Ian Holm as Richard III in the BBC's Wars of the Roses from 1965

First, Fergus McClelland led us to Brecht on television. Now, bless his little khaki shorts, he's led us to Shakespeare.

Ravensbourne University London explains the origins of the BBC's Wars of the Roses:

This production had had a highly acclaimed run on the RSC stage in 1963 and was directed for BBC Television in 1965 by Robin Midgley and Michael Hayes. It was filmed on the stage at Stratford-On-Avon using a multi-camera set up, resulting in a much more fluid filmic result with a greater variety of shots and even the use of hand-held cameras for the battle scenes. 

In this respect the production was a forerunner of today’s recorded theatre productions which are regularly streamed to cinemas and homes throughout the world.

The Wars of the Roses was an abridgement of four Shakespeare plays – the three parts of Henry VI and Richard III – into three plays: Henry VI, Edward IV, and Richard III.

You can find an extract from the third of these above. McClelland is playing Edward V, the elder of the Princes in the Tower, having played the similarly ill-fated Edmund, Duke of Rutland, earlier in the production.

But the real interest is Ian Holm's Richard III, who here appears not as a monster but very much the younger brother to the charismatic Edward IV that he was.

This recording is of some importance to theatrical history, because Holm was struck down with stage fright in the Seventies and thereafter chose to concentrate on film and television work.