Afternoon Play - Arabian Afternoons - The Casper Logue Affair

Arabian Afternoons: The Casper Logue Affair A darkly comic thriller by Sebastian Baczkiewicz, set in Baghdad. The first of three Arabian Afternoons - contemporary plays inspired by tales from The Arabian Nights. Junior diplomat Bob Goldacre is in trouble: the American businessman he was looking after has vanished from a Baghdad street. As the suspects pile up, Goldacre is going to have his work cut out if he wants to save his career and make sure that justice is done. Shahrazad.........SIRINE SABA Shahrayar..........KEVORK MALIKYAN Aseera..............BETSABEH EMRAN Rahim...............SARGON YELDA Goldacre...........TREVOR WHITE Hammond.........BRUCE ALEXANDER Casper..............NATHAN OSGOOD Kindermann.......RUFUS WRIGHT Carlton.............JOHN BIGGINS Charlene...........ALISON PETTIT Directed by Abigail le Fleming The Story The Casper Logue Affair is based on the story "The Hunchback", found in The Arabian Nights, which deals with the extraordinary events that take place after the death of the king's favourite fool. The Writer Sebastian Baczkiewicz is a radio writer of great range and experience. His work for Radio 4 includes 2000 Tales(an updating of the idea of The Canterbury Tales) and the New Metamorphoses (he wrote Semele). He also writes the series Pilgrim, based on the old myths and legends of Britain. The Arabian Afternoons Series A long time ago and far away, there was a king called Shahrayar. Betrayed in love himself, his custom was to enjoy his brides on their wedding night and then kill them at dawn. But one woman managed to survive, night after night, by telling the king stories. Her name was Shahrazad. The series comprises three afternoon plays, framed by Shahrazad's voice as she describes rare and strange places for her husband, the murderous king. But these places are not the markets and deserts of medieval Arabia - with the help of some of our best radio writers, she conjures the Middle East of 2010, a landscape against which stories from the original 14th century "Thousand and One Nights" can breathe again. The stakes are high: as each tale comes to a close, Shahrazad will learn whether it has earned her a night's reprieve. Each play is a tale within a tale - the stakes are also high for the storytellers Shahrazad introduces. Taken together, the plays reflect the humour, magic and savagery of the old tales.