Showing results by publisher "BBC Audio" in Arts & Entertainment

Were you terrified of the Daleks? Has the familiar Doctor Who theme tune ever sent a shiver down your spine? Did Saturday teatimes once mean gathering round the television to see where the TARDIS had landed each week? If so, Doctor Who at the BBC is for you. In this special release, Elisabeth Sladen and Nicholas Courtney take a journey through the archives and uncover the history of Doctor Who on BBC radio and television.

Here are all six episodes from this one-off 1987 radio comedy series, written by John Antrobus and starring Spike Milligan, Chris Langham, John Antrobus, and a jazz quartet. Episodes include "The Incredible Case of the Vanishing Flying Scotsman", "Jonah and the Whale", "From Rags to More Rags", "That 'Cake' Elusive Pimpernel", and "The Incurables".

This production of The Lost World, based on the novel by Arthur Conan Doyle, was first broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in 1975, and amongst the cast are Francis de Wolff, Gerald Harper, Carol Boyd and the renowned radio actor Carleton Hobbs. The story follows a 19th century expedition to enter the rumoured lair of animals thought to have died out millions of years before - a terrifying world of pterodactyls and other 'prehistoric monsters'.

Award-winning comedian Alan Davies stars in his own BBC Radio sitcom. Meet Alan. He's a struggling actor trying to cope with life in the 90s - the friends, the work, the romance... Meet the friends: Murray is a local journalist, who's given a crash course in tabloid sensationalism when the entire staff comes down with Peruvian flu. Kate is a primary school art teacher, who tussles daily with the obnoxious seven-year-old Tamara and tries to save time by getting the children to write their own reports.

A deliciously black satirical comedy about the dinner party from hell. The fastidious host, Paige, decides to throw a dinner party in honour of her husband, Lars, who is celebrating the success of his pop psychology book, Beyond Belief. She carefully plans a surprise menu that will mark the occasion and anxiously checks with the waiter she has employed to make sure that everything is perfectly prepared. Her lucky guests include a postfeminist vegetarian artist, a distinguished microbiologist, a TV journalist and an uninvited guest who ends up staying for dinner.

Prepare to have your synapses twisted into a string theorist's nightmare, as Professor Lloyd and his new curator, the startlingly insightful comedian Jon Richardson, hurriedly throw the dust covers off the Museum's clump of empty plinths for a brand new series of the BBC's most improving comedy panel show.

Presented by Michael Parkinson, this highly entertaining collection of interviews is taken from Spike Milligan's numerous appearances on Parkinson between 1972 and 1982. The subjects Spike covers include his early years, his poetry and books, The Goons, and his relationship with the BBC.

Steve Punt and Hugh Dennis present a mix of stand-up, sketches, and songs, along with Jon Holmes, Laura Shavin, Mitch Benn, and Marcus Brigstock, in an hour-long download-only special. This compilation features the highlights from the last five years.

A unique collection of historic recordings covering the events of 1916, from the final evacuation of Gallipoli to the aftermath of the Somme. These fascinating and often poignant firsthand accounts describe the humiliating retreat by Allied forces from Gallipoli, starvation during the Siege of Kut-al-Amara in Mesopotamia, the Easter Rising - viewed from both sides of the Irish divide - and the costly battles of Jutland and the Somme.

Lily Cole stars as Helen of Troy, ‘the face that launched a thousand ships’, in Simon Armitage’s vivid, visceral adaptation of Homer’s Iliad and Virgil’s Aeneid. For 10 years, the Greeks have been laying siege to Troy to win back their abducted queen, Helen. But as the war drags on, and the battlefields run scarlet with blood, the opposing forces are entrenched in a bitter stalemate. As gods and mortals squabble amongst themselves for the spoils of war, the exhausted warriors go to extreme lengths in a desperate grab for victory....

Six men have reached a certain age, their 40-something years, and each has a very different – and sometimes surprising – story to tell, from the brother who receives an unexpected letter to a compulsive philanderer, and a news photographer sent on an unusual assignment. All are funny, touching, and as beautifully observed as would be expected from the author of the phenomenal best sellers Eats, Shoots & Leaves and Talk to the Hand.

What To Do If You're Not Like Everybody Else' is a four-part mini-series of short comedic monologues on BBC Radio 4. Written and performed by stand-up comedian Andrew Lawrence, it takes a light-hearted look at various aspects of conventional living and the pressure we feel to conform to social norms and ideals.

A sparkling BBC Radio 4 adaptation of J.B. Priestley’s comic play, starring Alan Bennett, Brenda Blethyn, Gwen Taylor, Alun Armstrong, Michael Jayston and Nicola Pagett. Three eminently respectable Yorkshire couples are in the midst of their joint silver wedding celebrations when they receive a rude shock - they are not legally married.

Michael Kitchen stars as John Jarndyce in a BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of Dickens' classic tale of London and the law.

A centenary collection of the best BBC Radio programmes about the legendary Spike Milligan - including the brand-new documentary Spike Milligan: Inside Out. Named for Spike’s explanation of his sense of humour - ‘I’m Irish - we think sideways’ - this BBC radio anthology, published to celebrate the centenary of his birth, provides unique insight into his genius. Spike Milligan: Inside Out sees Milligan admirer Michael Palin and Spike’s daughter, Jane, chat through some of Spike’s many audio recordings.

Another helping of inspired ad-libbery from the multi award-winning BBC Radio 4 series.

Sorry I Haven't a Clue has Radio Four's highest listening figures for light entertainment and won the 1998 Voice of the Listener and Viewer for top radio show.

Tony Hancock stars with Sid James and Kenneth Williams in the legendary BBC Radio comedy series. Created by Ray Galton and Alan Simpson in 1954, Hancock’s Half Hour was the radio vehicle that made Tony Hancock a household name. Each week listeners would be admitted to the sometimes fantastical, sometimes mundane life of “the lad ‘imself”. Aided and abetted by Sid James, Andrée Melly, Bill Kerr, and Kenneth Williams, Hancock would enter into the spirit of each episode with characteristic dolefulness.

Highlights from the classic BBC TV comedy sketch show starring Lenny Henry, Tracey Ullman and David Copperfield. Broadcast over three series between 1981 and 1983, Three of a Kind made stars out of Tracey Ullman and Lenny Henry, and helped writers such as Rob Grant, Doug Naylor, Ruby Wax and Ian Hislop hone their considerable comedic talents. Full of quickfire quips and silly sketches, as well as spoof songs, it was hugely popular for its gentle humour, sarcasm and witty satire.

Toby Stephens stars in this BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of Raymond Chandler’s second Philip Marlowe mystery.Fast-talking, trouble-seeking private eye Philip Marlowe is a different kind of detective: a moral man in an amoral world. California in the ’40s and ’50s is as beautiful as a ripe fruit and rotten to the core, and Marlowe must struggle to retain his integrity amidst the corruption he encounters daily.In ‘Farewell My Lovely’, Marlowe has a chance encounter with a not-so-gentle giant outside Florian’s nightclub.