To Be

The BBC have put a short clip of Alex performing the Hamlet soliloquy up on the Open University site: BBC OU

Riot at the Rite

Riot at the Rite, with Alex playing the part of Diaghilev, can be seen again on BBC 4 this Friday at 21.00. It is part of the Ballet Russes Season. More information on the BBC website at BBC Four

Thanks to Penny!

Miss Marple

"They Do It with Mirrors", the Miss Marple mystery starring Alex as Inspector Curry will be broadcast on ITV 1, on 1 January 2009.

Bringing Down the House

The BBC has provided more details of the film on the MPs expenses scandal that is currently being filmed. It is to be called "Bringing Down the House" and will be broadcast on BBC 4 early next year. Brian Cox will play Michael Martin, former speaker of the House of Commons. The play will be a single 60-minute drama.

More details on BBC News

MP's Expenses

In an interview with the Telegraph Tim Piggott-Smith mentions that he has just started working on a forthcoming BBC Four drama about the MPs’ expenses investigation. The piece reads:

"The cast includes Brian Cox, the Emmy award-winning Scottish actor, as the former Speaker Michael Martin, and Alex Jennings – best known for his role as Prince Charles in The Queen – as Andrew Walker, the man in charge of the House of Commons’ fees office, the unit that was supposed to scrutinise MPs’ expense claims."

No mention yet of broadcast dates.

Full interview

Cranford Dates

The Cranford Christmas special will be broadcast in two parts. The first one will be shown on Sunday 20 December on BBC 1 at 21.00-22.30, the second one a week later at the same time.

Being Alan Bennett

This Saturday evening, 5 December, BBC2 shows a documentary on Alan Bennett. From the description on the BBC website: "Given exclusive access to the key moments in his year, including final rehearsals of his new play, The Habit of Art, the programme gains unique insight into someone who can truly be described as a national treasure - a title Bennett would, no doubt, hate."

The programme will be shown at 21.30, and will be repeated on Thursday 10 December.

Full details and description:

BBC Website - Being Alan Bennett

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

This Sunday at 15.00 BBC Radio 4 will broadcast the first episode of John le Carré's George Smiley novel. Simon Russell Beale plays the title role, Alex plays Oliver Lacon. This is the first of three episodes.

The series is part of the "Series Catch-up Trial", which means all episodes will be available on BBC IPlayer after broadcast until 20 December.

Return to Cranford

The BBC has just announced a two-part Cranford Christmas special. The special was recorded earlier this year and will have old favourites taking part as well as new characters. Alex will be back in the role of the Reverend Hutton.

BBC Press Office

Observer Review

Susannah Clapp reviewed the Habit of Art in yesterday's Observer. About Alex she writes: "Alex Jennings is trim and buttoned-up as Britten; as the actor who plays the composer, he is lissome, arch and knowing. Both Griffiths and Jennings are terrific, though neither of them are particularly like the famous men they play: they are actors not impersonators."

Full review:
Observer

NT Live - "Habit of Art"

The date for the live broadcast to cinemas around the world has changed to 22 April 2010. More details about tickets on the NT Live Homepage.

More Reviews

Susan Elkin in The Stage has the following description of Alex: "It means several actors play two or three roles. Alex Jennings, for instance, gives us a conscientious, competent, nicely camp actor playing Britten with tortured vowel sounds and awkward, anxious body language, who relaxes only at the piano keyboard. The Jennings character also ‘reads’ for the all-knowing servant in Auden’s rooms, supported by de la Tour as Stage Manager, reading for a cleaner to good comic effect. There are some lovely moments, too, when the fictional playwright gets carried away with artistic pretensions and the cast try - and fail, of course - to make sensible drama of it."

