BBC HomeExplore the BBC

27 December 2009
Accessibility help
Text only

BBC Homepage
Northern Ireland
» 

Contact Us

Like this page?
Send it to a friend!

 
Radio Drama
RELATED LINKS

BBC7

Radio3

Radio4

Radio Drama News

 

ARCHIVE HIGHLIGHTS Links

 

THE MYSTERY OF CHARLES DICKENS
TX date: 29/12/01 @ 14.30
Written by Peter Ackroyd
Produced by Stephen Wright
Directed by Gemma McMullan

The cassette is available to buy in BBC shops and other good book shops

Simon CalloePeter Ackroyd’s masterful creation takes you on a captivating journey through the life and writings of Charles Dickens. Simon Callow’s unique and sparkling performance brings this imaginative play to life, embracing the Dickensian era in all its glory by juggling the role of narrator, Dickens himself and a host of delicious characters from each of Dickens’ classic novels. Novels such as David Copperfield, Great Expectations, Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickelby, Our Mutual Friend and others.

Dickens CassetteThe highs and lows of this extraordinary writer’s life unleash a riveting and highly entertaining production – a truly unforgettable experience! Simon Callow (actor, writer, director) Among his many acting credits:
Shakespeare in Love, Four Weddings and a Funeral, A Room with a View, Amadeus, James and the Giant Peach.
Upcoming films:
Thunderpants (2002); Christmas Carol: The Movie (2001) (voice); No Man’s Land (2001). Simon Callow performed The Mystery of Charles Dickens to great acclaim as a one-man show at the Albery Theatre, London 2000.

Peter Ackroyd (acclaimed novelist of fiction and non-fiction)
Novels include: London: The Biography, 2000; The Trial of Elizabeth Cree, 1995; Chatterton, 1987 (shortlisted for the Booker Prize 1987); The Last Testament of Oscar Wilde, 1983; The Great Fire of London, 1982; T S Eliot, A Life, 1984; Dickens’ London: An Imaginative Vision, 1987; An Introduction to Dickens, 1991; Blake, 1996.


THE CALLING
, Pearse Elliott’s contemporary thriller set in Belfast, was repeated on Radio 4 on Friday 7 June at 21.00 pm. Eimear is a Doctor, and in her spare time a volunteer with The Samaritans. When she becomes involved with a caller who is committing murders in the city, she ceases to be the helper and becomes the hunted. Produced by Stephen Wright.

AMONGST WOMEN
Writer: John McGahern
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x 10)
Transmission Date: 06.08.90 - 17.08.90
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Tony Doyle Key cast: read by Tony Doyle (Ballykissangel, Amongst Women)

Moran, a proud, aloof Leitrim farmer was in his youth a fighter in the Irish War of Independence. These were the glory days, since then he has become bitter and conservative. But he still holds a permanent charisma for his family particularly his second wife and three daughters. Amongst Women was also a hugely successful TV Serial made by BBC NI Drama.


MAIDEN CITY MAGIC
Writer: Jack Houlahan
Duration/Slot: 30 min play
Transmission Date: 26.11.91
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Anna Healy, Maeve Connolly, Stella McCusker
Joint 3rd Prix Italia Prize Winner

Set in Derry, the play describes New Year’s Eve in the life of the family of an RUC Officer. The father is a drunk who is no longer able to contain the tensions and violence of his work and they increasingly infect the lives of his wife and two teenage daughters. On this particular evening they decide to play a harmless game of stuffing their fears into a jam-jar which they plan to bury in the garden. The game develops its emotional momentum and when the father arrives home
drunk and smashes the jar the family break up. The play explores the way in which primitive magic can still release pain and any longing for change.

AN EVIL CRADLING
Writer: Brian Keenan
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x 10)
Transmission Date: 08.02.93
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Brian Keenan (former Beirut hostage)

GOOD BOY
Writer: Owen Roe
Duration/Slot: 60 min Afternoon Play
Transmission Date: 18.11.93
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Owen Roe (Ballykissangel)

Eugene is a successful 30 something, advertising executive in
Dublin, whose parents have recently been killed in a roller coaster accident in Blackpool. In the counselling sessions that follow he recounts his obsessive guilty secret, his failure to pursue accordian playing as a child, after his parents had invested the money in the instrument and the lessons.

CHRISTMAS EVE CAN KILL YOU
Writer: Marie Jones (writer of hit theatre play, Stones In His Pockets)
Duration/Slot: 60 min Play
Transmission Date: 16.12.93
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Tim Loane, Marie Jones, Dan Gordon

A Belfast cab driver sets out to do his Christmas Eve run. He’s young and single and reveals that he is going to spend Christmas day in bed, pretending it is a wet Monday, with a good novel and a six pack for company. He is increasingly convinced that he is right as the emotional debris of Christmas floats in and out of his cab. A bomb-scare creates mayhem in the city and the cab driver eventually has to find room in his
‘manger’ for a stranded English actor and an old lady.

