Dark Doings in Morocco

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 786, 13 August 1954, Page 24

Dark Doings in Morocco

HE only things stirring at noontime in the Moroccan port of Agadir are mad dogs and two Englishmen named Boulcott and Plumley. The place is decidedly hot, and before they’ve been . there long it grows decidedly hotter. Boulcott, the pessimist, knew it all along. "In the first twenty-four hours," he had said, "we'll find a body, We always do." And he wasn’t wrong; he — was right. "And before we've been there three days we shall be up to our necks in some fantastic welter of crime and treasure-hunting, in cliff-hanging and general what-have-you. That, Plumley, is what will happen to you and me if we go to Morocco for a quiet winter." Right again. Anyone acquainted with the _ late, great comedy team of Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne will have no

trouble in picking Boulcott and Plumley for what they really are. The tadio show May I> Have the Treasure, — set .in Morocco, was, in fact, written for them. It was originally produced and broadcast by the BBC. Soon, New Zealand _listenere will he ahle

to tune ‘in to an NZBS production of the play. Produced by Jack Dobson from the BBC script, it has David Kohn and Alfred Farrell as Boulcott and Plumley respectively. The pair of rather pukka Englishmen arrive at Agadir in the first place to look after the Moroccan home of their friend Puffy Graham. Puffy had inherited the place from his uncle, one of the Middle East’s less savoury characters, along with a number of "businesses," including a house in Cairo complete with dancing girls. At Agadir, the pair encounter a number of types even less savoury than Puffy’s uncle. There’s a Frenchman named Mimmig, an Italian with the forbidding title of

Se ae ey ee Malevolecci, an American, Herman Rosenbaum, a Yorkshireman named Harker, who doesn’t object to murdering foreigners, but stops at Englishmen, and assorted Arabs with long knives and no such scruples. All are after the treasure that lies hidden somewhere near Puffy’s house, The treasure-hunters, by no means rubtle men, leave clues to their calling hat not even the bumbling Boulcott end Plumley can ignore. Rosenbaum assures them, however, that’s all fair and above board; they’re hunting for uranium, If he finds it, he says, he may persuade the U.S. to give a little of it to Britain. This touches Boulcott and Plumley on the patriotic raw. "Just for once in a way," says Boulcott, "why shouldn’t we have the stuff, and give them some afterwards, if we feel like it?" Without any very clear idea of what uranium looks like, they start searching. Even the discovery of an iron-bound chest filled with jewels and crowns fails to divert them from their patriotic purpose. "Pity you hadn't found half-a-crown," says Boulcott. "- been more useful." Plumley remains interested for a time, but is finally vanquished by the argument: "Plumley, if these were real jewels, d’you think they’d be lying about in a cave? The insurance companies wouldn’t allow it." May I have the Treasure will be broadcast in eight half-hour episodes, starting from 1YA at 8.0 p.m. on Thursday, August 19, from 4YA at 7.50 p.m. on Saturday, August 21, and from other YA and YZ stations during the ensuing two months.