A Rum Affair

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A Rum Affair
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Genre comedy fantasy play
Running time 30 mins
Country Australia
Language(s) English
Writer(s) Alec Coppel
Air dates since 1940

A Rum Affair is a 1940 Australian radio play by Alec Coppel.[1]

Although Coppel was Australian most of his career took place overseas. A Rum Affair was a rare work of his that debuted in Australia. It premiered in 1940 on the ABC as part of a series of Australian plays.

Leslie Rees called it "a short, irresponsible comedy of fantastic situation... Alec Coppel is willing to take types and settings that have served in other plays; his originality is in his wit and deft sense of situation and holding... of suspense... A Rum Affair is a saucy morsel."[2]

Another critic called it "the most suave and delicately balance radio script we have seen for years, only a trifle... but a trifle that is like a waffle that melts in the mouth. We don't often say, don’t miss this; but, don’t miss this. "[3]

The play was produced again in 1942,[4] 1946[5] and 1958.[6]

The 1946 version starred Peter Finch and was directed by Frank Harvey.[7] A review of this production called it "a pleasant enough trifle, proving a good starring vehicle for Peter Finch. For a while he stayed in the substrata of understatement, but on the entrance of the ghost a mos seductive shade played by Sheila Sewell, things got going so you could hear them. Outstanding was a nice piece of character from erstwhile A.B.C. producer Charles Wheeler. Production, by Frank Harvey, ideal."[8]

Premise

A travelling young man, Peter, pulls in for a night at a Kentish villages once on the sea, but now inland, because the sea has receded. The inn is haunted by a female ghost, Helene. He also encounters a man called Clifford and a yokel.

References

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