Private Resistance: Don't Tell Him Your Name, Pike...

It's early to bed at 1am after a very enjoyable performance at New Buckenham. The alarm is set and my head has hardly hit the pillow before I'm dead to the world. What seems moments later and it's time to get up and out. A brisk walk through the misty streets of Ipswich and I'm on the 0826 to London, heading to a Wardour Street studio for the first day's recording of 'Dear Arthur, Love John', an afternoon play for Radio 4. Taking the form of a letter from John le Mesurier to Arthur Lowe and flashbacks to days on set and off, the play tells the story of the legendary comedy series 'Dad's Army' and its stars.

I'm playing Ian Lavender (Pike). I've worked with Robert Daws who's playing Arthur Lowe/Mainwaring before, in his R4 detective series 'Trueman & Riley' and was a huge fan of his work in 'Jeeves and Wooster' while growing up. I've never met Anton Lesser (le Mes/Wilson) or Kenny Ireland (John Laurie/Fraser) but know them both from their film and TV work. James Lance who's playing James Beck/Walker is an old pal; we spent the summer of 2009 together playing Palin/Jones and Idle/Gilliam in a critically acclaimed Edinburgh show about the Pythons, which we later recorded for the BBC.

That Edinburgh show was written by Roy Smiles, who's reponsible for the script we're recording today. This will be the third play of Roy's I've recorded, and if the previous two are any indication, this will be a winner. Liz Anstee is producing for Celador; we met when she came to see Tracy Ann Oberman playing opposite me in Boeing Boeing at the Comedy (now Harold Pinter Theatre) in 2007, and after a few glasses of wine in the Tom Cribb post-show I was cast in her Beyond the Fringe comedy as Alan Bennett.

I bump into Roy in the street en route to the studio and after he's spent 5 minutes laughing at my Private Resistance moustache we catch up and are shown up to the studio. Kenny is next to appear and it's introductions and anecdotes over coffee as Anton, Bob and James arrive in turn.

The read-through's a very good indicator of how a radioplay will finally turn out; in theatre and film there's usually time for extensive re-writes, rehearsals and edits before the final product is presented to its audience, but in the swift cut and thrust of radio drama what you hear now is generally what you get. What we hear is superb: Roy has really captured the spirit of both the series itself, and the men who made it.

Liz seems delighted that her actors are hitting the right notes, and there's plenty of laughter amid clear moments of pathos. Her brief to us on casting was not to imitate the characters, which tends to feel like an extended impressions show sketch, but to 'find' them, mixing their recognisable personas into a genuine portrayal of their story as a company. For me this meant extensive research into Lavender - he mustn't just sound like Pike (who he played so beautifully as a 'mummy's boy') but as an excited young actor of 22, fresh out of drama school and thrown into a cast of veterans in a new BBC television comedy. I listened to as many recordings of the man as I could find, both in episodes of the series, the Dad's Army film, other television and radio programmes, and in interviews about his life and work.

Read-through complete we enjoy a quick tea break while the engineers prepare to record the first narration scene with Anton. He's in and out in a matter of minutes and he, Kenny and I launch into scene 2 which is set on the first day of rehearsal of the first (and what was firmly believed would be the only) series. It's delightful - Kenny has really captured the dour cynicism of Laurie/Fraser and Anton has le Mez/Wilson's cavalier anti-dote to it to a tee. Just one re-take with a few notes from Liz and we move swiftly on to scene 3.

I'm relaxing in the green room with James and Kenny when the call comes for the next scene; we really do seem to be progressing at an incredible pace and when lunch is called early at one Liz suggests that we may well be able to complete the recording today if we're all amenable to staying a little later. In over 170 radio plays and comedies, this is the first time I've ever know a producer to get 45 minutes recorded in a day; we were booked for 2 days, and that's almost always how long it takes, unless things are going really swimmingly and then there's an early finish on the second day. I check the trains to Chelmsford, where we're performing tonight, and confirm I can stay to six at a push, and still make the half comfortably. It's nice to be playing a venue on a main line out of Liverpool Street - anywhere in the wilds of Norfolk and this would be impossible.

We enjoy a great buffet lunch and there's plenty of banter over sandwiches and salad. I'm not in the first scenes after lunch and am pleased to see friends Jonathan Aris and Jonathan Keeble, who both happen to be recording audiobooks in this studio today. I make a note to send emails to their producers introducing myself, as I've not recorded any books here.

Into the next scene and it's great fun to have the whole gang in a scene; the energy's now really up and we're all having a ball. Bob is superb as Lowe - all his ticks and verbal mannerisms that Croft and Perry wrote into the scripts as the series progressed are there and wonderfully executed. Jimmy is his charmingly disreputable self as Beck, always very natural and engaging.

I'm called down at 1530 to record the credits, so that we can all finish the day together on the final scene, the beginning of a typical episode - it's a joy, and Liz asks for another take, not to change anything but 'just so she can hear it again. All too soon it's over, and those who have to disappear do, while the others head off to the Coach and Horses for a farewell toast. I make the 1800 service to Chelmsford, and spend the journey typing what you've just read. Time for a look at tonight's staging, a bite to eat, a shower & shave and our theme music starts drifting out of the auditorium.

Dear Arthur Love John will be broadcast at 1415 on Monday 7 May.