I'm probably the only vintage blogger who hasn't yet seen the (I can now say "Oscar-winning") film The King's Speech but rest assured I definitely will, be it on the big screen or DVD (or maybe both!).
In the meantime here is a clip from yesterday's Radio 4 programme Broadcasting House during which a member of the Corporation's in-house museum brought along an original example of the so-called "royal microphones" (above) that, as he explains, were first designed in the 1920s to hide the ugly(!) B.B.C. devices from His Majesty's view! The ones used in the Colin Firth film are exact replicas of this gloriously Art Deco-style piece of radio equipment, which the B.B.C. allowed the film's production crew to look over when recreating them. Even better, they still work! Is it me, or does it sound better when the presenter switches from his modern mic to the old '30s one? ;-)
What's more it sounds as though we may all get a chance to see (and hear?) this part of audio history in the future; amazingly these microphones had until recently only been on view to anyone visiting Broadcasting House but now it seems that the B.B.C. will be lending them out to more public displays (perhaps not so surprising considering the success of the film), so watch (or should that be listen to?) this space!
