Eastern Cabaret Explained

Genre:Variety
Creator:Harry Pringle
Based On:Cabaret
Presenter:Cyril Fletcher, Hari Sin Bey
Country:England
Language:English
Num Episodes:3
Producer:Harry Pringle
Runtime:4550 minutes [1] [2]
Company:BBC Television
Network:BBC Television

Eastern Cabaret was a live variety programme series broadcast 19381939 on BBC Television. It was one of several spin-offs from the BBC series Cabaret. Four episodes were broadcast; they were produced by Harry Pringle, the first was compered by Nelun Devi, the next two were compered by Cyril Fletcher, and the last by Hari Sin Bey. The BBC television service was suspended on 1 September 1939 with the outbreak of World War II, and no further episodes were made.

According to Radio Times (20 May 1938), "Harry Pringle, Reginald Smith's officemate, is having a busy time preparing for his Eastern Cabaret, to be given next week on Monday, May 30, and Saturday, June 4. One of his difficulties was getting snakes without temperament and susceptible to the charms of native charmers. He went to five different agencies and gave auditions to thirty-two snakes, and even then failed to find a satisfactory performer".[3] A later entry in Radio Times suggests that this may not have been entirely serious, saying that the background had been "codded" (i.e. parodied) by compere Cyril Fletcher.[4]

No episodes have survived.[5]

Performers

, the following performers who appeared in Eastern Cabaret are subjects of Wikipedia articles. The numbers of episodes in which they appeared are given in parentheses (treating repeat performances as a single episode).

Notes and References

  1. Radio Times 1938 . Radio Times . 22 February 2016.
  2. Radio Times 1939 . Radio Times . 22 February 2016.
  3. Television News. Radio Times. 20 May 1938. The Scanner. 22 February 2016 .
  4. Television News. Radio Times. 6 January 1939. The Scanner. 22 February 2016 .
  5. The show was broadcast live. Methods for recording live television did not exist until late 1947, and were used very rarely by the BBC until around 195355.
  6. Web site: Search for Eastern Cabaret. BBC. 22 February 2016 .