Nuremberg

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BBC Radio 4 FM

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Nuremberg: Because They Started It, by Jonathan Myerson

Because They Started It, by Jonathan Myerson

BBC Radio 4 - Nuremberg, Because They Started It, by Jonathan Myerson

Do the top Nazis deserve a trial? Or just summary execution? And what’s the charge?

The Allies must now decide what to do with the leading Nazis. Washington wants a trial, but Prime Minister Churchill is happy to have them shot. And what should be the charge?

June 1945 and, with the Nazis under arrest, the Allies must now decide what to do with them. 

Washington wants a trial while, in London, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill is happy with a summary court martial. But if you put them on trial, what is the charge? 

Seen through the eyes of Diana, a Whitehall secretary, the tortured negotiations unfold, edging towards the creation of a totally new sort of trial. Churchill wants the top 50 put against a wall and shot; Stalin wants them to have a show trial and then be shot. But following the sudden death of Roosevelt, the new US President Truman insists on formal justice. 

Whose trial procedure should they adopt? Russia and France don’t use cross-examination and America is insisting on a charge of conspiracy, unknown in France. But procedure is nothing compared to the problem of the Four Indictments. They end up having to invent new words – Crimes Against Humanity and Genocide.

Cast:
The Hon. Diana Ravenscourt - KATE PHILLIPS
Robert H Jackson - 	JOSEPH MYDELL
Sir David Maxwell-Fyfe -	FORBES MASSON
Samuel Rosenman 	CLIVE WOOD
Murray Bernays - JOSEPH ALESSI
Iona Nikitchenko - HENRY GOODMAN
General Clay -	NATHAN WILEY
Henri Gros - JONATHAN CULLEN 
Joseph Stalin -	JASPER BRITTON
Winston Churchill - ANDREW WOODALL

Sound Designer - ADAM WOODHAMS
Studio Manager - MARK SMITH
Original Score - METAPHOR MUSIC
Writer and Director - JONATHAN MYERSON
Producer - NICHOLAS NEWTON

A Promenade production for BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds


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

Drama

Dramatic reconstruction of the trial of Nazi war criminals in the aftermath of WWII.

This major new drama series, drawn from testimony, documents and court transcripts, tells the entire story of the trial of Nazi war criminals following Germany's surrender in 1945.

NUREMBERG tells the entire story of the trial of the most notorious Nazi war criminals through dramatic reconstruction, telling it from ground-level up, through the eyes of a Russian interpreter, the American prison psychologist, a French reporter, the British Court Liaison Officer and others from the thousands of individuals tasked with fighting 'the last battle of WWII'. Starring Natalie Dormer, Freddie Fox, Kate Phillips, Alex Kingston, Ed Stoppard and Henry Goodman.

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Nuremberg

Because They Started It, by Jonathan Myerson

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