The Invention of love: Tom Stoppard
BBC Radio 3: The Sunday Play
Broadcast: Sunday 18th April 1999 @ 7:30 p.m.
Take a mysterious voyage into the underworld that is also a moving and funny trip through a great man's life. In "The Invention of Love",
Oscar-winner Tom Stoppard explores the life of classical scholar and renowned poet A. E. Housman. Old and infirm, Housman dreams
that he is dead. As Charon, the mythical boatman, ferries him across the River Styx, Housman returns to the Oxford of his youth where he
fell in love with scholarship and with his fellow student, Moses Jackson. Stoppard's dream world includes Victorian London, where
Parliament made homosexuality a crime, and the French seashore, where Oscar Wilde - convicted of that very crime - is living out his
final days. This complex and rewarding play weaves ideas, wit, and passion.
A radio presentation of the Royal National Theatre production of Tom Stoppard's 1997 play, "The Invention of Love" which was
directed by Richard Eyre.
With John Wood [Alfred E. Housman (older)], Ben Porter [Alfred E. Housman (younger)], John Carlisle [Jowett / Stead], Benjamin
Whitrow [Ruskin / Labouchere], Robin Soanes [Pater / Harris], William Chubb [Postgate / Pattison], Robert Portal [Moses Jackson],
Adam Barker [Pollard], Chris Marshall [Chamberlain], Paul Shelley [Oscar Wilde], David Ryall [Charon / The Committee Chairman],
Paul Benzing [Ellis / Jerome K. Jerome], and Emma Dewhurst [Katherine].
Radio Production Manager was Sarah Scott.
Radio play directed by John Tydeman.
150 min.
Jim
