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Desert Island Discs

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Castaway guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

Eight tracks, a book and a luxury: what would you take to a desert island? Guests share the soundtrack of their lives.

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Kirsty Young

Harriet Walter

Desert Island Discs: Dame Harriet Walter

Dame Harriet Walter

26/06/2011

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, Dame Harriet Walter

Actress Dame Harriet Walter joins Kirsty Young to choose her Desert Island Discs.

Kirsty Young's castaway is the actress Dame Harriet Walter. 

She has been a stalwart of the stage for more than three decades - winning great acclaim for her work with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the National Theatre. Performing ran in the family - her uncle is the actor Christopher Lee and she remembers how, as a child, he would make her shriek by putting on his famous 'Mummy' walk to scare her. She turned down a place at Oxford because she knew she wanted to act - only to find that the drama schools weren't keen on her... she was turned down five times before securing a place. 

She says she has never thought about making clever career choices, but, in the year in which she has been made a dame, turned sixty and married for the first time, she says it has all turned out better than she ever expected. 

Record: My Baby Just Cares for Me - Nina Simone. 
Book: The complete works of Isabella Bird. 
Luxury: A flute 

Producer: Leanne Buckle.

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