Alick Rowe graduated from St. Catharine's College,
Cambridge in the sixties; he has been writing since 1969: books, radio and
television. I only know first-hand of his radio work: Crisp and Even
Brightly is a superb take on the Wenceslas story, and one of the funniest
plays I've ever heard; there are other comedies of similar standard
(Operation Lightning Pegasus, Totally Gutted, The Shepherd who Couldn't
See The Wood For the Trees) and serious plays
(The Valley, Boy Bishop)...
Below I've listed his radio and other work.
AFTERNOON THEATRE
08.10.1962 The Georgian Rake
01.08.1970 Fawcett ! Fawcett !
31.01.1970 The Great Balloon Debate
05.12.1970 A Passing of Power
16.01.1971 Accomplices*
18.05.1973 Accomplices
22.08.1976 Spin A Loving Thread
29.12.1979 The Great Balloon Debate (remade)
MIDWEEK THEATRE
13.02.1974 No Frontiers for the Captain
SATURDAY NIGHT THEATRE
13.08.1977 The Valley*
24.02.1979 Spin A Loving Thread*
07.11.1981 Operation Lightning Pegasus*
07.08.1982 Operation Lightning Pegasus
19.10.1985 Odysseus On An Iceberg*
19.12.1987 Crisp - & Even Brightly*
20.04.1996 Valtemand & Cornelius Are Not Well At All*
ADAPTATIONS
The Ascent of Rum Doodle, 5 part adaptation, 1972
November - dramatisation from Simenon, 1976
Monsieur Pamplemousse Investigates - 3 part comedy drama*
Violence and the big male voice, by Gwyn Thomas, 2005
OTHERS
Apples and Tea, 1975
Observations on a Jesting Man, 1977
Totally Gutted, 1991*
Arthur Halfshaft-The Man, 1991*
Boy Bishop, 1992
The Great Orange Outing, 1992*
The Dorabella Variation, 2003*: Piers Productions / BBC
The Shepherd Who Couldn't See The Wood For The Trees, 2003*
Readings: The Horse: more from Troy, 2006
Asterisked items known to exist in VRPCC collections.
TELEVISION
The Master and the Mask, Up School, Refuge for a hero,
Just Fine, She-Carole, Packman's Barn. SERIALS:Two people,
Claire, Morgan's Boy, A Sort of Innocence, Friday on my
Mind. SERIES CONTRIBUTIONS: Harriet's back in town,
Emmerdale Farm, The Crezz, The Law Centre, Thomas & Sarah,
The Vet, Dangerfield, Peak Practice, Mu Uncle Silas,
Rockface. DRAMATISATIONS: The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie,
The Tripods, A Taste for Death, A Quiet Conspiracy.
BOOKS
Boy at the Commercial, Morgan's Boy, Voices of Danger,
The Panic Wall, Trapped, Derek Dungbeetle in Paradise,
Derek Dungbeetle and the Lost Lover.
SHORT STORIES in collections:
The Dogs: Introduction 5; The Facts of Life: In between;
The Dorabella Variation: Ghostly Haunts; Derek Dungbeetle
and the Lost Lover.
compiled from info. supplied by Roger Bickerton and
Alick Rowe. Reproduced by permission.
NOTES ON THE RADIO PLAYS
OPERATION LIGHTNING PEGASUS....1981, 90m
Humorous version of the story of the Siege of Troy. The
wooden horse, the thick-as-a-plank muscular heroes, the seductress
Helen; they're all there...the scenes with the soldiers inside the
wooden horse are wonderful, and the sound effects exactly right.
With (as the Greeks): Timothy West as Agammemnon, Shaun Probert
as Menelaus, Geoffrey Bateman as Diomedes, Henry Stamper as Achilles,
Nicholas Courtney as Petroclus, Hugh Dickson as Odysseus, Ronald
Herdman as Philicus. The Trojans: Andrew Hilton as Priam, Neil
Stacey as Hector, Joy Harrison as Andromache, Tim Bentinck as Paris,
Norma Ronald as Helen, Rosalind Adams as Cassandra, Christian Rodska as
Melops. Harpist: Valerie Aldridge-Smith. Directed in Bristol by
Shaun MacLoughlin.
