| by J. B. Priestley
Directed by Emma Kimsey
October 6, 7 & 8, 2011
| Arnold Jordan |
Malcolm Bentote |
| Edna Sandars |
Bieneke Barwick |
| Keith Henley |
Ritchard Tysoe |
| Helen Tennant |
Alison Wyatt |
| Sally Philips |
Dorothy Bentote |
| Clara Packer |
Alison Marshall |
| Rose Heaton |
Estelle Dunham |
| Fred Poole |
David Bowers |
| Robert Crowther |
Duncan Sykes |
| Miss Tracey |
Valerie Clarke |
Location: The action takes place in the staff room of
the large Greenfingers Palace Hotel in the Peak District.
Time: The 1930s
Programme Notes
[ Photographs ]
The Author - J. B. Priestley
Priestley was born in September 1894 in Bradford. Having left
school at 16, he worked as a junior clerk at a wool firm and
wrote articles in his spare time for various newspapers.
He was to draw on memories of Bradford in many of the works he wrote after
he had moved south, including 'Bright Day' and 'When We Are Married',
Priestley served during the First World War in the 10th Battalion
of The Duke of Wellington's Regiment, and was wounded in 1916
by mortar fIre. After his military service Priestley received
a university education at Trinity Hall, Cambridge and by the
age of 30 he had established a reputation as a humorous writer
and critic.
Priestley's first major success came with the novel 'The Good
Companions', which made him a national figure. His next novel,
'Angel Pavement', further established him as a successful novelist.
He moved into a new genre and became equally well known as
a dramatist. 'Dangerous Corner' was the first of a series of
plays that enthralled audiences.His best-known play is 'An Inspector
Calls' which was made into a film starring Alastair Sim.
During World War II, he was a regular broadcaster on the BBC.
'The Postscript', broadcast on Sunday nights throughout 1940 and 1941,drew
peak audiences of 16 million; only Churchill was more popular with listeners.
Priestley chaired the 1941 Committee and in 1942 he was a co-founder
of the socialist Common Wealth Party. The political content of his broadcasts
and his hopes of a new and different England after the war influenced the politics
of the period and helped the Labour Party gain its landslide victory in the
1945 general election. In 1958 he was a founding member of the Campaign for
Nuclear Disarmament.
He married three times. In 1921 he married Emily 'Pat' Tempest, a music-loving
Bradford librarian. Two daughters were born in 1923 and 1924, but in 1925 his wife
died of cancer. In September 1926, he married Jane Wyndham-Lewis and they had two
daughters and one son. In 1953 he divorced his second wife and married the
archaeologist and writer Jacquetta Hawkes, his collaborator on the play 'Dragon's Mouth'.
He died on 14th August 1984.
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