LIPSTICK ON THE HOST
Writer: Aidan Matthews
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x 7)
Transmission Date: 24.03.94 - 01.04.94
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Pauline McLynn (Father Ted, Channel 4)

Meggie is a single, middle-aged Dublin teacher, trying to remain buoyant and humorous in the face of hopeless educational policies at work and a social desert at home.

THE HOUSE OF SPLENDID ISOLATION
Writer: Edna O’Brien
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x10)
Transmission Date: 04.07.94 - 15.07.94
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Edna O’Brien

A terrorist has escaped over the Irish Border - some see him as a psychopath, others as a freedom fighter. But it is a lonely and depressed old woman in whose house he hides that discovers who he really is.

DAISY THE COW WHO TALKED
Writer(s): Gerry Stembridge
Duration/Slot: 90 min Saturday Play
Transmission Date: 15.10.94
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Gerard McSorley
Winner of The Richard Imison Memorial Award 1995

Sitting in Dublin, months after, a tribunal investigates corruption within the meat industry in Ireland. The department of Agriculture desperately need to do a cover up job. The border has been an open invitation to skulduggery, corrupt vets, disguised abattoirs. Tom Doherty, a young civil servant is sent to investigate the border area. He can make no
sense of any of it until he meets and gradually falls in love with Daisy - a gentle and sweet natured COW!

MILK AND POTATOES
Writer: John Tunney
Duration/Slot: 15 min reading
Transmission Date: 02.11.95
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by David Kelly (Robin’s Nest, Waking Ned)

A man relishes the opportunity to revenge an act of cruel bigotry that has haunted him since childhood.

THE CONTRACTORS
Writer: John B. Keane
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x 10)
Transmission Date: 19.02.96 - 01.03.96
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Mark Lambert

Log Line: It is the 1950s and Dan Murray is forced by unemployment to leave his native Kerry and find work on the building-sites of London.

FIREFLY SUMMER
Writer: Maeve Binchy
Duration/Slot: 6 x 30 min
Transmission Date: 06.06.96
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: David Soul [Starksy & Hutch], Lorcan Cranitch [McCready & Daughter], Anna Healy BBC Radio Collection cassette.

Mountfern is a quiet, peaceful village in the Irish Midlands where little happens until an American, Patrick O’Neill, arrives with a desire to return to his Irish roots.

HOLY SECRETS
Writer: John Waters
Duration/Slot: 90 min Monday Play
Transmission Date: 09.12.96
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Tony Doyle, Luke Griffin, Geraldine Plunkett

A priest dies in suspicious circumstances in a small Irish village and a united front develops to obscure the causes. CO-WINNER OF 1997 RICHARD IMISON MEMORIAL AWARD

READING IN THE DARK
Writer: Seamus Deane
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (X 8)
Transmission Date: 24.03.97 - 02.04.97
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Stephen Rea [The Crying Game and many other films]

A childhood lived out in Derry, Northern Ireland in the 40s and 50s, a place that is haunted by political enmities, family secrets and lethal intrigue.

THE BOY WHO THOUGHT HE WAS AN ELEPHANT
Writer: John McClelland
Duration/Slot: 60 min Thursday Play
Transmission Date: 23.10.97
Producer/Director: Roland Jaquarello
Key cast: Adam Stewart, John Hewitt, Brenda Winter

A schoolboy becomes alienated from both his family and school and resorts to strange behaviour.

ANGELA’S ASHES
Writer: Frank McCourt
Duration/Slot: Book at Bedtime (x 7)
Transmission Date: 05.01.98 - 13.01.98
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: read by Luke Griffin

It is 1929 when Angela is banished to New York to seek her fortune. It’s here she meets Malachy and young Frank is born. After four more babies, Angela and her family are returned to Limerick by her American cousins in the hope that they will survive better there than they are in Brooklyn.

DIARY OF A QUITTER
Writer: Breda Nathan
Duration/Slot: 15 min reading
Transmission Date: 10.06.98
Producer/Director: Roland Jaquarello
Key cast: read by Pauline McLynn

A Dublin woman records a week in which she looks to give up
smoking.

SIGHTINGS OF BONO
Writer: Gerry Beirne
Duration/Slot: 15 min reading
Transmission Date: 24/08/98
Producer/Director: Anne Simpson
Key cast: read by Pauline McLynn

One unexpected ‘Bono Sighting’ quickly becomes an obsession when Ellen starts to spot the superstar everywhere she turns!

ADVERSE POSESSION
Writer: John Waters
Duration/Slot: 110 min Sunday Play R3
Transmission Date: 13.12.98
Producer/Director: Pam Brighton
Key cast: Michelle Collins [Eastenders, Sunburn, 2000 Acres of Skye], Chrissie Cotterill, Pauline McLynn

It’s a normal funeral in today’s West of Ireland, tears, regrets, some real, some sentimental, when an unknown, illegitimate, daughter arrives from England and Irish respectability and provincialism is exposed.

