Reg Calvert - Plays

 REG CALVERT   -   

THE OPTION OF THREE DIFFERNT NEW PLAYS Based on the extraordinary lives and times of Reg and Dorothy Calvert.  1946 - 1967

1) 'SHIVERING SANDS'   A fast moving drama telling the 'whole' story from 1946 - 1967.  How Dorothy and Reg met, living in an old bus, selling sweets, becoming a radio and television engineer and how Reg decides to bring Rock 'n' Roll to England when he first hears 'Rock Around the Clock.'  They go onto manage many top groups and singers and Reg follows his dream to have his own radio station.  Heartbreak, failure, success and murder.  Reg and Dorothy had the lot.    An extraordinary play with the option of recorded or live music and projected archive photographs.  (Rock band optional).

2) 'SCHOOL OF ROCK 'N' ROLL' - A MUSICAL or straight Drama - for younger performers (aged 12 - 25+).  The first 'school' of 'Rock 'n' Roll' was at Clifton Hall, Near Rugby. 1961 - 1965.  This play starts in 1946 and quickly moves from Ballroom dances to 'Rock 'n' Roll.  Wonderful zany characters.   Lives of Reg and Dorothy Calvert but in more depth with the singers they managed.  Optional: 4 new songs plus many songs from the period.  Projected Archive photographs. 

3) 'DEATH OF A PIRATE'   2014 will be the 50th anniversary of the start of pirate radio in the U.K. and the move towards 'free' radio without the constrictions of the government and BBC.  This play tells the powerful story of love and tragedy behind the glamour and sensationalism of pirate radio. 

When Reg Calvert first hears Radio Caroline broadcast from a boat off Frinton on Sea, he decides he wants his own station.  He is manager to my well known groups and 'Screaming Lord Sutch.'  He cannot afford to buy a boat so looks for an alternative and discovers abandoned war time forts in the Thames Estuary.  (A much more sensible idea).  Sutch soon loses interests and Reg struggles financially to float the station, much against his wife's wishes and it breaks up their marriage as they have to sell their beautiful home.  Just as Reg is about to amalgamate with Radio London and become the most powerful station, unsuccessful rivals who were financially stuck, took their opportunity of boarding the station in the middle of the night with armed men.  They threaten to smash all the equipment if Reg (or Radio London) do not agree to their terms to pay them a lot of money plus 50% of the profit.  Midsummer day 1966, Reg Calvert is shot and the killer walks free!  Dorothy is determined to carry on although her life is threatened.  A murder mystery based on true events and lives.