An early, live television broadcast presenting an excerpt from Shakespeare’s romantic comedy.
In a scene taken from the third act of the play, the banished Rosalind (Margaretta Scott), disguised as the young man Ganymede in the Forest of Arden, encounters the lovesick Orlando (Ion Swinlay). Finding him decorating trees with poems dedicated to her, she playfully offers to cure him of his infatuation by pretending to be Rosalind so he can practice his wooing.
This brief excerpt represents one of the BBC’s earliest forays into televised Shakespeare, broadcast live from Alexandra Palace during the infancy of the medium. Productions of this era were defined by their technical ambition and severe practical limitations. The presentation of a single scene from a classic play was a common method of bringing theatre to the very small, London-based audience able to receive the signal. These pre-war experiments, ephemeral and unrecorded, were foundational moments for television drama, establishing the potential of the new technology to transmit stage performance directly into the home.
Broadcast: BBC, 1 Episode, 5 February 1937
Written by: William Shakespeare
Presented by: Stephen Thomas
Main Cast: Margaretta Scott (Rosalind), Ion Swinlay (Orlando)
