BBC Radio To Pay Tribute To Anthony Minghella

BBC Radio has announced that they will broadcast a series of plays by Anthony Minghella, in a tribute to the director who died last month at the age of 54.
Prior to his work in film, Minghella wrote a number of plays for BBC Radio, including the award-winning productions of 'Hang Up' and 'Cigarettes And Chocolate'.
Programmes featuring Minghella talking about his own creative processes and literary works that inspired him, will also form part of this tribute season which will be broadcast on BBC Radio 3 and BBC Radio 4.
Radio 3 will broadcast 'Works In Progress' on May 10 at 8:30pm. Anthony Minghella originally recorded this in February 2000. In five short programmes, he talked about the creative process behind his films, as he was preparing his adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's novel 'The Talented Mr Ripley'.
This will be followed by the Prix Italia award-winning 'Hang Up' at 8:40pm, a radio drama starring Anton Lesser and Juliet Stevenson, which was written by Minghella and was first broadcast in 1987. This short play of a late night phone-call between two lovers is a study of lost innocence, deception and treachery.
'Cigarettes And Chocolate' on May 3 at 2:30pm. The Giles Cooper award-winning production starring Juliet Stevenson and Bill Nighy was first broadcast nearly 20 years ago and tells the story of Gemma, her explained silence and refusal to speak and how her circle of friends and lovers react.
A repeat of a 1994 edition of 'With Great Pleasure' will follow at 3:30pm, in which Minghella will talk about the four pieces of literature that inspired him most. Minghella's 'Two Planks And A Passion' will be broadcast on May 10 at 2:30pm. The 90-minute play is a comic account of the citizens of York preparing a dramatic performance for Richard II and his long-suffering Queen Anne of Bohemia.
Anthony Minghella was born in 1954 on the Isle of Wight. He wrote for BBC Television during the Eighties and his work included episodes of 'Boon' and 'Grange Hill'. In 1991, he wrote 'Truly, Madly, Deeply', which first appeared on television, then moved to the cinema. He wrote and directed the film 'The English Patient' (1997), for which he won an Oscar for Best Director and was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay. In 1999, he wrote and directed 'The Talented Mr Ripley'. For which he was again nominated for the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar, and 'Cold Mountain', based on the novel by Charles Frazier, was released in 2003.
Most recently he co-wrote and directed the TV film, 'The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency'.
He died in March this year.
(KMcA/JM)