ODYSSEUS ON AN ICEBERG....1985
Another humorous parody -The title refers to a navigational error
made by Odysseus in travelling from one part of Europe to another - he
went too far south. This is the story of Odysseus's return after twenty
years of trying to find Greece, and comfronting his wife's 112 suitors.
Homer describes the scene : '... so did Odysseus' party chase the suitors pell-
mell through the hall and hack them down. Skulls cracked, the hideous
cries of dying men were heard, and the whole floor ran with blood.....'
Alick Rowe's version is more plausible; listen to this and learn what
really happened. With Hugh Dickson as Odysseus, June Barrie as
Penelope, Stephen Thorne and Christian Rodska as the Chorus; the crew
by Neil Stacey, Eric Allen, Alex Jennings, Telemachus by Timothy Bentinck,
Eumaeus by David March, Eurycleia by Margot Boyd, and the Suitors were
Andrew Hilton, Geoffrey Bateman, Patrick Malahide, Mark Straker,
Angela Phillips; also starred Melinda Walker, Polly Wilson, Gilly Bond,
Paul Nicholson, Maggie McCarthy. Directed in Bristol by Shaun MacLoughlin.
TOTALLY GUTTED....1991
A local football team is faced with a bizarre new management
including a middle-aged striker with a wooden leg. The sound effects of
his running for the ball are wonderful. An excellent
comedy with Timothy Bateson as Tommo, Geoffrey Mathews as Cyril,
Terence Edmond as Shafter, Norman Jones as Nudger; also stars
Stephen Thorne, Tessa Worsley,
Elizabeth Kelly, Norman Jones, Richard Pearce, Paul Downing,
Alice Arnold, Mark Straker, Nigel Carrington, David Bannerman,
Stephen Garlick, Nicholas Gilbrook, James Simmons, Alan Barker.
Directed by Richard Wortley. SMs David Greenwood, Ian Harker, Colin Guthrie.
THE DORABELLA VARIATION....2003
Saturday play, 55m. Echoes of a great composer, and a chance meeting on a
lonely hillside in Elgar country. Rpt. Nov 2005, R4.
THE SHEPHERD WHO COULDN'T SEE THE WOOD FOR THE TREES....2003
R4, afternoon play, 24 Dec 03, 45m. Joel the shepherd is obsessed with his
sheep; he has little time for his wife and no time for his
mother-in-law. Then one night the ladies receive a visitation.
Joel is not impressed with the effect it has on his meals
or his sheep.
This is a splendidly
daft comedy where the sheep get most of the good lines, and one can guess
from the performance that they had fun doing the recording. Stars
Sarah Lancashire, Thelma Barlow, James Fleet, Judy Cornwell, Julia
McKenzie, Polly James. Directed by Celia de Wolff.
VIOLENCE AND THE BIG MALE VOICE....2005
- by Alick Rowe, from the novel by Gwyn Thomas (R4, 1415, 12 Sept 05) was a comic tale of passion, set in South Wales in the 1930s. There is comedy when you meet the members of a male voice choir. I met some recently in a pub; they sang in parts, drank a lot, and told ribald true stories about newlyweds. Alick's play was similarly amusing, but there was a darker side. Jonathan Floyd and Mali Harries starred; Gilly Adams directed.
THE HORSE .... 2006
R4, 27 Nov - 1 Dec, 1530. A Greek conscript and a military commander
from the Trojan wars tell five "inside stories" - including what
really happened inside the wooden horse. Read by Martin Jarvis,
Darren Richardson. There's even a Greek chorus.
Thanks to Alick for supplying some of the details
above.
