A House in the Square

Summary: 1949 BBC live studio production of Diana Morgan’s chronicle drama A House in the Square. The stage play ended its story in 1939, but additional scenes were written for this 1949 television production, taking it through the Second World War when the house ‘becomes a refuge for the bombed-out until its own destruction by a doodle-bug’ ('The Scanner’, ‘The House with a Story to Tell’, Radio Times, 22 April 1949, p. 29).
Theatre play: A House in the Square by Diana Morgan [more information]
Play synopsis: The play tells the story over the years from 1910 of a house in Eaton Square, where Lady Mountstephan is a great political hostess and her daughter, Vema, a militant suffragette. In the First World War the house becomes a hospital and Verna a V.A.D. We are taken through the years between the wars when the house is converted into flats and Vema’s daughter, Verity, is growing up’ ('The Scanner’, ‘The House with a Story to Tell’, Radio Times, 22 April 1949, p. 29).
Production history: Opened at the St Martin’s Lane Theatre, London on 4 April 1940; published in the same year.
Date of transmission: Sunday 24 April 1949
Time: 8.30-10.00pm
Channel: BBC Television
Production company: BBC

Producer

Harold Clayton

Playwright

Diana Morgan

Sets / Settings

Barry Learoyd

Cast

Origination: Live from studio
Vision original: Monochrome
Later transmissions: Presented again at 8.30pm on Thursday 28 April 1949.
Extant status: No archival copy is known to exist.
Play tags: First World War, as theme or setting; Second World War, as theme or setting; wartime, as theme or setting

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British Universities Film & Video Council