User:Jim Craigie/Gordon House

Gordon House joined the BBC as a Studio Manager in 1972, and worked in Children’s Television and Radio Sport, before becoming a drama director. He headed the small BBC World Service Drama team for fourteen years, during which time the Unit won over thirty national and international awards - many of them plays directed by Gordon himself. He has instigated and overseen several international competitions; he initiated the the World International Playwriting Competiton for radio dramatists, run in conjunction with the British Council, which attracts well over 1000 entries. He was responsible, with his colleague David Hitchinson, for the development and launch of BBC World Service’s highly popular twice-weekly serial Westway, which ran for seven years. . He also wrote a monthly humorous column for the World Service magazine “BBC On Air” under the pseudonym “Nelson Mature” – a column which brought him far more mail than any of his productions! Gordon has twice adjudicated the National Theatre Awards in Zimbabwe; run Shakespeare workshops in Kenya and Uganda, been a guest lecturer on several occasions for the Radio Nederland overseas drama course and produced a Shakespeare revue for the Harare International Festival of Arts. He has directed a number of plays in conjunction with the Canadian Broadcasting Company and with LA Theatre Works, Los Angeles, most notably “The Glass Menagerie” starring Julie Harris and Calista Flockhart (TV’s “Ally McBeal”), In 1998 he won the Writers’ Guild Special Prize for services for his work with new writers, and two years later won the Sony Drama Award for best drama with his World Service production of Alpha by Mike Walker, an award he won again in 2004 with Gregory Whitehead, for Whitehead's The Loneliest Road. He is a founder member, and ex-Chair, of The WORLDPLAY GROUP a radio association of drama directors from broadcasting stations around the world. In April 2001 he became Head of BBC Radio Drama, a post which he held until his retirement from the BBC in March 2005. During this time he was a judge at Prix Italia and Prix Europa conventions, and his tenure as Head culminated in the Department winning its largest ever number of awards in a single year. Gordon has now retired from the BBC and is an Executive Director of Goldhawk Essential. He has recently produced Alan Bennett’s latest book Untold Stories for BBC Audiobooks and BBC Radio 4 and will shortly be directing a four-part production of Terry Pratchett’s Small Gods.

Radio plays
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Sources:
 * Gordon House's radio play listing at Diversity website
 * Gordon House's radio play listing at RadioListings website
 * Gordon House's radio play listing at Audio Drama Wiki