Full review: The Stage


Henry Hitchings in London Evening Standard says: "Bennett frames the incident theatrically: we are backstage during rehearsals for a drama that deals with the two
men’s reunion. So, Richard Griffiths is crabby Fitz, an actor playing Auden. Alex Jennings with beautiful precision incarnates Britten through the actor who plays him, as well as playing an Oxford college servant unsettled by Auden’s personal habits, which include a taste for rent boys and an enthusiasm for pissing in the sink."

Full review: ThisisLondon

Reviews

The reviews are coming in for "The Habit of Art". There are mixed feelings about the play, though most reviewers have written favourable reviews. I give just the bits written specifically about Alex's performance, if you want the whole review, there is a link to the various papers.

Benedict Nightingale writes in The Times: "Does Jennings overplay Britten’s preciosity? Maybe, but he successfully comes across as defensive, insecure and envious of the rival composers he names with a staccato sneer. He’s primly unappetising while Griffiths’s Auden, despite such displays of coarseness as peeing in kitchen bowls, is warmer, more appealing — and, at the end, a bit lost and pathetic."

Full review: Times

Michael Billington in The Guardian: "A play that could easily seem tricksy is also given a superbly fluid production by Nicholas Hytner and is beautifully acted. Richard Griffiths bears no physical resemblance to Auden but he becomes a vivid metaphor for the poet. At the same time, Griffiths reminds us of the tetchy actor who is simply playing a role. Alex Jennings offers an equally potent echo of the angst-ridden Britten, spitting out the name of "Tippett" with calculated asperity.
Adrian Scarborough as Carpenter and Frances de la Tour as the stage manager are no less magnetic."

Full review: Guardian

Quentin Letts in the Mail Online calls Alex "nicely queeny".

Full review: Mail Online

Michael Coveney in Whats on Stage refers to Alex's Britten as "uptight, prissy and over-sensitive"

Full review: What's On Stage

Charles Spencer in the Telegraph: "Alex Jennings is superb, too, as the pained, prissily fastidious Britten and as a college scout grumbling about the squalor of Auden’s room, while Frances de la Tour, as the stage manager, and Adrian Scarborough, as the biographer Humphrey Carpenter, give performances of comic perfection."

Full review: Telegraph

The First Review

The first review of "The Habit of Art" has appeared, even while the play opens. The honour goes to the Independent. Paul Taylor has a very favourable review of the production and the actors. About Alex he says: "the inset drama is set in 1972 and stages an imaginary meeting, after a gap of twenty-five years, between Auden and his erstwhile collaborator, friend and psychological protégé, the composer Benjamin Britten. The latter is excellently portrayed in both his comic bassoon-up-the-bum inhibitedness and his tragically recessed self-repression by Alex Jennings who also plays his portrayer Henry, the kind of gay man that “trade” might call “a bit of neat”."

Full review: The Independent

More Praise for "Our Mutual Friend"

The Telegraph has a review of "Our Mutual Friend", written by Gillian Reynolds:

"Walker uses Dickens (played by Alex Jennings) as his narrator, stalking foggy streets, ears alert, eyes open for telling details of dress or manner. We follow him, let him show us the boat on the Thames, rowed by a girl, steered by her father. There’s a body in this boat. Whose is it? Why does it matter? Before the first 15-minute episode was out you knew. You could also tell it wasn’t going to be as simple as that."

Full review at: Telegraph

"Habit of Art" Pictures - More

Photographic press agency Rex has published a set of production pictures on: Rex

Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy

Alex will appear in the radio adaptation of John Le Carré's George Smiley novel, with Simon Russell Beale playing Smiley. The adaptation is in three episodes, to be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 from Sunday 29 November, 3.00 to 4.00 pm.

For more details: BBC Press Office

Thanks to Penny!

