Episode 205: Jessica Swale On The Music Of Summerland

Our latest guest on Soundtracking is an award-winning playwright and theatre director, now turning her hand to cinema.

Jessica Swale's first play Blue Stockings premiered at Shakespeare's Globe in 2013. She went on to win an Olivier Award for Nell Gwynn in 2016, a comedy initially starring Gugu Mabatha-Raw - and then Gemma Arterton when it transferred to the West End.

Fittingly, both women take leading roles in Jessica's debut feature, Summerland. Spanning half a century, Summerland tells the story of Alice, a reclusive writer who is forced to take on a young evacuee called Frank during World War II, totally against her wishes. 

It's a genuinely moving tale, complimented beautifully by Volker Bertelmann's music - aka Hauschka. Speaking of which, we'd like to say a huge thanks to Jess Barry at Lionsgate - and indeed the filmmakers - for providing us with his score, given that it's yet to be commercially released.