Zola Award

The BBC has an internal radio award ceremony, the Radio Awards. I was nominated once before but didn't win, to the Corporation's unending shame.

But Animals - episode 1 of series of of Émile Zola: Blood, Sex, & Money - was nominated and tonight it won.

I couldn't make the ceremony, being in Paris, so I haven't seen the award itself though it seems to be made out of a slate from the original roof of Broadcasting House, which is, goodness me, what a thing. And what a day, having my 4th Zola episode go out live this afternoon and having the first one win in the evening.

It's a prize for Best Drama Production (or reading), which means that the award is absolutely shared with Pauline Harris (producer) and Steve Brooke (sound designer) and, of course, an extraordinary cast that included Glenda Jackson, Robert Lindsay, Ian Hart, Fenella Woolgar and many more.

The judges citation reads: 'The judges said this was a gripping, entertaining piece of drama which conveyed the turbulent times of the Second Empire through the personal lives of its players. It was wonderfully well paced and varied, setting the tragic alongside the comic, interweaving the heroic with the grotesque and the pathetic.'