Accent on Youth

All My Sons

Amazing Dr Clitterhouse, The

Angel Street

London, 1880. Bella Manningham is losing her mind. She misplaces her jewelry and grocery bills; she removes paintings from the walls and forgets where she puts them and can't even remember removing them in the first place; she imagines the gas lights dimming in the evening... Jack, her husband, threatens to lock her in her room... alone and in the dark... if she doesn't straighten herself out. This doesn't seem to help.

With Vincent Price (Jack Manningham), Judith Evelyn (Bella Manningham), and Melville Cooper (Detective Rough).

"Somehow I hesitate to describe the Best Play we are presenting here as a 'psychological melodrama', because that phrase doesn't have the punch it used to have. It seems to me that it used to mean a play or a movie that was enormously exciting, but still intelligent. It was a thriller that made sense and didn't have to rely on sliding panels, clutching claws and all of the other machinery of the old-time [maller?]. But what I've seen lately, on the stage at least and a good bit of the time in the movies, a psychological melodrama is a melodrama in which nothing happens. Since nothing has happened, I go right home to bed and sleep like a practically toothless baby. But that wasn't the case on the night of December 5th, 1941, when I saw the first performance of Patrick Hamilton's 'Angel Street'. A great deal happened in that play, even though it was psychological. It was so psychological, in fact, that it kept my head whirling for hours. What a cunning and cruel devil that Mr Manningham was. And how clever was that very dull looking man from Scotland Yard, Sergeant Rough. And what a terrible time that frail, beautiful, Mrs Manningham had. This was indeed a Best Play." --- John Chapman

Another Language

Arsenic and Old Lace

With Boris Karloff.

Autumn Crocus

Bell for Adano, A

Biography

Blithe Spirit

John Loder is a writer researching material for a mystery novel. As a lark, he invites the eccentric medium, Madame Arcati, to hold a séance. It's great fun... until Madame Arcati inadvertently materializes Loder's first wife, Elvira! Further complications arise when Elvira refuses to return to the 'other side' and seems intent on disrupting Loder's current marriage.

With John Loder (Charles Condomine), Mildred Natwick (Ruth), Haila Stoddard (Elvira), and Anne Burr (Madame Arcati).

Bound East for Cardiff

Aired with "The Long Voyage Home", also by Eugene O'Neill.

Camille

Craig's Wife

Dark of the Moon, The

A dramatization by Howard Richardson and William Berney of the centuries-old European folk song "The Ballad of Barbara Allen".

See also: "The Death of Barbara Allen" (Suspense).

Detective Story

Elizabeth the Queen

Ethan Frome

Farmer Takes a Wife, The

A 1934 play by Frank B. Elser and Marc Connelly based on the novel Rome Haul by Walter D. Edmonds.

With Joan Lorring.

Glass Menagerie, The

Hasty Heart, The

Burma, 1943. Patients in the convalescent ward of an army field hospital try to make a dying Scot's last days happy and contented, but the hard-headed Scot—who doesn't know his kidney is failing—resists all attempts at friendship.

With John Sylvester (Lachie—soldier) and Anne Burr (Margaret—nurse).

"This Best Play we are about to do for you isn't exactly a War play, but it's a comedy with a war background. The year it was produced, 1945, brought us another good comedy with a war background. This was John Hersey's 'A Bell for Adano'. Our play, 'The Hasty Heart' did very well alongside such other new successes besides 'Adano' as 'Harvey' and 'The Glass Menagerie'... 'The Hasty Heart' is about a soldier who was in a hospital somewhere back of the China/Burma/India front and a nurse who was a gallant little girl and an interesting assortment of fellow patients." --- John Chapman

High Tor

Home of the Brave

John Loves Mary

Kiss the Boys Goodbye

Ladies in Retirement

Another version was produced for Theatre Guild on the Air.

Long Voyage Home, The

Aired with "Bound East for Cardiff", also by Eugene O'Neill.

Macbeth

Madwoman Of Chaillot, The

Male Animal, The

Men in White

Missouri Legend

A Tale about Jesse James.

Mister Roberts

Night Must Fall

Wealthy old Mrs Bramson hires charming young Danny as a companion, but her niece suspects him of being a murderer.

Of Mice and Men

On Borrowed Time

Fiercely independent Gramps refuses to accompany Death when he comes calling. Meanwhile, manipulative Aunt Demetria, offended at the way young Pud idolizes Gramps and mimics his uncouth behaviour, manoeuvres to gain custody over Pud so he can be raised as a proper Christian. The result is a battle of wills between Gramps, Aunt Demetria... and Death.

With Parker Fennelly (Julian Northrup—gramps), Mildred Natwick (Nellie Northrup—granny), and David Anderson (Pud).

Another version was produced for the Theatre Guild on the Air.

"For myself, the test of a fine play or a fine performance is a simple one: after I've seen it, do I want to stay up half the night, or maybe all the night, talking about it? That's just what happened to me on the cold evening of February 3rd, 1938. I was too excited to sleep, for I'd just seen the first performance of Paul Osborn's 'On Borrowed Time'. Here was a beautiful play, brimful of humour and affection. It was one of the Best Plays of that season, and it's one of the best for you, now." --- John Chapman

Outward Bound

Petrified Forest, The

Philadelphia Story, The

Rope

Rose Tattoo, The

She Loves Me Not

Skylark

St Helena

Summer and Smoke

Susan and God

There Shall Be No Night

There's Always Juliet

Tonight at 8:30

Uncle Harry

Victoria Regina

Voice of the Turtle, The

Winterset

A young man (Mio Romagna) believes his father was wrongly executed for a murder he didn't commit. His search for truth and justice take him to a tenement on New York's East River where he falls in love with a young woman (Miriamne Esdras) and discovers her family may know more about the murder than they are willing to admit.

With Burgess Meredith (Mio Romagna) and Maureen Stapleton (Miriamne Esdras).

"You may remember that Winterset was first produced in the fall of 1935. That was a good year in the theatre, and there was a new group calling itself the 'New York Drama Critic's Circle'. The circle was going to give a prize to the best play of that year, and this [?] time. Up till then, nobody thought that one drama critic could agree with another one on anything. But the critics circle came out of its huddle quite happily and announced that its very first prize was going to Maxwell Anderson for 'Winterset'." --- John Chapman

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