with their brief romance. But now she employs Amanda (Dorothy Gordon), a little milliner from Paris, to impersonate the dead diva for three days.

Rosalynde

Character: Rosander

Broadcast by the BBC Home Service – 8th August, 1954

Variety Playhouse: A Rose Without A Thorn

Broadcast: BBC Radio – 27th December, 1954 at 20.40

Character: Francis Dernham

N.B.: A second performance of the play was broadcast on 31st December, 1954 at 19.30 

Story Synopsis: In what was billed as “One of the finest historical plays written in modern times”, Clifford Bax conducted a sympathetic and unerring dramatic enquiry into the love of King Henry VIII for Katherine Howard.

The King’s fourth marriage – to the pathetic and bewildered Anne of Cleves – has come to grief as the play opens, and Henry’s questing eye has already been taken by another lady of the Court when he asks the young Courtier, Thomas Culpeper: “Is her reputation as fair as her face?”

The unhappy Tom, who is himself enamoured by Katherine, acknowledges that is; and it is at that moment, perhaps, that the King is falsely persuaded that he’s found ‘the rose without a thorn’.

The play is thereafter concerned with a royal passion, foolishly idealised, and doomed to tragedy because it knows no compromise with jealousy.

Bax treats Katherine’s dilemma, of past feeling and present indiscretions, with a delicate understanding. He also allows the King as much dignity, sensitivity and charm as can be allowed to a man who avenged to wounds to his pride as a husband – as he rebuffed the challenges to his authority as a king – by a lavish recourse to the executioners block.

The Ermine

Character: Frantz

A play in three acts by Jean Anouilh

Translated by Miriam John Radio adaptation and production by Raymond Raikes Broadcast: BBC Radio – 2^nd April, 1955 at 18.35

Read Review

The Golden Bowl

Character: The Prince

Part 1: ‘The Prince’

Part 2: ‘ The Princess’

The novel by Henry James dramatised by Mary Hope Allen The principal scenes take place in London and at Fawns House at the beginning of the century. 

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 10th January, 1956 at 19.30

Above: Peter as the Prince and Irene Worth as Charlotte Stant reading ‘The Golden Bowl’ – adapted from Henry James’ novel, and recorded for transmission in the BBC’s Third Programme on October 2nd, 1955.

Also Amongst The Prophets

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 5th February, 1956 at 15.00

Character: David

Story Synopsis: The Old Testament story of Saul, the first king of Israel, is shot through with tragic irony. The corruption of power was thrust upon this innocent young man by a prophet who himself was bitterly opposed to kingship. ‘And the Spirit of the Lord will come upon thee,’ said Samuel, and thou… shalt be turned into another man.’ But Saul, after his early successes, was turned into another man in a tragic sense; ‘ for thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, and the Lord hath rejected thee from being king over Israel.’ Abandoned by Samuel, Saul becomes gradually madder and unhappier, and his one consolation is in David – until jealousy makes him David’s enemy. He swings to and fro between love and hate, between sanity and madness, and, as he swings, is propelled towards disaster by his own actions and by circumstance.

Honesty Is The Best Policy

Character: Marchese Fabio Colli

A tragi-comedy by Luigi Pirandello translated by Frederick May Adapted by Helena Wood Produced by Mary Hope Allen

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 25th March, 1956 at 21.25

Repeated on 31st March, 1956

The Wood Demon

Introductions to the four acts spoken by Peter

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 4^th November, 1956 at 15.00

The Oresteia

Character: Orestes, son of Agamemnon

Part 1: ‘Agamemnon’ Broadcast: 23rd November, 1956 at 21.45

Part 2: ‘The Choephori’ Broadcast: 24th November, 1956 at 21.45

Part 3: ‘The Libation Bearers Broadcast: 25th November, 1956 at 21.45

Part 4: ‘The Eumenides’ Broadcast: 26th November, 1956 at 21.45

A new translation by Philip Vellacott with music by Antony Hopkins. Arranged for broadcasting and produced by Raymond Raikes

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 23rd November, 1956 at 21.45 

Uncle Vanya

Scenes from country life in four acts by Anton Chekhov Translated from the Russian by David Tutaev Radio adaptation and production by Raymond Raikes Other parts played by members of the BBC Drama Repertory Company Introductions to the four acts spoken by Peter.