"Habit of Art" Tickets

All performances this year and January 2010 are sold out, but "The Habit of Art" will continue in to February and March 2010. Booking for February and March dates will open as follows:

SUPPORTING CAST: Online booking opens on Fri 13 Nov
PRIORITY MEMBERS: Online booking opens on Sat 14 Nov
ADVANCE MEMBERS: Online booking opens on Fri 20 Nov
GENERAL PUBLIC: Online booking opens on Wed 2 Dec

From the National Theatre Website

"Habit of Art" Pictures

The Playbill website has published a gallery of 13 pictures from the new play. They are at:Playbill

Series Catch-up Trial BBC Radio 4

The BBC are running a Series Catch-up Trial. This means that all episodes of "Our Mutual Friend" will be available on the iPlayer until one week after the end of the full serial, that is 11 December 2009. So for the patient, they can listen to all episodes in one go from 4 December on!

"Our Mutual Friend" Review

The Independent has a review of the new Dickens serial, written by Jane Thynne:

"If there's one realm in which television is supposedly pre-eminent, it's costume drama, and of all costume dramas, it's Dickens. So how could Dickens on radio, without bonnets and lamplight and all the glories of the BBC prop department possibly compete? The answer is magnificently. Woman's Hour's adaptation of Our Mutual Friend is like Christmas come early. Its timely theme is money and its power to corrupt. Old Harmon, a misanthropic miser who made his money from London's rubbish tips, has left a fortune to his estranged son, on condition that he marries a woman he has never met, Bella Wilfer. Yet at the start of the story a body pulled from the Thames is identified as that of the Harmon heir.

No one was more alert than Dickens to the importance of vivid dramatisation. In Our Mutual Friend, Sloppy is commended when reading out the paper because "he do the Police in different voices" whereas Silas Wegg reads "in a dry, unflinching way". Assisted by fabulously atmospheric music from Roger Goula, Jeremy Mortimer's production luxuriates in Dickens's language and the actors, including Pauline Quirke as Mrs Boffin, Alex Jennings as Dickens and Daisy Haggard as Bella, plainly relish their scripts. Our Mutual Friend was Dickens's last finished work and when it came out contemporary critics complained about the complexity of the plot, but judging by the first three of 20 episodes, Mike Walker's adaptation has overcome this problem. Even if you can't make a date with Woman's Hour, it's well worth catching the 7.45pm repeat."

The original review

That Elusive Alfonso Bonzo

The final episode of this children's series, with Alex playing exchange student Alfonso, has turned up on YouTube in three parts. The first one is at the following link, from there you can find the next two!

Alfonso Bonzo on YouTube

Brilliantly Cool

The Guardian's Elizabeth Mahoney has a few lines on "Our Mutual Friend":

"It's good that the weather has turned properly chilly in time for Our Mutual Friend in the Woman's Hour Drama slot (Radio 4). A month-long treat just right for winter, this adaptation is stylish and gripping from the start and Alex Jennings is brilliantly cool as Dickens. "Let's throw a stone into this pool," he says, observing his characters and relishing the ripples to follow. Almost every character and event is greeted with strong drink, with hot gin the favoured tipple when there's a nip in the air."

The Guardian Radio Review

Thanks to Jen!

Our Mutual Friend Blog

The new instalment of the Radio 4 Blog for "Our Mutual Friend" has an entry on Alex:

"15 May. Alex Jennings. So completely at ease with Dickens, Mike's writing, the microphone. He's a joy. He's disappointed to have been such an outsider to the process, having called in to studio the day before and 'felt the love', but we can tell how crucial his voice and his interest will be to the pieces as a whole."

The whole blog is at: BBC Radio 4 Blog

Thanks to Lori

Our Mutual Friend broadcast dates

Broadcasting of the new Dickens adaptation "Our Mutual Friend" will start on BBC Radio 4 on 9 November. The broadcasts will be part of Woman's Hour and will be at 11.45 a.m. They will be available for a week after broadcast on the BBC IPlayer.


See: BBC Press Office

Our Mutual Friend

Alex has been playing the part of Dickens in a radio adaptation of Our Mutual Friend for BBC Radio 4. The BBC has created a blog for the series, which contains a short film (available only in the UK), and some nice pictures of the members of the cast. More instalments of the weblog should be added in the near future.

