Drury Lane to Dimapur

Glamorous, ambitious and headstrong, Doreen Lawrence entertained audiences in Britain throughout the Blitz and from 1942 the troops in India, Africa and Burma. From the age of four, the theatre shaped her world. By 18, she was a hard-working actress engaged to the young Peter Cushing. At the outbreak of war, she married a soldier who was posted abroad, and through ENSA (the organization set up to provide entertainment for the troops), Doreen joined the India Repertory Company. A fraught reunion with her husband signalled the end of their brief marriage - but a year later she met Jack Hawkins. They fell in love as the Company criss-crossed India by train, ending up high in the jungle on the Burmese border where the Japanese advance into India had only just been halted. In 1946, she left India and the last days of the Raj to join demobbed Britain in the search for work and a roof. After Jack's return, they were finally able to make a future together.

Belinda Lang reads this engrossing and hugely entertaining memoir of life in a wartime entertainment company from Doreen Hawkins.

©2009 Doreen Hawkins (P)2012 AudioGO Ltd