The Circle

Summary

1948 BBC live studio production of Somerset Maugham’s maritial comedy The Circle.

Theatre play

The Circle by W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965) [more information]

Play synopsis

In a large house in Dorset, Arnold Champion-Cheney and his young wife Elizabeth play host to Arnold’s mother, Lady Kitty, and her aristocratic lover, Lord Porteous, a married man with whom she ran off twenty years before. The older couple are shown to have a difficult relationship, and Kirry advises Elizabeth against leaving her husband for her own lover, although this is in fact what occurs towards the end of the play.

Production history

Premiered on 3 March 1921 at The Haymarket Theatre, London, where it enjoyed a six-month run.

Date of transmission

Sunday 12 September 1948

Time

8.30-10.00pm

Channel

BBC Television

Production company

BBC

Credits

Producer

Campbell Logan

Playwright

W. Somerset Maugham (1874-1965)

Sets / Settings

Stephen Bundy

Cast

Daphne Arthur	Elizabeth
Bryan Coleman	Arnold Champion-Cheney
Walter Fitzgerald	Lord Porteous
R. Stuart [Stuart] Lindsell	Clive Champion-Cheney
Clement McCallin	Edward Luton
Mary Merrall	Lady Catherine Champion-Cheney
Sidney Monckton	Butler
Alison Pickard	Mrs Shenstone
Alan Rolfe	Footman

Additional details

Origination

Live from studio

Vision original

Monochrome

Extant status

No archival copy is known to exist.

Play tags

comedy; Dorset, as theme or setting; marriage

Print sources

Title

Radio Times, 10 September 1948 (Magazine)

Linking notes

article by J. C. Trewin, ‘Maugham’s Best Comedy’, p. 25; listing, p. 26