❉ ‘Crackanory’ returns from Monday 30 January on Dave, previewing exclusively on UKTV Play from Monday 23 January.
The new series of Crackanory, from UKTV in partnership with Audible, sees one narrator per episode reading an extended story. Each story is brought to life with live action featuring some of Britain’s best comedy actors.
Narrators include Sheridan Smith, Dara O Briain, Doc Brown, Anna Friel, Mackenzie Crook, Miriam Margolyes, Bob Mortimer and Mel Giedroyc.
On Thursday 9 February, Mirian Margolyes narrates Pickled, written by Kevin Eldon: A down on his luck former aristocrat who squanders away his fortune, stumbles upon an old house with a mysterious inhabitant.
Miriam Margolyes
What do you think makes a great storyteller?
A great storyteller is someone who can weave magic using character and structure and prose. And of course from my point of view, there’s only Charles Dickens because he’s the best and the greatest storyteller of all. A storyteller that can hold your attention, fascinate you and make you want to know what’s coming next.
What is your Crackanory story about?
The Crackanory story that I was asked to read surprised me very much because it was, I thought, rather rude. I don’t know why they gave it to me! It’s about a wastrel from the upper classes – most of them are wastrels really, aren’t they? He happens by chance to come in to a house in which there is an incredibly strange person…
It is scary, and funny, and shocking; a very good story.
What is your favourite story of all time?
My favourite story of all time is probably ‘Little Dorrit’ by Charles Dickens. I’m just locked into the nineteenth century, and everything after it feels rather irrelevant to me. I love a story that’s got a moral to it, and that’s what’s so lovely about the story I’ve recorded for Crackanory.
I was in the film of ‘Little Dorrit’ and I’ve read it over and over again all my life, I never get tired of it. For me a story has to have wonderful characters. Charles Dickens believed that we should all be better to one another and the world would be a better place, and I think he’s right.
Who would you choose to give you a bedtime story?
It’s very difficult to know, because in an ideal world it would be my mother. She is long dead, but she used to read to me when I was little and I would always say to her “read it again, read it again!”. She could never understand why I wanted to hear it again. But these days, now, there are two men whose voices I love. One of them is Charles Dance and the other is Martin Jarvis, and I could listen to them until my eyes closed.
❉ Crackanory is brought to you by Audible from Monday to Thursday at 10pm from Monday 30 January 2017. The first episode will also preview exclusively on UKTV Play from Monday 23 January.
❉ Source: UKTV Press
