Bleak Expectations

Original version

BBC Radio 4 Extra

Your digital radio entertainment station showcasing the best in comedy and drama

Your digital radio entertainment station showcasing the best in comedy and drama. With recent favourites from BBC Radio 4.

Comedy: Spoof

Comedy Victorian adventures by Mark Evans

BBC Radio 4 FM

BBC Radio 4 LW

Gareth Edwards

Bleak Expectations: Series 4: A Tolerable Life De-Happified

A Tolerable Life De-Happified

Series 4

BBC Radio 4 - Bleak Expectations, Series 4, A Tolerable Life De-Happified

Attacked by sinister custard, Pip must fight a new form of evil.

Attacked by sinister custard, Pip must fight a new form of evil. Mark Evans' Victorian epic stars Tom Allen. From November 2010.

Our hero Pip sees his former nemesis - the badly named Gently Benevolent - thwarted and locked up in a prison within a jail within a gaol spelled the other way, and apparently repentant of his crimes. 

But late one foggy night when Pip is attacked with a bowl of sinister custard, he realises a new form of evil is stalking the streets of London. He is obliged to ask for help from his erstwhile foe. 

Can Benevolent now be trusted? And who is the sinister evil figure? 

Meanwhile, Pip's wife Ripely, has become obsessed with cutlery, and the purchase of some diamond-handled dodo knives will probably force Pip into bankruptcy. 

And his best friend Harry Biscuit claims to be having terrible problems with an angry badger.

Mark Evans's epic Victorian comedy - with apologies to Charles Dickens.

Sir Philip ..... Richard Johnson
Young Pip Bin ..... Tom Allen 
Gently Benevolent ..... Anthony Head 
Harry Biscuit ..... James Bachman 
Grimpunch ..... Geoffrey Whitehead 
Ripely ..... Sarah Hadland
Pippa ..... Susy Kane

Producer:  Gareth Edwards

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in November 2010.

Bleak Expectations: Series 4

BBC Radio 4

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Comedy Victorian adventure by Mark Evans. Several years after the death, for the second time, of his evil guardian Mr Gently Benevolent, Pip Bin's happiness is shattered once again

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Bleak Expectations

Series 4

A Tolerable Life De-Happified

Contributors

Genres

Brand

Series

BBC Radio 4 Extra

About BBC Radio 4 Extra