Official Anthony Stewart Head Bleak Expectations: Series 2

Bleak Expectations: Series Two
Radio Series (UK)
Role: Mr. Gently Benevolent
Episodes: All
Original Air Date: August 7th, 2008 - September 11th, 2008
Network: BBC Radio 4

Bleak Expectations on Audio CD

Comedy Victorian adventure by Mark Evans.
Starring: Anthony Head as the evil Mr Gently Benevolent
Richard Johnson as the venerable narrator, Sir Philip
Geoffrey Whitehead as all six members of the sinister Sternbeater family
Tom Allen as young Pip Bin
James Bachman as Harry Biscuit

The cast also includes Laurence Howarth as the fatally generous Mr Skinflint Parsimonious; Sarah Hadland as the chaste but very frustrated Ripely Fecund; Susy Kane as Pip's charitable, goose-protecting sister, Pippa; and Mark Evans as a variety of Victorian gentlemen and members of the lower orders. Chapter Three includes guest star David Mitchell as the muscular, Methodist-hunting vicar Mr Godly Fecund.

This is the second volume of Mark Evans's comic Victorian epic, in the style of Charles Dickens – after too much gin. Evil villain Mr Gently Benevolent is brought back from the dead by the terrifying Sternbeater family to destroy the life of young Pip Bin, inventor of the bin and one of the wealthiest young men in Britain.

Six stirring chapters gallop through six different aspects of Victorian life as it really probably wasn't. Listeners can bask in the kindness of St Lovely's school, with its classes of double Definitely-Not-Latin and its School Cakery; marvel at the engineering genius of the early railways; and rage against the injustice of Parliament, where the walls are soaked in brandy – and so are the MPs.

They must surely weep as Young Pip spirals into vast debt, undergoes a tragically unsuitable marriage to an evil man in a dress, and sinks into opium addiction amid the grimness of the Victorian East End and the thieving gang of Mr Abraham Bagel. And finally, they will cower before the terrifying spectacle of the Martian invasion, where only Pip and some geese stand between Mr Benevolent's army of long-eared purple space villains and all that is good and true.

EPISODES

1. Pip Bin struggles against the cruel plotting of his evil guardian Mr Gently Benevolent, recently returned from the dead. A plot is afoot to steal Britain's loveliest school, St Lovely's.

2. Pip and Harry find themselves building an entire railway network in their bid to catch the evil Mr Gently Benevolent.

3. Young Pip is nursed back to health by the Reverend Fecund and his hideously ugly daughter Ripley.

4. Pip is heavily in debt when he has to bribe the whole of the House of Commons not to hang him.

5. Full of self-loathing, Pip drinks some very strong gin, finds he is really quite keen on opium, and falls in with a gang of thieves. But is their leader Abraham Bagel, all he seems?

6. The planet is in deadly peril when Gently Benevolent summons a massive Martian invasion. Is this the end for Pip, Harry and the rest of the human race, not to mention Pippa's goose sanctuary?

AUDIO CD RELEASE INFORMATION

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	An Audio CD of series one was released in the UK on 3rd March, 2008, and is available to order
from the BBC Shop *website and various online outlets. The series is also available to download from digital retailers.


A BBC Audio CD of the 2nd series was released in the UK on the 9th October, 2008. Copies
can be ordered from the BBC Shop *website.

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	A BBC Audio CD of the 3rd series was released in the UK on February 4th, 2010. Copies can be ordered from
BBC Shop here.

* Please note that we are not responsible for the content and reliability of external sites.

To Bleak Expectations Series 1 and Series 3

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