Tag Archives: Radio drama

Piper Alpha, on Radio 4

On July 6, 1988, just before 10 pm, a gas explosion aboard the North Sea oil Rig Piper Alpha ignited a fire that became an inferno fueled by oil and gas pumped by two other rigs upstream in the production line. One hundred and sixty seven men died, including two from a rescue boat, almost before those outside the rig took measure of the catastrophe. Only 59 men survived, some of whom did so by jumping into the sea from heights of up to 175 feet.

Members of my family were living in Scotland at the time of the disaster; they spoke of the profound collective shock. I arrived in Leeds in time to follow Lord Cullen’s inquiry. Last July, 20 years after the disaster, BBC Radio 3 broadcast a riveting, damning, impeccably constructed documentary drama based upon the testimonies and findings of the inquiry. This week, the play is being repeated on BBC Radio 4.

It begins with the explosion of the gas line and ends 90 minutes later as the accommodation block, where most of the remaining men had been trapped, falls into the sea. A narrator – the only female voice in the production that needfully consists entirely of male voices – is the voice of the chorus, providing technical detail and essential context, as the play overlays dialogue from the inquest upon by-the-minute dramatization of the experiences of several men who survived as well as key exchanges between the operators of the other rigs, the crews of pilot and rescue boats, and executives and rescue organizations on shore. And it works, without a moment of confusion and a wasted word. Though I have no doubt that there are controversies and arguments about what exactly happened when and where, and simplification is inevitable; it is, after all, a dramatization. Compelling as a tragedy, for we all know the end. Fascinating as an examination of systems failure, communications failure, unheeded warnings and flawed human decision-making in an information void. (Not only oil and gas, but communications flowed through Piper Alpha, and very shortly after the first explosion, the communications centre was destroyed and the upstream rigs ceased to have any communications with Piper, each other, or the head office on shore. All they had was a mayday, a horizon lit up with fire and explosions. Disbelief, and a miscue by a pressure-guage, led to an hour-long delay in shutting down the flow of fuel to the fire.) And impressive in the way it weaves together narrative, multi-viewpoint action, reflection and analysis.

The acting is very fine, from the subtle shadings of compassion and force in Lord Cullen’s portrayal, through the strain and chagrin of the managers and executives facing his questions, to the actors portraying the men themselves, both within the inferno and as they recollect what they did, saw, and survived. Even the sound-effects, superb and intermittedly frightening, merely augmented the impact of voices and dialogue. The play is available until next Saturday afternoon (GMT).

Authorial mischief, and hollow dreams

Just been listening – with wicked snickers – to the last excerpt of The Uncommon Reader, British author Alan Bennett’s impish fictive speculation on the consequences, for monarch, court and constitution, of the Queen of England’s being bitten by the reading bug. It’s been on BBC4 arts, Afternoon Reading, for this last week.

I’m also waiting for the last part of the Book at Bedtime, Richard Yates’ Revolutionary Road, about the hollowness of the American Dream for a young couple, Frank and April Wheeler, living in post-WWII suburbia. With their dream – or rather April’s dream – of escaping suburbia for Paris undone by her pregnancy, and Frank’s manipulation and prevarication named and shamed by their neighbours’ disturbed son, their marital battles have descended into primal cruelty. The climax of the last episode made for shuddersome listening.

Classic politics

The BBC Classic Serial is broadcasting 3 plays based upon Suetonius’ Lives of the Cesars. The first 2 are currently available on their website. The first covers a clandestine meeting between Gaius Julius Cesar, Governer of Gaul, Cicero and Cato, in which they attempt to hash out their differences to let Cesar return to Rome without either being arrested or invading; also present, and inadvertantly key, are Cesar’s daughter Julia, married to another, absent factor in the equation, the general Pompey, and Tulia, Cicero’s daughter (Julia and Tulia may be historically accurate names, but they’re too close for hearing; it’s a credit to the actresses who played them that from the start there was no confusing the personalities of the high strung Tulia and the forceful Julia who inadvertantly brings about the final schism between Cato and Julius).

The second play takes place after Cesar’s assassination and concerns the survival and rise to power of Cesar’s adopted son, Octavian (later Augustus), 19 years old at his adopted father’s death. Two characters appear of whom I’d formed a strong impression from other works of literature – Livia, Augustus’ wife (can anyone forget Sian Phillips in I, Claudius), and Mark Anthony. Only this is not Shakesphere’s noble Mark Anthony, but a foul-mouthed brute of a Roman general. The BBC attaches a warning of “strong language” – Roman politicians are not delicate in their insults. The latter play reminded me a little of the recent film Elizabeth in the shape of the growth of a young person who, though innately noble, is a survivor more than he is an idealist, and when he finds himself forced to sacrifice principle, uses that sacrifice without apology to his advantage; in the case of the Octavian play, Octavian, who found war repugnant, builds an ordered society in which violence finds its release in the carnage of the arena. A note of warning: if you want to hear the first of these, listen before Saturday, as only two plays are available at one time, and each new play bumps the earlier of the 2 from the site.