On the Cob
NOBODY could accuse ZB Sunday Showcase of adhering to a stereotyped pattern. Hard on the heels of
Jean Anouilh’s charming Leocadia, with its combination of poetic fantasy and sardonic wit, Showcase last week gave us what is surely the most corny melodrama ever to appear in this session, Within the Law. It is probably attribut-
ing too great a subtlety to programme organisers to believe that these succes‘sive plays were juxtaposed to set off each other, but the effect was certainly to accentuate the triviality of Within the Law. Played with vulgar vigour by Gingers Rogers and flat indifference by buzz-saw-voiced Lee Tracey, the hokum concerned an innocent shop-girl imprisoned for theft who revenges herself on ‘ her employer by marrying his son, only (you’ve guessed it!) to fall in love with him. From internal evidence, the play dates back about fifty years; age has added not a patina, but cobwebs, A few years ago we might have accepted it on the radio with pleasure, but it is a tribute to the high standard of Sunday Showcase and to the increased quality of radio plays in general that Within the Law sounded infantile, dated, and at times like a TIFH parody of crime |
plays.
J.C.
R.
Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi
https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19560427.2.36.6
Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka
New Zealand Listener, Volume 34, Issue 873, 27 April 1956, Page 19
Word count
Tapeke kupu
208On the Cob New Zealand Listener, Volume 34, Issue 873, 27 April 1956, Page 19
Using this item
Te whakamahi i tēnei tūemi
Material in this publication is protected by copyright.
Are Media Limited has granted permission to the National Library of New Zealand Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa to develop and maintain this content online. You can search, browse, print and download for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Are Media Limited for any other use.
Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
Copyright in the Denis Glover serial Hot Water Sailor published in 1959 is owned by Pia Glover. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this serial and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the Listener. You can search, browse, and print this serial for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from Pia Glover for any other use.
Log in