Cath Drake’s The Poetry Curve is a short series of interviews over six months with inspiring people who reach wider audiences and stretch format so that exciting poetry finds its way to appreciative audiences, beyond the usual audience in radio, TV or performance.
Episode 1: Adrian Bate producer of ‘The NHS: To Provide all People’, a one hour film poem ‘In the voice of the NHS’ to celebrate the 70th anniversary in 2018, talks about the making of the film and poetry on film generally.
The film was written by poetry Owen Sheers and made for the BBC by Adrian’s company Vox Pictures. Director Pip Broughton previously worked with Owen Sheers on ‘Aberfan: The Green Hollow’ (2016). Pip also directed the Dylan Thomas’ iconic ‘Under Milkwood’ for BBC TV in 2014.
I started by asking him about his background in working with poetry. Listen here