Paul Temple and the Sullivan Mystery (Radio Collection) - Books (Francis Durbridge, Audio CD)

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Customer Reviews of Paul Temple and the Sullivan Mystery (Radio Collection)

austinjr@bigpond.net.au
Kangaroo Ground, Australia
31st August 2008

They're at it again!
Having listened to the surviving original BBC radio episodes for years. I welcome the decision to "revive" the lost radio episodes, and I look forward to more of them. Readers of this review will know that only about one third of the long radio Paul Temple broadcast series survives. This "revival" project seeks, by using contemporary microphones, sound effects and the original Francis Durbridge scripts, to recreate the original productions for today's audience.

Slight production differences are noticeable. Sound effects, crowd noises, etc. are suggested here rather than overplayed as they used to be. Sometimes a shock ending to an episode loses its effect when several seconds elapse before "Coronation Scot" breaks in. A smaller cast is engaged, doubling many of the parts. Just as Marjorie Westbury's contributions outshone all others in the original series, I find Eliza Langland's work to be the most effective here.

The plot is not one of Durbridge's best. After Paul and Steve are entrusted with a pair of spectacles to return to their owner as they depart for a holiday in Egypt, murders, deceptions, dodgey assignations and kidnappings follow at breath-taking speed.

This is a 2006 recreation of a 1947 original.

Big Jim
London, UK
27th June 2008

Look out Steve!
This ludicrous story involves a breathless trip to Egypt in a flying boat as the central theme, with Paul and Steve having taken on the task of returning a pair of glasses(!) to its supposed owner. Of course being the Temples nothing goes smoothly and within hours the death toll mounts as just about everyone the pair comes in contact with cops their lot in a variety of ways. As coincidence piles on coincidence, this pair must be the most dense private eyes in the business as they cause havoc wherever they go and get the solution more by luck than judgement (just as well as we were running out of characters to play with) Did this sort of thing really keep our parents and grandparents amused all those years ago?

Of course it did, and we enjoy it even now. Of course my score gave it away because for all the daft stuff that happens, this story kept the kids (and their mum) quiet and enthralled on a long motorway trip to Scotland, so for entertainment value you can't beat it! One complaint I have is that the discs could have been edited because the opening of each episode has a brief reprise of the cliffhanger ending of the previous one, which is necessary when it was on radio but gets a bit wearing on CD.

manmonkey

23rd August 2007

Temple but not as we know it
If you've never heard a Paul Temple before this you will probably find this quite satisfying, Unfortunately I have and this wasn't. Paul Temple was one of BBC's most successful series running from the late 40's to the 60's, the adventures of the debonair socialite captivated the Uk, and strangely Germany, In this re production of an old script were treated to a very different Paul Temple, no longer suave he's played as a rather abrupt snippy sarcastic Temple, and the iconic catch phrase of " By Timothy" seems to appear only once. Paul and his wife Steve seem to have no chemistry either, Temples sarcastic and sometime downright rude to her, thankfully she seems none too aware of Pauls character traits though.
The whole story seems to be absolutely jam packed with Un Temple like moments, there even a scene were Temple uses strong arm tactics to squeeze information out of a waiter, any Temple fans would know Temple is far too sophisticated to even consider such an act of barbarism against an unarmed man.

I'm not quite sure if this is a reproduction of a previous lost Radio play or a script that didn't make it to production, the later is more believable, believable for a reason too. The story is very unlike a Temple mystery, usually in a case Temple doggedly chases clues, rarely telling Steve the full story, In this mystery thing just seem to happen to Paul, buffeted by circumstance he seems to flounder from one location to the other with things and clue's just Happening. It's a pity, Maybe it's not a case of they don't make them like they used too, it's more like there incapable of making them like they used too.

John Leasure
Portsmouth, Ohio USA
21st August 2007

Who says they don't make them like they used to?
A remarkable remake of a classic "lost " Paul Temple episode without modern influences produces as good a production as any of the others. Hopefully BBC Radio 4 and BBC 7 can fund more of these "lost" episodes.

Ian
Sunnyside, New York United States
30th May 2007

Highly recommended!!!
Great job!!! Crawford Logan makes an excellent Paul Temple. He's a tad less genteel than the Peter Coke version,so it's a tad more believable when he slugs a guy. Gerda Stevenson is excellent as well, but for me, there's only ever going to be one Steve...Marjorie Westbury. Short of channeling the talents of Miss Westbury, this is an excellent production which I highly recommend. It really captures all the suspense of the original broadcasts. Acccording to the liner notes, there are eight more productions "lost to the archives". I can only hope the BBC produces these scripts as well.