BBC and Royal Court to partner for celebration of contemporary playwrights, with new production of Lucy Kirkwood’s The Children

BBC Radio 4 and the Royal Court Theatre have announced a collaboration to mark the theatre’s 70th anniversary, featuring a new audio production of Lucy Kirkwood’s The Children alongside a season of landmark Royal Court plays from the BBC archive.

The season begins with The Children, which will air on BBC Radio 4 on 26 September from 3pm to 4.30pm. First staged at the Royal Court in 2016 before subsequent international productions, the play follows retired nuclear physicists Hazel and Robin, whose former colleague Rose unexpectedly arrives at their home near the damaged power station where they once worked.

Emma Fielding stars as Rose, alongside Anastasia Hille as Hazel and Stanley Townsend as Robin. The production is directed by Mary Peate, produced by Jessica Dromgoole for Hooley Productions, with sound design by Peter Ringrose and original music by Jon Nicholls.

Playwright Mark Ravenhill has curated a selection of seven BBC radio adaptations of Royal Court plays spanning the theatre’s history. The archive productions will air on BBC Radio 4 Extra at 8.30pm each evening following the broadcast of The Children, and will also be available on BBC Sounds for 28 days.

The season includes John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger (26 September), Arnold Wesker’s Roots (27 September), Athol Fugard, John Kani and Winston Ntshona’s Sizwe Banzi Is Dead (28 September), Caryl Churchill’s Top Girls (29 September), Timberlake Wertenbaker’s Our Country’s Good (30 September), debbie tucker green’s Random (1 October) and Charlene James’ Cuttin’ It (2 October).

The archive productions feature casts including Ben Whishaw (in Don’t Look Back in Anger), David Bradley, David Troughton (both in Roots), Adetomiwa Edun (Sizwe Banzi is Dead), Helen McCrory, Siobhan Finneran, Sheila Hancock, Nikki Amuka-Bird (all in Top Girls), Kate Fleetwood, Adjoa Andoh, Elliot Levey (in Our Country’s Good), Nadine Marshall (Random) and Susan Wokoma (Cuttin’ It). 

Alison Hindell, commissioner for Radio 4 drama and fiction, said: “These productions showcase the breadth, ambition and enduring relevance of great playwriting. As the biggest commissioner of audio drama in the world, the BBC is proud to bring these remarkable stories to a wider audience, so that everyone can access brilliant contemporary theatre through the visionary lens of the Royal Court.”

Royal Court Theatre executive director Will Young added: “It’s an absolute gift for the Royal Court to have this collaboration with Radio 4 during our 70th anniversary. Opening up their archival treasure trove of seven decades of pioneering playwrights from our stages, and making that freely available to listeners – with Mark Ravenhill as our national guide through contemporary British theatre – is thrilling. Look Back In Anger, Sizwe Banzi Is Dead, Cuttin’ It, Random, Roots, Our Country’s Good, Top Girls, plus a radio premiere for The Children – what a feast, and what a reminder of the value of a public service broadcaster.”

Ravenhill commented: “I’ve got a particular bond with the Royal Court Theatre, as they discovered and produced my first play, so it’s been fascinating to work through the archive of BBC radio productions of Royal Court plays and to select seven of them for Radio 4 Extra. It’s a chance for listeners to share the journey that Royal Court new plays have made in the last seventy years, to hear the swaggering male voice of John Osborne’s Look Back in Anger – the Court’s first big hit – and then trace the emergence of powerful Black and female voices in more recent years. Radio brings a fresh intimacy to a series of plays that have become contemporary theatre classics and provides a great introduction to plays that the listener may never have encountered.”