Showing results by narrator "Frances Barber" in All Categories

A dazzling collection of comedies from the later Restoration period England's 'Glorious Revolution' of 1688 and the reign of new monarchs William and Mary signified a turning point for Restoration comedy with laws being passed to restrict playwrights' freedoms. The latter years are marked by a...

David Edgar is among the UK’s leading contemporary dramatists, well known for his powerful plays chronicling Britain's changing political landscape over the past 50 years. More than 60 of his original plays, adaptations and translations have been performed around the world, and in 2023 he was honoured with a Writers’ Guild Outstanding Contribution award for his service to British playwriting. This radio anthology contains some of his most notable work.

Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, known as Colette, was a French author and woman of letters. She was also a mime, actress, and journalist. Colette is best known in the English-speaking world for her 1944 novella Gigi, which was the basis for the 1958 film and the 1973 stage production of the same name. Gigi became a celebrated stage musical and film; the stage production made a star of Audrey Hepburn, who was personally chosen by Colette for the role, and a dramatized adaptation is the centrepiece of this collection.

In this BBC full-cast production of Antony and Cleopatra, the soldier and noble prince Mark Antony's enthralment with the Egyptian queen Cleopatra is proving controversial. Will the tumultuous relationship ultimately end in tragedy? Antony and Cleopatra is an intense love story, exploring the...

Toulouse-Lautrec's iconic Parisian poster stars come to life in these full-cast dramas, set in 19th-century Montmartre 1889, Paris. When Charles Zidler's extravagant pleasure palace, the Moulin Rouge, opens in bohemian Montmartre, he commissions local artist Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec to create a...

Abandoned at birth, little Mercy Hanley shows a fierce determination few others can match. Her inner fire burns brightly, even in the harsh conditions of turn-of-the-century Birmingham. For behind Mercy's pale and haunting face, there is a mind of steel, as her harsh foster mother, Mrs Gaskin...

The abridged, downloadable audiobook edition of How to Be Good, Nick Hornby's No.1 bestseller in the UK and Ireland. Read by the actress Frances Barber. According to her own complex moral calculations, Katie Carr has earned her affair. She's a doctor, after all, and doctors are decent people...

23 November, 1963. It is the day after John F. Kennedy's assassination - and the faces of the dead are everywhere. PC Reg Cranfield sees his late father in the mists along Totter's Lane. Reporter Mae Callon sees her grandmother in a coffee stain on her desk. FBI Special Agent Warren Skeet finds...

Sir Lenny Henry has had a long and successful career as a comedian, impressionist, actor and presenter. Having starred in several plays in the West End and on radio, he was inspired to complete an MA in screenwriting and in 2011 penned his first radio drama, Corrinne Come Back and Gone, which opens this collection. He continued his writing career with three more Radio 4 plays and nine episodes of his comic monologue series Lenny Henry’s Rogues Gallery. Collected here for the first time, listen to these poignant and humorous original dramas.

Best known for her posthumously published novel Suite française, Irène Némirovsky was born in Kiev in 1903. Her family fled the Russian Revolution for Paris, where she found fame as a novelist. But when the Nazis occupied France, she was arrested as a Jew and sent to Auschwitz, where she died aged just 39. This collection includes four of her best works, dramatised for radio with a full cast.

When newly widowed Jessica decides to rent a room to recently divorced Rex, she's a little apprehensive. She's never had a lodger before, and he's not used to being a tenant. Neither are quite sure how their relationship works—and to make things trickier, they're wildly different people. But unbeknownst to either of them, they share a secret—they both keep a diary. Taking turns to read from their respective journals, they relate their thoughts, hopes, dreams and first impressions of each other, which are somewhat less than flattering. 

In early 20th Century England Hamilton James Macaulay relates the tale of how he found himself in a Scarborough Bric-a-brac shop. The owner of the shop has 13 long playing records that each contain a hidden track at the end, that tell strange tales of future times. These 13 tales of terror will change Hamilton James Macaulay's life forever and he will leave the shop a murderer. Thirteen is a portmantaeu audio anthology, harking back to the classic horror albums of the 1970s.

A BBC Radio 3 production from the 'Drama on 3' series exploring the idea of a fascism of the mind.Nigel is bored. But then he meets the glamorous Liv and Tony and becomes part of their beautiful world; a beauty that hides a disturbing secretDavid Eldridge's 'The Secret Grief' stars Paul Chequer...

Lucy White ends up in Farewell Square after a messy divorce. The other residents are anything but quiet, and they're as intrigued by Lucy as she is by them. As she's drawn into their midst, she realises that life can be kind as well as cruel.

Doctor Elehri Mussurana has spent a lifetime on her work. She's guarded her pet project close to her chest, letting only one person share her secret - her husband and lab partner Ernst Wharner. As their experiment reaches its final, glorious fruition, they watch in awe as sparks fly in a sealed...

When Jonny went missing everything changed. His mother's heart is full of terror and sadness instead of joy. His father's study overflows with newspaper cuttings and profiles on missing people instead of the academic texts that were there before. His sister, once carefree, now carries the weight of the world on her shoulders. His bedroom at home remains untouched and ready for his return. The hands on the clock continue to turn and yet Jonny hasn't returned. Where is he?

Doug Lucie's satirical sequel to 'Hitched' revisits the bride and groom, Emma and Richard, two years after their big day. The honeymoon is well and truly over and wedded bliss hasn't turned out to be, well, blissful. With their relationship at crisis point, Emma returns from America with her...

A wise and hilarious novel from the bestselling author of Funny Girl, High Fidelity, and About a Boy. A brutally truthful, compassionate novel about the heart, mind, and soul of a woman who, confronted by her husband’s sudden and extreme spiritual conversion, is forced to learn “how to be...