JOHN ARDEN RADIO PLAYS

JOHN ARDEN - an article written in about 1960 by H.B. Fortuin: (summarised by N.D.)

John Arden was born in 1930 in Barnsley, Yorkshire, and before becoming a full-time writer, worked for two years as a qualified assistant in a London architect's office. Apart from Sergeant Musgrave's Dance his stage works include Live Like Pigs and the Happy Haven - all presented at the Royal Court Theatre, London. Soldier soldier, an original play for television was presented by the BBC in 1960 and one the Trieste prize in the Prix Italia or international competition.

When in October 1959 John Arden's Serjeant Musgrave's Dance was first produced at the Royal Court Theatre, a number of people were angry about his own historical parable. Neither the play's main character nor the author seemed to have made up their minds as to what they were about. The sergeant felt strongly about war and God's word, and the author felt strongly about his characters' predicament. but neither made it clear to the paying customers and to the critics where they stood.

At the same time, many people were convinced that a play of Merit had arrived. The Times praised the author's realistic dialogue and his gift for creating an atmosphere full of suspense. But the reviewer thought these dramatic virtues got submerged in a mass of character defects. The Daily Telegraph stated that the plague missed its target. The Sunday Times also complained about the author's lack of purpose. But Arden does not care to preach confidently about what he cannot practise. Feeling strongly about man's inhumanity he is equally convinced that this is part of human nature.

Serjeant Musgrave's Dance, produced by Lindsay Anderson, had memorable performances by Ian Bain as the sergeant, Freda Jackson as the landlady, Patsy Byrne as Annie the serving maid who, having lost her man to the war, is drawn to a soldier, and by the Hon L Donnelly, Alan Dobie and Frank Finlay as the three deserters. James Bree was their hypocritical bargee.

The setting is Victorian England. The sergeant and his three men are deserters from a bloody colonial war, sick of killing. Led by their puritan sergeant, they bring to a colliery town their rifles, their old Gatling gun and the body of Billie, one of their number, killed in street fighting and now returning as a corpse to his home town. In the town a strike is on the point of erupting into violence and the sergeant promises the town dignitaries that by addressing the striking miners and starting a recruiting campaign, he will remove the troublemakers. By pointing a machine gun at the crowd threatening to kill the high- ups and by showing them the body of their former mate hanging from the Market Cross, he means to bring home to them the frightful meaning of punitive expeditions. But there are further complications involving a barmaid and things do not work out as planned.

...John Arden added the following comments:

...I have tried to write about the violence which is evident in the world. I think many of us may have felt an overpowering urge to match some outrageous piece of violence more outrageous retaliation. Serjeant Musgrave tries to do this... the fact that the sympathies of the play are clearly with his original horror, and then turn against him and his intended remedy, seems to have bewildered many people. Complete pacifism is a very hard doctrine; if this play appears to advocate it with some timidity, it is probably because I know that if I am hit I very easily hit back.

H.B.Fortuin

N.D. adds:.........John Arden is a highly regarded playwright. His stage plays include Sergeant Musgrave's Dance, Armstrong's Last Goodnight and The Happy Haven. He has written a large number of radio plays. "Pearl" was mentioned in a survey by The Guardian as one of the best ever. He has also written short stories and novels.

The radio plays I've identified are listed below. Recordings of those with asterisks are known to exist in VRPCC collections.

BBC BROADCASTS

1956 The Life of Man
1959 Sergeant Musgrave's Dance
1961 The Dying Cowboy
1964 Ars Longa Vita Brevis
1964 The Business of Good Government
1970 The Bagman* - The Impromptu of Muswell Hill; rpt. 1975.R4.
1970? The Happy Haven
1978 Pearl*
1980 The Adventures of Don Quixote
1982 The old man sleeps alone
1999 Woe, alas, the fatal cash box*
2003 Wild ride to Dublin*
2003 Poor Tom, thy horn is dry*, 120m R3
2007 Scam, 75m
nk.....Whose is this kingdon?

NOTES ON THE PLAYS
Serjeant (sic) Musgrave's Dance....1959
First Produced : 1959 Royal Court, London
First Published : 1960 Methuen, London
Genre : An Unhistorical Parable Male : 13 Female : 2 Other : --
Notes : revised version produced London 1972
Synopsis : An 1880's recruiting sergeant, in fact a deserter, tries to bring the truth about war home to a strike ridden town.