See: BBC Radio 4 blog

The Habit of Art

Michael Gambon has withdrawn from "The Habit of Art" due to health reasons. The play will open on the date already announced, the part of Auden will now be played by Richard Griffiths.

For the official announcement see: National Theatre

Roald Dahl Day

To celebrate the fourth annual Roald Dahl Day, his principal illustrator Quentin Blake once again draws live on stage, and is joined by actors Frances de la Tour, Alex Jennings and Adrian Scarborough, who read from Dahl’s wonderful work. The event will take place on Saturday 3 October at 10.30 a.m. at the National Theatre, and will last about an hour. The Platform is followed by a booksigning. Tickets cost £3.50 / £2.50 (concessions)

For more information and tickets: National Theatre

Silas Marner

Alex appeared in the BBC Radio 7 adaptation of George Eliot's novel, which was broadcast yesterday and today. Can be heard for seven days after original broadcast on the BBC IPlayer!

Thanks again to Penny!

Lehman Brothers

Some images from "The Last Days of Lehman Brothers", broadcast on BBC2 last Wednesday 9 September.

Erskine May

Alex stars in "Erskine May" on BBC Radio 7 this week. The play will be broadcast Thursday 17 May at 11.15am, 9.15pm and 2.15am. It can be heard for a week after initial broadcast on BBC Iplayer.

"Unhappy with its design, a man blows up the Palace of Westminster. An assistant librarian is called upon to help rebuild it in time for Queen Victoria to open. Written by Dan Rebatello and starring Alex Jennings, Roger Sloman, Ewan Hooper, Amanda Root and Lucy Robinson. Directed by Polly Thomas it was first heard in 2000.

Lehman Brothers

"The Last Days of the Lehman Brothers" can be seen on BBC2 this Wednesday evening, 9September, at 9 p.m. UK time. Alex plays Timothy Geithner, then New York Fed president, now U.S. Treasury secretary. Other cast members are James Bolam, James Cromwell and Ben Daniels.

BBC2 Feature Lehman Brothers

Lehmann Brothers

The BBC have announced a new drama for the autumn called "The Last Days Of Lehman Brothers" about the collapse of Lehmann Brothers. Alex is mentioned as a member of the cast, and the one hour drama will be transmitted some time in the autumn on BBC Two.

Thanks again to Penny!

NT Platform in December

The National Theatre announced the NT Platform "In conversation with Alex Jennings" today: "Alex Jennings, company member in The Habit of Art, chats informally about his career and answers your questions."

The platform will be chaired by Al Senter, will take place on 8 December 2009 at 3 p.m and will last about an hour.

For tickets see: NT Platforms

Dates for "The Habit of Art"

The National Theatre has announced dates for "The Habit of Art". Previews start november 5, dates for November, December and January are up on the website.

The NT live broadcast to cinemas around the world is now set for 22 April 2010.

See National Theatre

The Guardian has the best announcement so far:

"Two of Britain's greatest living stage actors, Michael Gambon and Alex Jennings, will take the lead roles this autumn in Alan Bennett's new play The Habit of Art, the National Theatre announced today.

Gambon returns to the National for the first time in four years and will play the poet WH Auden in an imagined meeting with his former artistic collaborator Benjamin Britten, to be played by Jennings.

The words "much-anticipated" are artistic cliches, but in Bennett's case they ring true. There is genuine excitement about his new play – his first since The History Boys became such a global success, on stage and screen, in 2004.

The National today said The Habit of Art would be "as much about the theatre as it is about poetry or music", and that it will look at "the unsettling desires of two difficult men, and at the ethics of biography". Directed by Nicholas Hytner will be a cast including Frances de la Tour, Adrian Scarborough, John Heffernan, Stephen Wight and Elliot Levey."

