The German Pilot

Stanley Baxter and Rona Munro have been collaborating for some years now on the stories in The Stanley Baxter Playhouse; last year listeners were full of praise for Stanley's performance in Rona's Playhouse story -The Man In the Garden.

This story is a wartime romance set in rural Scotland in the second world war.

Friedrich is a German pilot whose plane is shot down over a remote rural area in the west of Scotland. He is a prisoner of war, and initially local feelings against him are vitriolic; but he, like everyone in the community in which he finds himself, is a cattle farmer, and as his English improves, he forms strong bonds with his captors, and forges an unlikely friendship which, many years later, brings him back to Scotland.

Cast:
Fred ... Stanley Baxter
Friedrich ... Sam Peter Jackson
Beth ... Vicki Liddelle
George ... John Ramage

Stanley, a past master in accents and impersonation, plays the older Friedrich, looking back over sixty years to tell the story. John Ramage and Vicki Liddelle play the other parts, with Sam Peter Jackson, [son of the composer Mick Jackson who wrote the disco hit 'Blame It On The Boogie'] who was brought up in Germany and is completely bi lingual, playing the young German pilot.

Rona Munro is one of Scotland's most highly regarded playwrights, with award winning films [Ken Loach's Lady Bird Lady Bird] and television dramas [Rehab] and her Edinburgh International Festival success The Last Witch to her credit.

Producer: Marilyn Imrie
A Catherine Bailey production for BBC Radio 4.