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03/01/10

Ashes to Antarctic

BBC Radio 4 play focusses on the widow of FID returning his ashes to his beloved Antarctic
Category: General
Posted by: Rod

Prolific playwrite Jim Eldridge was inspired by a visit to the Antarctic Peninsula and the crosses at Petermann Island to write a fictional play about a widow of a FID (staff of the British Antarctic Survey) who planned to return his ashes to the place he loved.  They had planned a visit to Antarctica but he died before they could make the trip together. With her sister in tow the widow, Jill, played by Carolyn Pickles, takes her husband's ashes with her. She finds attitudes have changed and learns of some of the implications of the Antarctic Treaty.

It captures some of the history of exploitation, the lifestyle on base in the seventies, tour boats and much more. The playwrite Jim Eldridge told the British Antarctic Monument Trust, "the problem that I had, as I'm sure you can imagine, was making sure the story didn't disappear under the weight of information, and that the play turned into a travelogue ... something that Radio 4 did not want to happen. So the producer, Peter Leslie Wild, and I did our best to balance the information about Antarctica past and present, with the characters in the story."

If you would like to hear it you can listen to it for the next seven days on the BBC website at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00r0qhc 

Jim commented, "I think it will be a wonderful thing to commemorate the memories of those brave people who died there. As I hope came across in the play, the memorial cross on Petermann Island struck a very poignant chord with me."

Jim Eldridge has been a scriptwriter for 35 years. He has had over 250 TV and 250 radio scripts broadcast in the UK and across the world. You can read more about Jim's work here http://www.jimeldridge.com/ and if you would like take a writing course.


 

 


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