For full article see: Guardian

Poetry!

Alex was one of the readers on Words and Music on BBC Radio 3 last Sunday. Tamsin Greig is the other reader. They read a selection of poems recommended by BBC Radio 3 presenters. The programme includes work by Gerard Manley Hopkins, Keats, WH Auden, Emily Dickinson, Edna St Vincent Millay and Maya Angelou, and music by Bach, Shostakovich, Nina Simone, Schubert, Martinu and Yasmin Levy.

The episode is available on the iPlayer until next Sunday on: Words and Music

Thanks to Penny!

Mirrors

The PBS Masterpiece website has the new Miss Marple "They Do It With Mirrors" available for viewers in the US until 2 August. Alex plays the part of Inspector Curry.

The website: PBS

The Top of the World

Next Friday Alex appears again on BBC Radio 7 in the radio play "From The House At The Top of the World". It is about a major Buddhist artefact discovered along the legendary Silk Road. A German archaeologist becomes involved in an attempt to steal it. Written by Ray Jenkins, it also stars Siobhan Redmond, Sean Baker and David Tse, and is directed by Janet Whitaker. The play was first heard in 1999.
Friday at 11.15am, 9.15pm and 2.15am

Odysseus on an Iceberg

A very early radio outing for Alex in 'Odysseus on an Iceberg'. It was repeated on radio 7 earlier this week and can be hear on the iplayer until Sunday afternoon: BBC Iplayer

Thanks to Penny!

Casino Royale

Alex reads "Casino Royale" on BBC Radio 7 all this week. You can listen live at 20.30 every night, or listen again at: BBC Radio 7

Thanks to Jennifer!

Through a Glass Darkly

Penny found an image of the reading in Stockholm:

A Tale Told by Moonlight

Alex read this story by Leonard Woolf for Radio 3 last Friday. It is available through the BBC Iplayer for a week through BBC Radio 3.

Thanks to Penny!

Electric Ink

Alex will be appearing in a new BBC Radio 4 comedy called "Electric Ink". This will be a six-part series starting on Friday 5 June.

The BBC Press Office provides the following information:

"Robert Lindsay stars as old-school hack Maddox Bradley, in this satire set in the world of journalism.

Finding himself lost in the ever-changing world of newspapers, Maddox struggles to keep up with new technology and marketing techniques. He feels the art of getting out there and finding stories is being forgotten and he is not about to let that happen. So he intends to remind his colleagues that journalists are meant to ask difficult questions and report proper news – and turns his nose up at soft-sell celebrity interviews, rehashed PR stories and the lifestyle questionnaire.

Written by well-known satirist Alistair Beaton and comic writer and journalist Tom Mitchelson, the cast also features Alex Jennings as the Editor, Elizabeth Berrington as the News Editor, Ben Willbond as Head of Online, Zita Sattar as Marketing Director and Debbie Chazen as Head of Moderation."

Thanks, once again, to Penny!

Scarlet on Black

Alex's weekly appearance on BBC radio this time is in "Scarlet on Black" on BBC Radio 7. From the announcement:

"In Roger Danes' fast-moving thriller, set in Paris, there is a link between the kidnap of Yvette Lalande and events in Algeria thirty years ago. 'Someone in authority' has good reason to hamper Commissaire Grosset's investigations. With David Calder, Peter Jeffrey and Alex Jennings."

It will be broadcast on Saturday 23 May at 1pm and 1am

At a Cinema Near You?

The National Theatre has created the NT Live scheme, broadcasting selected live performances to cinemas around the world. The first production to be broadcast will be "Phèdre" starring Helen Mirren this June. Next year the NT intend to broadcast Alan Bennett’s latest play The Habit of Art, which stars Alex, Michael Gambon, and Frances de la Tour

For more details and a list of cinemas in the UK and abroad taking part in the scheme see: NT Live

For more details on the story also see: Whatsonstage

Bergman Festival

For any Alex fans in Sweden: Alex will appear at the Bergman Festival in Stockholm later this month.

