The Russian Gambler, Fyodor Dostoevsky
The Russian Gambler, Fyodor Dostoevsky
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The Russian Gambler
A BBC Radio full-cast adaptation

Author: Fyodor Dostoevsky, Dolya Gavanski

Narrator: Ed Stoppard, Dolya Gavanski, Eleanor Bron, Full Cast, Matthew Marsh

Unabridged: 1 hr 53 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 10/21/2021

Synopsis

Ed Stoppard stars as obsessive pianist Alexei in this modern-day take on Dostoevsky's classic The Gambler

When brilliant but penniless pianist Alexei is hired to tutor the 10-year-old daughter of Russian oligarch Mikhail, he is drawn into a world of chance, obsession and violence. Hopelessly infatuated with Mikhail's beautiful stepdaughter Polina, he vows to do anything to win her love: and so begins his involvement in a dangerous, high-stakes game...

Seduced by the lure of the roulette wheel, and embroiled in the complications and machinations of Polina and her family, Alexei's life takes a dark turn. The unexpected arrival of Mikhail's mother Anastasia from Russia offers hope of rescue from financial ruin: but an obsession with risk-taking threatens to destroy everything...

This lively reimagining, set in contemporary London, was written by Dolya Gavanski, who also plays Polina. Ed Stoppard (Home Fires) stars as Alexei, with Eleanor Bron (A Little Princess) as Anastasia and Matthew Marsh (Love, Lies and Records) as Mikhail.

Production credits
Adapted by Dolya Gavanski, from Fyodor Dostoevsky's The Gambler
Directed and produced by John Dryden
Original music composed by Sacha Puttnam
All music performed by Sacha Puttnam
Casting: Toby Whale
Script Editor: Mike Walker
Sound Design: Steve Bond
A Goldhawk Production for BBC Radio 4

Cast
Alexei - Ed Stoppard
Mikhail - Matthew Marsh
Polina - Dolya Gavanski
Vika - Isabella Blake Thomas
Astley - Graham Seed
Francois - Orlando Seale
Katie - Lucy May Barker
Inokenti - George Lasha
Masha - Irina Karatcheva
Mullighan - Jay Taylor
Office Worker - Alana Ramsey
Blake - Timothy Walker
Anastasia - Eleanor Bron
First broadcast BBC Radio 4, 17-24 November 2013

© 2021 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd
(p) 2021 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd

About Fyodor Dostoevsky

Fyodor Dostoevsky (1821-1881), born in Moscow, lived much of his childhood distanced from his frail mother and officious father. During these formative years, he formed a close bond with his elder brother Mikhail. When they were teenagers, however, Fyodor and Mikhail were enrolled in separate boarding schools, Fyodor matriculating at an engineering school in St. Petersburg. Even as he was studying the trade of government, Dostoevsky was honing his skills as a writer, inking drafts of what would become his first novel-Poor Folk. In 1846, it was published to warm critical response. Something of a literary figure at the age of twenty-five, Dostoevsky began attending the discussion group that would result in his imprisonment. His sentence was commuted to four years in prison and four years of army service. His prison experiences, as well as his life after prison among the urban poor of Russia, provided a vivid backdrop for much of his later work. Released from his imprisonment and service by 1858, he began a fourteen-year period of furious writing, in which he published many significant texts, including The House of the Dead, Notes from the Underground, Crime and Punishment, The Idiot, and Devils. During this period, Dostoevsky's life was in upheaval, as he lost both his first wife and his brother. On February 15, 1867, he married his stenographer Anna Grigorevna Snitkina, who managed his affairs until his death. Two months before he died, Dostoevsky completed the epilogue to The Brothers Karamazov, which was published in serial form in the Russian Messenger.

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