In a Grove
by Ryunosuke Akutagawa
BBC Radio 4: The Classic Serial
Broadcast: Sunday 19th March 2000 @ 3:00 p.m.
The setting is 10th century feudal Japan as a police commissioner is involved in an extraordinary murder investigation. Who killed the
young samurai warrior from Kyoto? Why does every witness have a different story to tell? If one cannot determine which version of a story -
if any - is truthful, then determining guilt is impossible. For Police Comissioner Akutagawa, the contradictory confessions of the characters
warns against mistaking the apparent sincerity of their experiences for truthfulness.
A classic tale about a murder investigation which becomes an examination of the nature of confession and truth.
Adaptation by Kevin Fegan of Ryunosuke Akutagawa's 1922 short story, "In a Grove" ("Yabu no naka").
With Gerard Murphy [Police Comissioner Akutagawa], Jack Davenport [Takejiro], Natascha McElhone [Masago], Andrew Schofield
[Tajomaru], Noreen Kershaw [The Old Hag], Russell Dixon [The Buddhist Priest], John Henshaw [The Policeman], and Parvez Qadir
[The Woodcutter].
The music was composed by Clive Bell and played by Clive Bell and Sylvia Hallett.
Directed by Melanie Harris in Manchester.
60 minutes.
Jim
