Open Microphone

New Zealand Listener, Volume 31, Issue 786, 13 August 1954, Page 28

Open Microphone

ce O stay-at-home he" is how Time would probably describe David Wentworth (see page 26), and though he was born in Australia and now lives in New Zealand it isn’t easy to decide which of the years in between a good journalist would pick on to begin his story. The running away from school? Or the interlude with the mental cese? Mr. Wentworth NO STAY- didn’t tell us how much AT-HOME anxiety he caused his parents in his first few years, but he started his wandering on the grand scale when he was about six by going with his family to live in Europe. His home was in Belgium, but he went to school in England till he was 16. Then he decided he’d had enough of it, and ran away to ‘oin the campaign against capital ,punishment conducted by the fabulous Mrs. van der Eist. Under the heading of "publicity and general organising" young David engaged in such activities as telking in Hyde Park and taking a loudspeaker van through various parts of London where this was forbidden. "Td been sending stuff to papers since I was about 11," Mr. Wentworth says, "and after about nine months with Mrs. van der Elst I worked for a couple of provincial papers before going to Berlin. I did a good deal of free lance journalism in France and Belgium, and often had to take odd jobs of various kinds. Just before the. war I .returned to Australia. I was in the R.A.A.F. throughout the war, at first for a short spell as a pilot in Europe, and later back home on administration." After the war Mr. Wentworth took up his wandering again, and ‘he has been in most parts of Australia except Tesmania. The interlude with the mental case took place in Western Australia. With no other job in sight, Mr. Wentworth took one looking after a man who was on parole from a mental hos-

pital. It worked out all right, too, though ‘he thinks it might easily have been otherwise. For about a year he edited a monthly called Pertinent, and between other jobs he gave some advice to the Ealing Studios team which was filming Eureka Stockade. Mr. Wentworth has been in New Zealand about four years. He came here, he says, to write a novel-it seemed unlikely he’d get enough peace and quiet to do so in Australia. With that out of the way-it’s now with a London publisher-he turned to other odd jobs and his perennial free lance journalism, and just now he is working in the Information Section of the Tourist and Publicity Department. Did his literary interests and the problem of earning a living leave him time for anything else? we asked Mr. Wentworth. Well, yes, they did, he said. He was very interested in food and found cooking in Chinese, Italian and Hungarian style a very practical hobby. * ATIN-AMERICAN music, with all its colour; rhythm, and melody, is popular today far beyond the countries of its origin-Brazil, Mexico and the West Indies. Patrick Murdoch (baritone), of Christchurch, has joined with one of New Zealand’s leading exponents of Latin-American music. band-leader Brian Marston, in a new series of pro-’ grammes called Latin-American Style, which will be broadcast in a link of the YA stations every Saturday night for the next six weeks. The first broadcast is at 7.30 p.m. this coming Saturday, August 14. Pat Murdoch went to England with the help of a Government bursary and studied singing for three years at Trinity College. He got his first break as a guest soloist with Geraldo in a BBC radio programme. Since

then he has had engagements with various West End shows (including a part in Kiss Me Kate), and "ice shows" at Earl’s Court. He came back to New Zealand to visit his family and, he says, his future plans are indefinite. But his eves are still on the bright lights overseas. ‘ *

MAURICE DENHAM’S extraordinary range of voices, which listeners are hearing demonstrated each week in the new Much-Binding series, is not without its drawbacks. He told a Radio Times interviewer not long MANY ago that when he was apVOICES pearing as Dudley Davenport in the old Much-Binding quite a lot of practical jokers used to ring him up. When he answered A

ARTS AND FLOWERS [_ILLIAN SCOTT (left), whose programme "Gardening with Lillian Scott" is heard from 2ZA every second Monday in the "Women's Hour," began to take an interest in flowers and flower-arranging when she went to live in the country and, as an escape from her isolation, became interested in gardening. But flower arrangement is only one outlet for her. She has always been interested in art and in colour blending, and flowers have enabled her to experiment in a field with almost unlimited possibilities. She became adept, went in for Show work; and met with outstanding success. Now she is in demand as a judge of floral work, as a lecturer to Horticultural Societies, Women’s Movements, etc., and as a teacher of classes on the subject. Although she is interested in gardening as such, she is more concerred with what she can make of the fiowers she grows; are they "pickable," will she be able to blend them into artistic and colourful arrangements? Lately she has formed a new outlet for her talents-ex-perimenting in arrangements with driftwood, ferns, mosses, stones and other natural, elemental forms.

EWS OF BROADCASTERS, ‘ON AND OFF THE RECORD

"Maurice Denham speaking,’ they would say, "Oh, I am a fool," and ring éff. But he got wise to that and began to use a’strange voice when answering the phone. That was all right till, speaking in the quavery tones of a very old man, he had a long and complicated conversation with a caller who turned out to be his own brother! Maurice Denham has not always been an actor. In fact, one of his first jobs as an apprentice engineer was to assist in installing lifts at Broadcasting House, the London home of the BBC. The vow he

made then, that when he went back to Broadcasting House it would be as an actor, was made good when he joined the BBC Variety Repertory Company in the early days of the war. Listeners may remember him as the original charlady, Mrs. Lola Tickle ("I always do my best for all my gentlemen.) in

Tommy Handley's ITMA, and as the first announcer in the same show’s "Radio Fakenburg." During a spell in the army after leaving ITMA he was asked to form a concert party, and though he had his doubts about this assignment, he "just

got on with the job as best I could." After the war Davenport again attracted the attention of BBC wariety producers when taking part in school and children’s broadcasts. "In those days," he says, "I always seemed to be playing talking water taps or human steam engines. At any r.te, I very seldom used my own voice." So much has he used this talent since, that in one Much-Binding series he played no less than 62 odd characters. Has he time for anything else? Well (as Sam Costa would say), he is frequently heard as Maurice Denham in tadio plays, and since the war he has had more than 40 film. parts. ;

HARD ROAD

"THE recorded music of Albert Sandler, his trio and his orchestra, is still frequently heard on the air, but Sandler himself. (in whom Rodney ‘Nicholls, Titirangi, is interested) died six years ago this month. His beginnings were humble enough and the popularity which he eventually achieved came only

after a ditmcuit and hungry apprenticeship. His father was an emigré from Czarist Russia, who settled in the

East End of London in 190), and young . Albert’s first violin. was a 16/- one

picked up in a local pawnshop. His first teacher was his elder brother, then came a local "maestro" who charged ninepence a half-hour for tuition. When the boy graduated to a teacher who exacted a full half-crown for the same period the whole family of Sandlers had to club together to find the money. More of the same self-denial efiabled him to study at the Guildhall School of Music, and he eventually became a professional musician at the ripe age of 12, earning 5/- a week as "relief" in a cinema orchestra. But by the time he was 18 his skilful playing had brought him to the notice of the managers of a chain of London restaurants, and beginning as the sub-leader of one of their orchestras he ended up as leader at the Trocadero. By now the long battle was nearly won. He followed de Groot in the famous ballroom of the Grand Hotel at Eastbourne and it was through his broadcasts with. the Palm Court Orchestra there that he became known to millions of listeners. He was only 42 when he died.