.......John Arden's play, first staged at the Royal Court in 1959, was back in fashion with a recent production at the Nottingham Playhouse and this version tonight (R3, 8pm, Sat 14 Dec 03). Set in the late nineteenth century, it's a powerful poetic indictment of war, oppression and political justification. Iain Glen plays Serjeant Musgrave; Toby Swift directs. (....Gillian Reynolds, Daily Telegraph)


ARS LONGA VITA BREVIS....1964
12 Dec 1964; 30m 45s. By John Arden and Margaretta D’Arcy. The play was written for and first performed by schoolchildren, and later by the Royal Shakespeare Company during an experimental Theatre of Cruelty season earlier in 1964.

Headmaster..........................Maurice Denham
Art Master...............................Kenneth Griffith
Boy.................................Frederick Treves
Roxana..............................Glenda Jackson
Officer..................................William Fox
Lance-Corporal.............................Garard Green
Soldier..............................Frederick Treves
Governor 1...............................Eric Anderson
Governor 2..............................Garard Green
Governor 3.............................Frederick Treves

Music by Guy Halahan; played by the Recorder Group from St. Aloysius’ Girls Grammar School, Patrick Harvey (Harmonium), Cyril Jackson (Fiddle). Produced by Charles Lefeaux. (...details from NC)

The Business of Good Government, 16.12.64
Tony Britton/Ralph Truman/Patrick Waddington

The Bagman or The Impromptu Of Muswell Hill ....1970
First Produced : 1970 BBC Radio
First Published : 1994 in "Plays 2"
Genre : Witty Fable Male : 6 Female : 6 Other : extras
Synopsis : modern version of Moliere's Versailles Impromptu

28/06/1970 BBC Radio 3; Cast: John Arden ; Sheila Allen ; Hilda Kriseman ; Geoffrey Matthews ; Hector Ross ; Austin Trevor ; Margaret Wolfit ; Peter Pratt ; Sonia Fraser ; Madi Heod ; Sean Barrett ; Wilfred Carter ; Kerry Francis ; Leonard Fenton ; John Rye ; David Spenser. Producer Martin Esslin. Music by Delia Derbyshire. Special sound from the BBC Radiophonic Workshop with Alan Dobie as the Narrator.

A piece which is not to everyone’s taste. The announcer introduces it as: «…John Arden, in the form of a dream, gives a highly personal view of the problems of an English playwright of his generation.». Arden wrote this play especially for radio as a companion piece to Ionesco's L'lmpromptu de l'Alma which Radio 3 had broadcast on 26/06/1970. Arden’s work was polemical and was often concerned with tackling political issues, particularly Britain’s colonial and post colonial history. These preoccupations and his uncompromising stance led him into conflict and resulted in his work being performed less frequently than many would say it merited. Ironically the difficulties of his work being commissioned and produced served to reinforce his professional and artistic isolation. (....notes from Alistair Wyper - thank you)

Pearl, 3.7.78
Directed by Alfred Bradley
with Elizabeth Bell, David Calder, Peter Jeffrey, David Mahlowe, John Jardine.

03/07/1978 Broadcast as The Monday Play on BBC Radio 4, rpt 12/10/1978 and 04/03/1979. BBC Radio 3. Cast: Elizabeth Bell ; John Arden ; Peter Jeffrey ; David Calder ;Paula Tilbrook ;David Mahlowe ; John Jardine ; Geoffrey Banks ; Ronald Herdman ; Lynda Marchal ; Kathleen Helme ; Alan Taylor ; Jane Knowles ; Robert Morton. Music composed by Stephen Boxer. Julian Drake (cometto) ; Turner (crumhorns, flutes, recorders) ; Ephraim Segerman (viols, cittern, lute) ; Bill Nickson (percussion) ; Stephen Boxer (psaltery, lyre, dulcimer). Directed by Alfred Bradley.

This play set during the English Civil War uses a play within a play device involving Irish rebels and English Dissenters. From the play: ' I find nowt now in the whole of England fit for the tip of my pen. We spoke once to the whole people. But these days we have rejected the home-spun jackets, the square-toed shoes, and the forthright-word of the godly tradesmen. And by God, they've rejected us. There are those in Parliament have said openly they'd close down every play house if they once attained full power. And I want them to attain full power.' (....notes from Alistair Wyper - thank you)

The Happy Haven....c1970?
Broadcast date not known.

