A Kind of Alaska by Harold Pinter

Harold Pinter was born in London in 1930. His career as a playwright began with a production of The Room in 1957. His second play, The Birthday Party, closed after eight performances but was enthusiastically reviewed by critics. His early works were described by critics as "comedies of menace". Later plays such as No Man's Land (1975) and Betrayal (1978) became known as "memory plays".

His writing career spanned over 50 years and he produced 29 original stage plays, 27 screenplays, many dramatic sketches, radio and TV plays, poetry, one novel, short fiction, essays, speeches, and letters. He appeared as an actor in productions of his own work on radio and film, and directed nearly 50 productions for stage, theatre and screen.

Despite frail health after being diagnosed with oesophageal cancer in December 2001, Pinter continued to act on stage and screen. In 2005 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature and, in the same year, the Wilfred Owen Award for Poetry and the Franz Kafka Award (Prague). Pinter’s last performance was in October 2006, in the title role of Samuel Beckett's one-act monologue Krapp's Last Tape, for the 50th anniversary season of the Royal Court Theatre. In 2006 he was awarded the Europe Theatre Prize and, in 2007, the highest French honour, the Légion d'Honneur. He died in December 2008.

Presented here is a selection of Pinter’s best works, broadcast by BBC Radio across 6 decades.

A Kind of Alaska
A one-act play in which a middle-aged woman named Deborah, who has been in a comatose state for 29 years awakes with a mind still that of a sixteen-year-old. She must confront a body which has aged without her knowledge or consent, and a brother-in-law who has fallen in love with her.
Deborah ..... Harriet Walter
Hornby ..... Guy Paul
Pauline ..... Indira Varma
Written by Harold Pinter
Directed by Toby Swift
First broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in November 2015


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