Romance, and Other Thrills

New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 769, 15 April 1954, Page 23

Romance, and Other Thrills

()CTAVUS ROY COHEN first won renown as a writer by creating, for the Saturday Evening Post, a fabulous character known as Florian Slappey. Later, he turned to mystery writing, spurning Slappey’s hilarity in favour of the more earnest pursuit of criminals and the solutions to romantic entanglements. Listeners have been able to gauge the success of his change in such popular serials as Lady in Distress, an adaptation of Cohen’s story Dangerous Lady. This week listeners tuning to the ZB stations will be able to hear another of Octavus Roy Cohen’s thrillers, Danger in Paradise. The story centres round Jimmy Drake, who works for a New York advertising agency, and Iris Randall, a radio singer for whom he cherishes an unrequited love. Iris looks on Jimmy as a friend-nothing more--but Jimmy is hopeful that when the lady returns from a tour she undertakes things will be different. They are, but not quite in the way Jimmy hopes. All Iris brings back with her is news of a new man in her life, and a~box of cigars for Jimmy. Surprisingly the box of cigars starts something more than a quarrel between friends. A man is shot, a box of cigars goes missing, and before Jimmy has time to say "Iris Darling" the pair are involved in no end of skuliduggery. Danger in Paradise was directed for Grace Gibson Studios by Lawrence Cecil, the director of such popular shows as Night Beat, Deadly Nightshade and Dragnet, The part of Jimmy Drake is played by Alan White, that of Iris Randall by Margaret Christensen, and the supporting roles by Gwen Plumb, John Saul, Rodney Taylor and the New Zealander Barry Cookson. The serial begins from all ZB stations on Monday, April 12, at 7.30 p.m., and will play weekly at that time.