Miss Fay Compton

Synopsis: Radio broadcast. Dramatic critic James Agate reviews Fay Compton’s career on the English stage. The talk is illustrated with extracts from gramophone records featuring Compton as Ophelia and Henry Oscar as Hamlet in III i and IV v.
Series: Stars in Their Courses
Language: English
Country: Great Britain
Medium: Radio
Recording date: 1 Mar 1933
Transmission details: 28 Apr 1933 at 09:20 (Channel: BBC National Programme)
Duration: 25 mins

Writer

Contributor

Cast

Henry Oscar	Hamlet
Fay Compton	Ophelia

Production type: Documentary/Educational/News
Plays: Hamlet
Keywords: actors; Shakespeare, William (1564-1616); Compton, Fay (1894-1978).

Notes: Broadcast on the Daventry National Programme.This production is one of the earliest BBC Shakespeare recordings to have survived.
General: Stars in their Courses consisted of a series of talks devised by dramatic critic James Agate (1877-1947) in 1933, in which he talked about the achievements of famous theatrical actors and actresses in London. The programme would be rounded off with actors’ performances of short scenes from their past successes by way of illustration. These performances would either be recorded live or played from gramophone records.
Reviews: Source: Radio Times, The Times, BBC Archive
BBC catalogue reference: 266.
James Agate writes about his conception of the series in ‘Actors, Past and Present’, Radio Times, 31 March 1933, p. 798.

British Universities Film & Video Council