The announcement by the festival reads:

"A reading from The Almeida Theatre of a stage adaptation of Bergman’s film Through A Glass Darkly. Performed, script in hand, by four British actors, this new adaptation by Andrew Upton is currently being developed by director Michael Attenborough and Dramaturg Jenny Worton, with a view to a full production at the Almeida Theatre in London in 2010.

The film Through A Glass Darkly from 1962 was both written and directed by Ingmar Bergman. The film is often referred to as a “chamber film” because it features only four characters, takes place in a mere 24-hour period and entirely on an island."

The readings will take place on May 28 at 6.00 pm & May 29 at 8.00 pm on the Small Stage, Dramaten, Stockholm.


For more information check the festival's official website at Bergmanfestival

Happy Birthday!

to Alex on his 52nd birthday!

Royal Again

Alex is back on Radio 4 tomorrow, appearing as King George VI in the afternoon play, "A King's Speech". The BBC website gives the following description:

"It is 1937, the day of the Coronation, and the newly-crowned George VI must broadcast to the nation and the empire - a terrifying prospect for perhaps the most notable Briton to have suffered from a stammer. This play focuses on the close working relationship between the King and his speech therapist."

The play was written by Mark Burgess and stars Joan Walker as Queen Elizabeth.

The play will be broadcast at 14.15 on April 30.

For a full cast list see:
BBC Radio 4

Thanks again to Penny!

The Siege Of Krishnapur

From the BBC Press Office:

It is 1857, and British rule in India is under siege. Inspired by the sieges of Cawnpore and Lucknow, this dramatisation, by Olivier, Sony and Writer's Guild award winning Shelagh Stephenson, details the siege of a fictional town during the Indian Rebellion, from the perspective of the British residents.

The main characters find themselves subject to the increasing strictures and deprivation of the siege, which reverses the "normal" structure of life where Europeans governed Asian subjects. The absurdity of the class system in a town that no-one can leave becomes a source of comic invention, though the text is serious in intent and tone.

Heat, starvation, disease and death take their toll on the besieged colonists. But though vaguely absurd and impossibly insular in their outlook, they are given the opportunity to show the stuff of which they are made. Some, remarkably, rise to the occasion, surprising even themselves, while others betray the more preposterous traits of 19th-century colonialism and the reason why the Raj was ultimately destined to collapse.

Alex Jennings stars as The Collector, charged with care of a small and often fractious British community. Malcolm Tierney plays Dr Dunstable and Jasmine Hyde plays Louise.

The Siege Of Krishnapur Ep 1/2, Sunday 10 May, 3.00-4.00pm BBC RADIO 4

The Habit of Art

Playbill.com announces that Alex will star with Michael Gambon in Alan Bennett´s new play "The Habit of Art" at the National's Lyttelton this November. Alex will play WH Auden, Gambon will play Benjamin Britten. The play will be directed by the National's artistic director, Nicholas Hytner.

Playbill.com says: "The play is based on an entirely fictional meeting that takes place when poet Auden and composer Britten are respectively aged 70 and late 50s, when Auden was living in Oxford in the early 1960s before he died. In fact, though the two had collaborated on several works earlier in their careers – which included Auden writing the libretto for Britten's operetta Paul Bunyan and the song cycle "Our Hunting Fathers" – their relationship came to an uneasy end and they had not spoken since the mid-1940s."

Dates and further production details are still to be announced.

Full article at: Playbill

Dormouse

As part of the John Mortimer Tribute Season BBC Radio 7 broadcasts "The Summer of a Dormouse" this week, with Paul Scofield, Imelda Staunton and Alex.
An elderly man stands in the darkening garden of a vicarage by the sea and looks back on a life which seems to have passed as swiftly as Lord Byron's dormouse summer. John Mortimer's funny and poignant recollection of missed opportunities stars can be heard Tuesday at 10am, 3pm and 3am. It was first broadcast in 1999, the producer was Marilyn Imrie.

