Radio 4 Reviews | Star Trap | Ed Reardon's Week | Alexei Sayle's The Absence of Normal - The Minister for Death: March 12 2019

While Radio 4 might have the highest figures for the Today Programme at just under 7 million, I, like lots of other people, have dropped my consumption of news coverage, but I still love listening to radio programmes.

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I started listening to Radio 4 in my early twenties. I was helping a mate decorate a flat over in Broadstairs, above the Barnaby Rudge, or maybe next door. I was entranced by the afternoon play and episodes of book of the week.

Years afterwards, as I was decorating my own first home, I followed the events of the Gdansk shipyard strikes and the formation of Solidarity and, later, the shocking live broadcasts from the Falklands War and the tragic unfolding of the Miners' Strike and the Hillsborough disaster.

Like the 750,000 other people who have stopped listening to the Today programme over the past year, I couldn't bear the Brexit coverage and the relentlessly savage and one-sided reporting of Jeremy Corbyn.

But still we have heart lifting comedies with witty dialogue, thank goodness.

Source Bill Nighy as Charles Paris

Star Trap

A Charles Paris Mystery

I love Charles Paris, the old reprobate, and the repartee between Charles and his agent, Maurice:

I get out of bed in the morning with a lust for life.
Really?
You don't think I've got a lust for life?
I don't think you get out of bed in the morning.

This episode included a lovely little exchange between Charles and his "semi-detached wife, Frances" about ballroom dancing which included "Shut the foxtrot up" a line I am aching to use myself the first opportunity I get.

As the blurb says,

Bill Nighy [excellent] returns as actor-cum-amateur-sleuth Charles Paris in Jeremy Front's new dramatisation of Simon Brett's novel.

Suzanne Burden plays Frances and Jon Glover Maurice. Crime is probably my favourite genre and Charles Paris one of my favourite sleuths, In the interests of balance, I also enjoy Paul Temple Investigates (from 1938 onwards), especially the wonderful accents and gender stereotyping.

Source Christopher Douglas as Ed Reardon

Ed Reardon's Week

Speaking on Pick of the Week Christopher Douglas explained where Ed's character came from: "Simon Gray's published diaries were mainly about how badly treated he'd been by producers, actors, critics and electronic machinery. His impotent rage against his employers was one of the inspirations for Ed Reardon, the character I co-write, perform and in some ways resemble. Ed often rants from the point of view of appalled gentleman author, but he can also play the thwarted radical." from wikipedia

Again, I love so much of the dialogue, especially the exchanges between Ed and his literary agent's assistant, Ping, a dim posh bird, obsessed with social media and pink pens with fluffy attachments. Ed can get a bit much with his rants and tirades, but I've usually fallen asleep before he gets to full flow.

This week's episode had Jack Farthing as a soppy literary assistant (soppy is a great word, you don't hear it often nowadays. I think I picked it up from the Beano, maybe Lord Snooty and his Pals).

Source Paul Barber as Ronnie

Alexei Sayle's Absence of Normal

The Minister for Death

Part of a series of plays adapted from Alexei Sayle's short stories, The Minister of Death stars Paul Barber as aging pensioner Ronnie suffering sciatica and other ills who discovers his lust for life. It's a lovely little story with a twist, and Paul Barber with his fabulous voice and Liverpool accent is great. You kind of know what the ending is going to be, and that only adds to the pleasure of listening when it transpires.

The Absence of Normal is a little dark as a series but interesting. My sister and I went to see Alexei Sayle a few years ago at the Theatre Royal, Margate. I loved it. My sister said she had forgotten how angry everyone was in the eighties.

Walking