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 1^st February, 1957 at 20.50

Repeated: October 1972

The Egotist

Character: Sir Willoughby Patterne

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 30^th August, 1957 at 21.15pm

Read Review

Children’s Hour: Captain of the Dragoons

Character: Captain Charles Carey

Part 1. Swords and Pistols For Two

Part 2. Secret Service

Part 3. A Pinch of Snuff

Part 4. The Traitor

Written by John Keir Cross from the novel by Ronald Welch 

Part 1: ‘Swords and Pistols For Two’ Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 2nd October, 1957

Story Synopsis: Captain of Dragoons is a stirring tale of adventure and intrigue set in the time of John Churchill , first Duke of Marlborough. The young Captain Charles Carey is called upon, against his will, to serve his country as a secret agent in French territory. He is entrusted with a perilous mission, calling for all his skill as a swordsman and his full reserves of courage and resource. “Perhaps my hand trembles a little from my wound in the duel. The pistol swings round towards me; and, suddenly, as I touch it …”

Part 2: ‘Secret Service’ Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 9th October, 1957 at 17.00

“Behind every great campaign, there is another campaign. Behind every Service, there is another and a hidden Service. I, by the Duke’s good grace, am the head of that Service; and you, Charles Carey, are its newest recruit!”

Part 3: ‘A Pinch of Snuff’ Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 16th October, 1957 at 17.00

“It is still snuff that I am in pursuit of, as I enter the little tobacconist’s shop of a certain Monsieur Henri Vallon, in a side-street: a rather special snuff, not quite to everyone’s taste, recommended to me by a certain Colonel Henshall, and known as the Nantes mixture….“  

Part 4: ‘The Traitor’ Broadcast: 23rd October, 1957 at 17.00 

“The one remaining thread to be tied was that of the mystery of the traitor-the man who had so nearly brought about my death long ago at Limburg. I longed more than ever to unmask him, and at last the opportunity came.”

The Alabama

Character: Captain Raphael Semmes

The story of an ocean raider Written and produced by Kenneth Poolman

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 20th November, 1957 at 20.00

British Drama: A Woman Killed With Kindness

Character: Master Wendoll

Broadcast: British Home Service – 25^th February, 1959 at 20.00

Repeated: Under the title ‘National Theatre of the Air’ by the BBC Home Service on 20^th August, 1961 at 20.30, and as ‘The Sunday Play’ by The BBC Home Service on 3^rd April, 1966 at 14.30

The Balcony

Character: The Chief of Police

Written by Jean Genet translated by Bernard Frechtman ‘We’ve reached the point at which we can no longer be actuated by human feelings. Our function will be to support, establish, and justify metaphors.’ Produced and adapted for radio by John Tydeman

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 6th December, 1964 at 20.55

Time Remembered

Character: Prince Albert Troubiscoi

Produced by Charles Lefeaux The action takes place in the house and grounds of the Duchess of Pont-au-Bronc’s country estate in Brittany

Broadcast: BBC Home Service – 25th January, 1965  20.30

Saturday Night Theatre: The Sleeping Prince

Character: The Regent

Written by Terence Rattigan adapted for radio by Gerry Jones

The fairy story of a Gaiety Girl invited to supper by the Regent of Carpathia, in London for the Coronation of King George V. A casual encounter involves her not only in romance, but in the turmoil of Europe just before the First World War.

Broadcast: BBC Home Service 7^th January, 1967.

Repeated: 27^th September, 1970

Mort

Character: Death

By Jon Pope (based on Terry Pratchett’s ‘Discworld’ books)

Story Synosis: Teenager, Mort has a personality and temperament that makes him unsuited to the family farming business, so his Lezek takes him to a local hiring fair hoping that he’ll get an apprenticeship for himself. Just before the last stroke of midnight that same day, Death arrives and takes Mort on as an apprentice, although his father believes that Mort is actually working for an undertaker.

Broadcast: BBC Radio 4 – 28th August, 1991

The Pickerskill Detentions: Part 3 – ‘A Textbook Detention’

Character: Mr Mike Poulson-Jabby

By Andrew McGibbon.

Story Synopsis: Dr Henry Pickerskill, retired English Master of Haunchurst college for boys, looks back on his most memorable detentions.

Pickerskill’s doctoring of a hated school textbook amuses him greatly, and goes unnoticed until an unfortunate detention in the late fifties where the subversive book is mistakenly used by another teacher.

Broadcast: BBC Radio 4 – 28th February 2007 at 23.15

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