Lambeth Palace

The Saturday Play today also features Alex. Lambeth Palace (Radio 4, 2.30pm), is a comedy of church politics by Christopher William Hill. Alex stars as a prime candidate for succeeding a lately deceased Archbishop of Canterbury. But he’s having doubts about his faith plus his liberal views stand accused, by his rival, the Archbishop of York (Geoffrey Whitehead), of being possibly schismatic. It was written by Christopher William Hill.

Cast:
Michael Lombard ...... Alex Jennings
David Channing ...... Geoffrey Whitehead
Grace Lombard ...... Phoebe Nicholls
Patrick Latimer ...... Murray Melvin
Alicia Latham ...... Susan Jameson
Simon Brooker ...... Philip Fox
Anthony Taylor ...... Sam Dale
Russell Graves ...... Stephen Hogan
Claudia ...... Caroline Guthrie
Robin ...... Jonathan Tafler
Cardinal Daeneker ...... Malcolm Tierney
Seb ...... Benjamin Askew
Jade ...... Lizzy Watts

With Kirsty Wark and Jonathan Dimbleby as themselves, other parts are played by Janice Acquah, Matt Addis and Paul Rider. It is directed by Mary Peate.

Ayckbourn at 70

Alex takes part in the celebrations for Alan Ayckbourn's 70th birthday on BBC Radio.

On 11 April he will appear in Radio 4's Saturday Play, Man Of The Moment. This is Ayckbourn's play which examines the cult of celebrity and reality television. Vic Parks (Tim Piggott Smith), a failed criminal turned television celebrity, agrees to appear on a reality show with Douglas Beechey (Alex Jennings), the unassuming bank clerk who foiled the robbery. But the documentary starts to free-fall and events take an extraordinary turn.

Saturday Play: Man Of The Moment, Radio 4, Saturday 11 April at 2.30pm

BBC Radio 7 This Week

A lot of Alex on BBC Radio 7 again this week:

Without The Option 1/2
P G Wodehouse's delighfully scatty Bertie Wooster causes chaos when he persuades his friend Sippy to 'nab a policeman's helmet'. As usual, Jeeves is on hand to resolve the situation. This Radio 7 commission is unabridged and read in two parts by Alex Jennings, It was produced by Katherine Beacon.
Friday at 5pm


Speaking For Themselves - 1-5 of 10
An insight into the lives and personalities of Winston Churchill and his beloved wife, Clementine - as revealed in their letters. Starring Alex Jennings and Sylvestra Le Touzel, narrated by Helen Bourne, directed by Di Speirs and first broadcast in 1999.

Monday to Friday at 10am, 9pm and 2am

Stream, River, Sea

Alex will appear in the afternoon Play "Stream, River, Sea" on Friday 27 March,
2.15-3.00pm, on BBC RADIO 4. It is a play about the aftermath of bereavement. Juliet Stevenson also stars.

See: BBC website

Thanks, again, to Penny!

An Actor for All Seasons

Alex will be compere at a celebration of the life and work of the actor Paul Scofield, which will be held on the first anniversary of his death.

Other contributors are Eileen Atkins, Claire Bloom, Anna Calder- Marshall, Ralph Fiennes, Robert Hardy, John Harrison, John Hurt, Nicholas Hytner, Michael Pennington, Diana Rigg, Donald Sinden and John Tydeman. The tribute is directed by Gregory Doran.

Tickets are free but must be obtained in advance, in person or by telephone, from the National Theatre box office: 0207 452 3000 .

See: National Theatre

Thanks to Penny!

Big Thank You...

to Penny for blogsitting the diaries over the past three months while I was skiving off again way down south.....

