Audio Ghost - Esmeralda - George Baker - Kim Braden - Pauline Letts - Crawford Logan - Pauline Letts

Esmeralda by John Keir Cross Audio Ghost - Esmeralda - George Baker - Kim Braden - Pauline Letts - Crawford Logan - Pauline Letts In a bleak London flat above his struggling tobacconist shop, middle-aged Felix Broom suffocates his fat, overbearing wife Nancy after fifteen years of a miserable and resentment-filled marriage. Driven by intense hatred and regret, Felix buries Nancy's heavy body in a shallow grave beneath the cellar floor, convincing himself that he is finally free to start a new life. However, Felix immediately becomes haunted by the lingering scent of Nancy's cheap perfume and the sudden appearance of a beautiful young woman who claims to be Esmeralda, his ideal daughter. Esmeralda relentlessly confronts Felix with intimate details of his past sexual repressions, past romantic failures, and childhood trauma, gradually revealing that she is a tragic psychological manifestation of his own guilt and repressed illusions. Overwhelmed by terrifying visions, scent hallucinations, and Esmeralda's mocking revelations, Felix suffers a complete mental breakdown and destroys the shop in a frantic fit of madness. Driven insane, Felix drags a visiting police officer down into the cellar and frantically digs up Nancy's buried corpse with his bare hands before being arrested and taken away by Scotland Yard. Cast Mr Broome .... George Baker Esmeralda .... Kim Braden With: Pauline Letts Katherine Parr David Gooderson Crawford Logan First broadcast on BBC World Service in February 1982 Production Credits Series: Haunted (Tales of the Supernatural). Author: John Keir Cross. Director: Derek Hoddinott Production Company: BBC. Network: BBC Radio 4. Original Broadcast Date: August 30, 1980.