Branagh to play Cyrano on Radio 3

by Ben Dowell
January 18, 2008

Actor and director Kenneth Branagh is to play Cyrano de Bergerac in a BBC Radio 3 production of the play.

Branagh is returning to radio drama after a gap of more than two and a half years to star as the lovelorn Cyrano in the network's flagship programme for Easter Sunday on March 23.

The actor, who has recently directed two feature films including a version of Mozart's opera The Magic Flute, stars alongside Jodhi May, star of the recent BBC film The Other Boleyn Girl, as Roxane, the beautiful cousin that he loves but has not the confidence to woo on account of his large nose.

Other parts in the adaptation of Edmond Rostand's classic story set in Paris in 1640 will be taken by John Shrapnel, star of the film Gladiator and Tom Hiddleston, who plays Christian, the man for whom Cyrano writes love letters in order to seduce Roxane.

The decision of Branagh to appear in his first radio work since Radio 3's version of Terence Rattigan's Bequest To The Nation in 2005 was welcomed by the station's head of speech programming, Abigail Appleton.

"I was lucky enough to watch the recording in studio of the final scenes of this new production of Cyrano de Bergerac - I hope listeners will feel as moved by the performances as I was," she said.

"New radio productions of classic stage plays are at the heart of Radio 3's drama schedule alongside new writing and we are delighted to be able to bring listeners two major new productions with such distinctive casts."  The Guardian