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  • Published: 2 July 2008
  • ISBN: 9781405608572
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 3 hr 40 min
  • Narrators: Crawford Logan, Gerda Stevenson
  • RRP: $13.99

Paul Temple And The Madison Mystery



Crawford Logan and Gerda Stevenson star in this brand new eight-part recording of a lost archive Paul Temple serial.

From 1938 to 1969 crime novelist and detective Paul Temple and his Fleet Street journalist wife Steve solved case after case in one of BBC radio's most popular serials. They inhabit a sophisticated, well-dressed world of chilled cocktails and fast cars, where the women are chic and the men wear cravats - and where Sir Graham Forbes of Scotland Yard always needs Paul's help with a tricky case. Returning from America by ocean liner, the Temples enjoy the company of their fellow passengers, only to find one of them dead the next morning - and when Paul and Steve get home to London, Sir Graham is waiting to plunge them into one of their most thrilling and dangerous adventures, the pursuit of a ruthless international gang of counterfeiters. As knives fly and bombs explode, the key to the puzzle seems to lie in a coin on the end of a watch-chain... This new production for BBC Radio 4 uses the original scripts, vintage sound effects and much of the original incidental music from a lost archive 1949 production. As far as possible, it is a technical and stylistic replica of how that production might have sounded had its recording survived.

  • Published: 2 July 2008
  • ISBN: 9781405608572
  • Imprint: BBC DL
  • Format: Audio Download
  • Length: 3 hr 40 min
  • Narrators: Crawford Logan, Gerda Stevenson
  • RRP: $13.99

About the author

Francis Durbridge

Francis Durbridge was one of Britain's most popular crime novelists and playwrights. Born in Hull, he was educated at Bradford and read English at Birmingham University. His first play, 'Promotion', was broadcast by the BBC in 1933. Encouraged by its success he was asked to contribute further plays. 'Send For Paul Temple' proved so popular that the BBC received 7,000 letters asking for more. 'The Adventures of Paul Temple' ran for over 30 years.

In 1969 BBC Television, having just started broadcasting in color, commissioned Durbridge to write a 26-part series of Paul Temple starring Francis Matthews.

It was not until 1971 that Durbridge wrote his first thriller directly for the theatre. The play, 'Suddenly at Home' (the title was taken from the death notice column of The Times newspaper) starred Gerald Harper and Penelope Keith and was a huge success in London's West End.

Durbridge also wrote 'Murder With Love' (1976), 'House Guest' (1980) and 'Fatal Encounter' (1996). Critics were apt to dismiss his plays, but the public did not. Durbridge himself said: 'My thrillers are not so much who dunnits as will-he-get-away-with-its.'

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