THE PROPERTY OF COLETTE NERVI
Writer(s): William Trevor
Duration/Slot: 45 min Afternoon Play
Transmission Date: 15.04.99
Producer/Director: Roland Jaquarello
Key cast: Trudy Kelly, Marcella Riordan, Don Wycherley
Selected as one of the EBU entries 1999

When a visiting French woman’s necklace and handbag disappear, it has considerable repercussions for a small rural Irish community in the late 60s.

OUR LADY OF SLIGO
Writer(s): Sebastian Barry
Duration/Slot: 125 min Sunday Play
Transmission Date: 30.05.99
Producer/Director: Roland Jaquarello
Key cast: Fiona Shaw [Gormenghast], Laura Hughes, Gerard McSorley

While seriously ill in a Dublin hospital, Mai O’Hara is visited by her husband Jack, her daughter Joanie and her dead father. She struggles to come to terms with her life and in particular he volatile relationship with both Jack and her country.

BALDI (SERIES ONE)
Baldi Cast Writer: created by Barry Devlin & written by Barry Devlin, Simon Brett and Annie Caulfield
Duration/Slot: Afternoon Play 6 x 45 min
Transmission Date: 10.01.00
Producer/Director: Lawrence Jackson
Key cast: David Threlfall [Sex, Chips And Rock & Roll, Conspiracy] Tina Kellegher [Ballykissangel]
Hugely popular. 3rd series recording this Autumn for Radio 4.

First in the murder mystery series about Paolo Baldi, priest and amateur sleuth, who teams up with woman police inspector Tina Mahon to solve various murders in and around Dublin.

GHOST STORIES (x 5) The Erlking, Mr Pettinger’s Demon, Mr
Gray’s Folly, The Ritual of the Bones, Nocturne
Writer: John Connolly
Duration/Slot: 15 min readings
Transmission Date: 10.01.00 - 14.01.00
Producer/Director: Lawrence Jackson
Key cast: read by Tony Doyle

John Connolly is an exciting young writer from Dublin, He has always been a lover and respecter of the genre of ghost stories, and these five stories - The Erlking, Mr Pettinger's Demon, Mr Gray's folly, The Ritual of the Bones and Nocturne - are reminiscent of the Victorian-Edwardian world of Dickens, Poe and the master ghost-story writer himself, M R James.

LADIES NIGHT AT FINBAR’S HOTEL
Ladies night at Finbars Hotel Writer(s): Maeve Binchy, Clare Boylan, Emma Donnohue, Deidre Purcell, Anne Haverty, Ellis Ni Dhuibhve, Kate O’ Riordan. Dramatised by Dermot Bolger
Duration/Slot: Afternoon Play
Transmission Date: 10.05.00
Producer/Director: Gemma McMullan
Key cast: Sorcha Cusack [Casualty], Dermot Crowley [Falling For A Dancer], Liam Cunningham [Cracker, Jude, Into The West], Marie Jones [In The Name of The Father], Pauline McLynn

A refreshing and imaginative Irish comedy divulging the hidden secrets of each of the guests staying at Finbar’s Hotel…the hotel where just about anything can happen.

AFTER THE HUGE SUCCESS OF FINBAR’S HOTEL, DERMOT BOLGER DECIDED TO PUBLISH ANOTHER NOVEL AND INVITE SEVEN OF IRELAND’S LEADING FEMALE NOVELISTS FOR A VERY UNIQUE COLLABORATION.
The Irish novelists were each assigned a guest room for one night at "Finbar’s Hotel" and asked to create the fictional characters within. The stories are self-contained and explore various people and their personal reasons for being at the hotel that night. None of the writers were aware of the other novelists’ stories and therefore the humour of the novel is fuelled by Dermot loosely linking the stories by adding short interludes where the various characters will see or overhear the guests from a different room.

Bull EpicBULL EPIC
Writer: Don McCamphill
Duration/Slot: 45 min Afternoon Play
Transmission Date: 28.07.00
Producer/Director: Lawrence Jackson
Key cast: Des McAleer, Conleth Hill, Ian McElhinney, & introducing the fabulous Andrew Harrison as Colin.

When eleven year old Colin’s mother leaves him to stay with his rough and ready relatives on their farm in rural Ballymena, little does he know what trials the week ahead holds in store for him. SHORTLISTED FOR THE RICHARD IMISON MEMORIAL AWARD 2001

More Archive Highlights>>

Download our BBC Drama Winter'08 Brochure here Drama PDF

Download our BBC Drama Autumn'07 Brochure here Drama PDF

Download our BBC Drama Summer'07 Brochure here Drama PDF

Download our BBC Drama Spring'07 Brochure here Drama PDF

 



About the BBC | Help | Terms of Use | Privacy & Cookies Policy