Electric Decade: USA

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Drama: Classic & Period

Classic titles that influenced and characterised the Jazz Age of the 1920s.

During 2020, we bring you a range of classic titles that influenced and characterised the Jazz Age of the 1920s.

During 2020, we bring you a range of classic titles that influenced and characterised the Jazz Age of the 1920s, from the beginnings of Modernism, through the parties and dancing as the shadow of the war was thrown off, to increasing uncertainty as the decade drew to a close.

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Electric Decade: USA by John Dos Passos: Episode One

Episode One

USA by John Dos Passos

BBC Radio 4 - Electric Decade, USA by John Dos Passos, Episode One

USA is John Dos Passos’s masterpiece, an epic saga of American life from boom to bust.

USA is an epic saga by John Dos Passos, following the interwoven storylines of a fascinating group of disparate characters at the beginning of the 20th century.

USA is an epic saga following a group of characters through the opening decades of the 20th century, in a grand sweep that takes us from post-war boom to Great Depression bust. 

It has modernist flair, a sharp social eye, and a profound humanity. We follow key individuals, drawn from all walks of life, as their paths cross to creating a complex and moving tapestry of American society. 

One by one, we are introduced to the players, and we learn about each in depth from infancy to maturity. We see them growing up, negotiating adolescence, looking for love and finding their place in the world, meeting each other as fortune dictates, and following their destiny to success or failure. 

Dramatised by Robin Brooks from John Dos Passos's USA trilogy: The 42nd Parallel, 1919 and The Big Money

Episode One : John Ward Moorehouse, Eleanor Stoddard, and Janey Williams.
In the opening episode, we meet the first players in our saga, as fate draws the threads of their lives together - John Moorehouse, a young man on the make, Eleanor Stoddard, a young woman with artistic ambitions, and Janey Williams, a girl growing up on the wrong side of the tracks.


Cast:
John Ward Moorehouse ..... Tom Bateman
Eleanor Stoddard ..... Tanya Reynolds
Eveline Hutchins ..... Hannah Genesius
Janey Williams ..... Sheila Atim
Annabelle Strang ..... Jessica Phillippi
Rochevillain /Oliver Taylor ..... Jacob Fortune-Lloyd
Freddy Sergeant / Alec ..... Calam Lynch
Joe Williams ..... Adam Courting
Gertrude Staple ..... Laurel Lefkow
McGill ..... Eric Meyers
Jerry Burnham/ Oppenheimer ..... Will Howard

Producer / Director - Fiona McAlpine
Sound Design - Lucinda Mason Brown

Production Manager - Lucy Barter
Broadcast Assistant - Georgia Brown

An Allegra production for BBC Radio 4

Electric Decade: USA by John Dos Passos

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

USA is John Dos Passos's masterpiece, an epic saga of American life from boom to bust.

John Dos Passos's epic saga follows a group of characters through the first decades of the 20th century, in a grand sweep that takes us from post-war boom to Great Depression bust.

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