The Old Man Sleeps Alone, 22.10.82
Directed by Alfred Bradley
With Ronald Baddiley, Nigel Anthony, Christian Rodska, Russell Dixon, Frank Middlemas, David Calder". Well-above average radio play. repeated on BBC7, Saturday 7th June 2003, 13:00....about the building of Durham Cathedral.


WHOSE IS THE KINGDOM?....1988
Nine plays about Church and State under the Roman Empire, by John Arden and Margaretta D'Arcy. Radio 3, 19 Feb 88 – 16 Apr 88. Each play 60m. Cast:Elizabeth Spriggs as Kybele, Michael N. Harbour as Constantine, Timothy West as Hosius, Samantha Bond as Fausta, and Nicholas Gecks as Crispus, son of Constantine.

1 The Cross of Light
2 Christ is Risen: Constantine
3 Burdens of Empire
4 Letters Discreet and Indiscreet
5 Fowlers' Nets
6 Nicaea
7 An Eye for an 'I'
8 Interrogations
9 Hypothesis


(Play 4) Letters, Discreet and Indiscreet
11 Mar 88. 'I had a great vision, the sunrise of my day of victory. You can't question visions. But by God you can question the men into whose hands they deliver you!' Semiramis ......... Souad Faress, Mary ............... Angela Pleasence, Helen ............ Mary Wimbush, Jaxartes, Head of Secret Service ....... Sam Dastor, Physcon, a baker ........ David Buck, Bishop of Nicomedia ....... Ronald Herdman, with Jonathan Tafler, Steve Hodson, Anthony Jackson, Victoria Carling, Sheila Grant and Diana Olsson. Music composed and conducted by Stephen Boxer. Directed by Penny Leicester.

John Arden's "Woe, Alas, the Fatal Cash Box" (R4, 2100, 23 Jul 1999) was his first radio play for some time. It was another of those plays which only work on radio, a little like Alan Plater's "The What on the Landing", or Giles Cooper's "Under the Loofah Tree". Julius Applewick, recovering in hospital from a heart attack, has a stream of visitors; some real, some imaginary. With some of them he revisits his childhood. Bernard Hepton, with his conspiratorial half-whisper, was well cast as Applewick. (ND, VRPCC newsletter, Sep 99)

Wild Ride To Dublin....2003
Conscience, decency and politics compel Spike Oldroyd to undertake a crazy journey to save his love affair, his honour and an almost innocent villain. Wed 9 July 2003, 14:15, Afternoon Play, 45m. Cast: Edward Petherbridge, Sara Kestelman, John Quinn, Peter Gowen, Lloyd Hutchinson, Marcella Riordan. Director: Roland Jaquarello.

Poor Tom, Thy Horn is Dry....2003
Picaresque tale of Thomas Ashe (Aidan McArdle), born a Tipperary Protestant in 1787, scamping through Europe at its most adventurous era. With David Calder and Jim Norton........Gillian Reynolds, Daily Telegraph. R3, 120m, 2000 hrs.

John Arden's new play, written specially for Radio 3, is based on the memoirs of Captain Thomas Ashe, who was brought up amongst the impoverished Irish gentry. He became a soldier, but he was much more than that. The play shows him as clerk, tradesman, teacher, sailor, murderer, embezzler, explorer, impersonator, writer of political propoganda, hack journalist, plagiarist, blackmailer and more. His memoirs were somewhat exaggerated but he was a man of energy, ingenuity and entrepreneurial spirit. He believes in 'the main chance'. He is a survivor amidst the violence of the French Revolution, even if it means changing sides. The play explores the life of Ashe in a mixture of prose, verse and ballad (the amount of verse is small) and conjures up an interesting picture of a highly unusual man.

The cast: Aidan McArdle, David Calder, Jim Norton, Colum Convey, Rakie Ayola, Marcella Riordan. Producer and director: Roland Jaquarello.


SCAM....2007
Saturday play, 75. Pursuit of a dubious email by a lady who should have known better. With Kika Markham, Deborah Findlay, Emma Amos, Neil Dudgeon; producer Roland Jaquarello.

(see also the "Bob Servant" emails, 2011, where email scammers are themselves taken for a ride).

Info. from "Doollee", Greg Linden, Alistair Wyper, own notes and other sources.

©Nigel Deacon, Diversity website

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