Herman Melville - Britten 100: Billy Budd - These Buttons We Wear ( BBC Radio )
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Billy Budd by Herman Melville
The playwright Keith Dewhurst adapts Herman Melville's powerful story of persecution and retribution in the aftermath of the Naval Mutinies at Nore and Spithead in 1797. He also tells the story of the man who wrote it. Part of Radio 3's Britten centenary weekend, this play provides an alternative context to Britten's opera, which is also being broadcast on the station. Herman Melville was a man who himself had more than a passing acquaintance with mutiny. There was a history of it amongst his forebears and his own escapades as a sailor in the South Pacific involved him in a mutiny of his own. Starring Gerard Murphy, Robert Portal and Monica Dolan and with effects specially recorded off the Cornish coast, this is a story steeped in the naval history of two nations. It is also a touching account of creative aspiration, failed adventuring and a family haunted by misfortune.
Herman Melville - Gerard Murphy
Eleanor Melville - Monica Dolan
Long Ghost/Captain Vere - Robert Portal
Guert Gansevoort/John Claggart - David Westhead
Bill Budd - Mark Quartley
Young Eleanor - Caitlin Welch
Liverpool/The Dansker - Simon Greenall
Salem/The Stranger - Nathan Osgood
Consul Wilson/Captain Graveling - Pip Donaghy
Replies
Yea ! I'm a big Melville fan. Thank you, sir !
Thank you, Rick!