Product Description

Talking Heads is a complete collection of Bennett's six masterful monologues, performed by the author and five of Britain's leading actresses. In these compelling pieces, Bennett displays the wry observation, knowing irony and tender understatement that have ensured his rightful place at the forefront of contemporary writing.

Included in this collection is:

Chip in the Sugar with Alan Bennett
A Lady of Letters with Patricia Routledge
Bed Among the Lentils with Anna Massey
Soldiering On with Stephanie Cole
Her Big Chance with Julie Walters
A Cream Cracker Under the Settee with Thora Hird

Includes 3 CDs

Running Time: 3 hours 15 minutes.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #8496 in Books
• Published on: 2005-10-03
• Released on: 1999-10-01
• Number of discs: 3
• Format: Audiobook
• Binding: Audio CD

Amazon.co.uk Review
Alan Bennett's award-winning series of six television monologues, Talking Heads, may have been first aired in 1988, but over a decade later it is still impossible to read these deeply moving and affectionate scripts without hearing the voices of the actors who played them. Maggie Smith as the alcoholic vicar's wife finding a semblance of happiness in an affair with an Indian shop owner, Patricia Routledge as the poisonous neighbour, Julie Walters as the over-the-hill dolly bird auditioning for a porn film and of course Thora Hird as Doris, the old lady alone in her home having fallen and broken her hip. All great performances and all made possible by Bennett's wonderfully observant and poignant scripts. Bennett rightly notes in his introduction to the pieces that, maybe apart from Doris, his narrators are artless in that they "don't quite know what they are saying and are telling a story to the meaning of which they are not entirely privy". But through their artlessnes they reveal more about Britain today and the stresses and strains placed upon ordinary people, than any number of docu-soaps that now claim to show us real life. --Nick Wroe

Synopsis
This title features: "A Chip in the Sugar" with Alan Bennett, "A Lady of Letters" with Patricia Routledge, "Bed Among the Lentils" with Anna Massey, "Soldiering On" with Stephanie Cole, "Her Big Chance" with Julie Walters, and "A Cream Cracker Under the Settee" with Thora Hird. Alan Bennett' six monologues are poignant, funny and written with the author's powerful insight into human nature. As a TV series, a book, a stage play and an audio, "Talking Heads" has become a phenomenon.

Customer Reviews

Genius
I am a fan of talking books, and I would describe many of the ones that I have heard as good, entertaining, thought provoking even. But this collection of stories stands so far above everything else that I have listened to that I can't see them ever being eclipsed. They are that very rare thing in literature - something that is brilliant, complex, moving - but absolutely not worthy, or 'difficult'. How many of us have struggled through a Booker prize winner because we 'ought to', when really it was too much like hard work? These stories are just so entertaining. You very quickly forget that they are monologues because the scenes and other characters are so real that you can see and hear them as if you were watching a full-cast production. You will be able to come back to them again and again because they are so rich with detail, and so beautifully written, and spoken, that they will always be fresh. If you are considering whether or not to buy these, then consider no longer. This is a cast iron guaruntee that tou will love them - and I don't say that very often, if at all.

Try this, and be surprised
Some twenty years ago, mr. van Broekhoven, who taught us english, told us one day to be sure and watch a television programme called "Talking Heads" which would be shown on the BBC that same evening.
I loved it, right from the start. I was spellbound by the quality of the acting and by the words, especially by Alan Bennett's ability to put the right words in a character's mouth. He fashioned these truly moving stories out of little else but the dreary everyday life of ordinary people.
"Talking Heads" started me off on Alan Bennett and I've read a lot of his other work since, which I've also enjoyed very much.
Bennett writes with elegance, understatement and with uncanny empathy. He succeeds in really making these people come to life. One can't help but be moved by what these people tell us and you end up sympathising with them, pitying them, hoping they'll be alright, hoping it'll all work out for them. You end up sympathising with nasty small-minded people like Miss Ruddick, who is a poisoned pen-letter writer, with sad people like Graham, a man in his forties who lives with his mum, with a gullible, naïve half-wit like Lesley: a bit-part actress or "extra" who unwittingly, but unrelentingly cheerful and chirpy, ends up doing a cheap German nookie film, you even end up sympathising, awkward though it is, with a pedophile.
Yet there are no tricks, no ploys being used to achieve this, to draw upon emotions. It's just ordinary people telling their stories, revealing much about themselves, even those thing they would not want to reveal to a stranger. Reading this reminded me of a familiar experience: one feels as if being on a train, or in a waiting room. There is only one other person there and this person starts talking to you. You nod and smile politely, listen with half an ear, try and hide behind a paper or a book, but they just keep on talking, not even expecting a reply, just being glad of the chance to talk.

The form and the words are brilliantly chosen. There is so much in the little, throwaway remarks, in the seemingly unimportant. Much sadness, and loss and so much loneliness, sand painful self-awareness (or the absence thereof), much comedy, too, although these 13 people do not mean to tell a funny story. What they do, in fact, is to tell us the story of their lives (even if they do not really mean to) in little more than 30 minutes. Unwittingly they open cupboards and one or more skeletons fall out, as happens in all our lives.
Also, each of these stories has one or more wicked twists, which work marvellously: your perception of the story and of the person telling it is suddenly being tilted as the story sort of hits a bump. And after it's been given this jolt, nothing is quite the same.

I'll bugger off now but not after making 3 appeals:
1. Do not be put off by the fact that these are monologues, do not be put off by the fact that it's all about very ordinary people and do not be put off by the fact that all kinds of people about whose judgment is suspect (like teachers, critics, or indeed amazon-book reviewers) keep on telling you this is Literature, and great stuff. Just give this book a try. You will be amazed by the quality, the sensitivity and the common sense of the writing. You will probably end up as I did: recommending it to others.
2. Mr. Bennett: I know it's a bore being asked this, but could you find it in your heart to write some more of these wonderful monologues, to celebrate 20 years of "talking heads"?
3. BBC: bring them back!! Show them again, all thirteen of them, and do so every year, please.

Second chances are a good thing...
I too had to study the Bennett monologues at `A' level, and found it hard work - in fact, I came out of the whole ordeal with a great disliking for Bennetts work. However, I recently found myself with some time to spare and so I decided I'd perhaps give the monologues a second chance. I'm glad I did. Second time around I found the tales of each of the characters to be highly enjoyable. The characters were extremely well drawn and likable - be it the naive actress Lesley in `Her Big Chance' comparing the differences of a German director of an adult film to Polanski, or the rather sad character of Graham, dependent on his mother and horrified when she starts to have a life without him. Personally, I liked the story told by Miss Ruddock, that of someone obviously in need of attention and trying so hard to get it.

Bennett has captured perfectly the nature and personality of the simple characters in each of his stories and manages to recount each tale in both a humorous and touching way. The stories leave you caring for each of the main figures, each broken in some way and most of them blind to the fact.

Once again, I can only say how glad I am to have revisited this work and offer my apologies to the author for missing the point in the first place!