Victoria and Albert

Alex will appear on BBC Radio 4 Front Row this Tuesday 17 March, 7.15-7.45pm
With producer Nica Burns he will visit the new theatre and performance gallery at the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Thanks to Jen!

Cry Babies - Radio 4

Alex plays Dr Rossiter in Kim Newman's Cry Babies, on Monday 9th of March at 2.15pm on Radio 4.

Cry Babies

By Kim Newman

It's the near future and busy, successful couple Angela and Barty Flitcroft want a child, but do not have the time to look after it. The solution is a genetically-enhanced daughter, Joy, birthed by a surrogate mother and reared to adulthood in a cryogenic chamber.

Joy experiences brief moments 'out of the machine', and as time passes each opening brings shocks and surprises as her parents and their society undergo incredible changes. And for Joy, stuffed with education by the machine but denied everyday experiences, life is not just a strange new country, but a frightening, confusing and often funny one, too.

Dr Rossiter ...... Alex Jennings
Angela Flitcroft ...... Natasha Little
Barty Flitcroft ...... Rupert Degas
Joy ...... Sia Berkeley
Roger ...... Colin Morgan
SleepLearn Machine ...... Sarah Douglas
Aruna ...... Emma Darwall-Smith
Jeff ...... Sam Alexander
Daisy ...... Kirsty Stuart
Ari ...... Rob Kendrick
Nurse Marketa/Girl ...... Emma Handy

Director Neil Gardner.

Edit: The play is available to listen again here until March 16th.

BBC Radio Sci Fi Season

There are more details of the BBC Radio Sci Fi season in this weeks RadioTimes and an eyecatching article promoting it.


The full article in two parts is here and here. I also missed this recent NT Platform, sorry.

Whitechapel - Episode 3

Even less of Alex in this final episode than the last one and then only looking very serious. Screengrabs below.



The final episode is available to watch on the ITV website here.

Erskine May

This play was broadcast on Wednesday on BBC Radio 7 and you can still catch it on iPlayer for the next four days here. Alex plays Thomas Erskine May.

With the Palace of Westminster blown up, can an assistant librarian rebuild it for Queen Victoria to open? Written by Dan Rebellato.

Whitechapel - Episode 2

Only fleeting glimpses of Alex in episode two. Screengrabs below.



The second episode is available to view here for 33 days. A preview of episode three is online here.

Whitechapel - Episode Two Preview

ITV have a preview synopsis and clip of episode two on their website and it is worth a look.

Whitechapel - Episode 1

The first episode of Whitechapel was entertaining enough, if somewhat gory. Not a lot of Alex: the clip that I posted yesterday had pretty much all of his appearance in it, with a tiny part a little later on. A few screengrabs below.



Episode one is available on the ITV player for the next 29 days.

Whitechapel - Clip

As I'm snowed in today and have had time to peruse the wonders of the internet, I found a short clip of Whitechapel nestling at the top of an interview with Rupert Penry-Jones from the The Telegraph. No mention of Alex in the interview, but the video clip is more fruitful and can be found here.

Critics' Circle Awards

Alex attended the Critics' Circle Awards yesterday, and here he is with winner of the Best Actress Award, Margaret Tyzack.


More pictures are available at Whatsonstage.

Whitechapel

Whitechapel will be broadcast on ITV at 9pm from the 2nd of February for three weeks. Alex plays Commander Anderson.

"A series of bloody, tragic and impossible crimes suggest someone is carrying out copycat Jack the Ripper murders 120 years after the killer first struck..." So not one for the faint hearted then.

There are more details on the ITV minisite for the programme. The press release with details of the first two episodes can be found here.

Cry Babies

In the first post of the New Year, The Stage newspaper announces BBC radio's SciFi season and that Alex will be playing the part of Dr. Rossiter (a cryogenics expert) in a play by Kim Newman, called Cry Babies. There's no news on the date of transmission or which radio station will be airing it.

Full article can be found here.