Greene kills off the Golden Age of Murder Fiction

Dr Lucy Worsley

‘The Golden Age’ was broadcast on Monday 7th October 2013, and is the third in a series of three programmes televised on BBC4 and titled A Very British Murder with Lucy Worsley.

 

In this final programme the historian Dr Lucy Worsley tells the story of one of the first high-profile killers, Dr Crippen, who was hanged in 1910 for poisoning and dismembering his wife. Then she turns her attention to the interwar period, when detective fiction reached the peak of its popularity at the hands of authors Agatha Christie and Dorothy L. Sayers. After undergoing the elaborate initiation ceremony of the Detection Club, which was set up by a group of British writers in 1930, Dr Worsley considers how Alfred Hitchcock's films and Graham Greene's novels eclipsed the traditional murder-mystery story in the depiction of homicide.

 

She suggests that Greene’s Brighton Rock is ‘a new kind of novel with the emphasis off the detective and onto the murderer himself’. Comparing Greene’s settings to those of Christie or Sayers, she argues: ‘We are in a very different environment. The story of Brighton Rock takes place in tea-rooms and pubs and amusement arcades. The murder happens in a public toilet. It’s a long way from the rarefied country houses of the classic golden age detective novels. Graham Greene loves taking us into the sleazy underbelly behind the shiny ships and the hotels of the Brighton sea front.’ She concludes that, like Charles Dickens and Wilkie Collins and the writers of melodramas, ballads and broadsides, Graham Greene tapped into a significant strand in the national psyche, a very British relish for murder as presented in fiction.

In her review of ‘The Golden Age’ in Radio Times Alison Graham wrote:

‘Lucy Worsley is always effervescent, but, when discussing her favourite author of detective fiction, Dorothy L Sayers, she bubbles like an overheating foot spa. “She’s my absolute favourite,” says Worsley. ‘She had a very big brain.” Worsley’s favourite Sayers novel is Gaudy Night, thanks largely to its gutsy protagonist, the feminist Harriet Vane, who was to become the wife of Sayers’ great detective creation, Lord Peter Wimsey.

‘Worsley is the perfect guide through the bloodied hallways of murder scenes, both real ([such as] Dr Crippen) and fictional, in a series that’s caught the interest of BBC4 viewers, even beating the mighty 'Only Connect' in ratings.

‘She strikes just the right tone; yes, she might be as jolly as a young gel who’s just won a lacrosse match, but she’s not frivolous. Murder, after all, is a serious business, as she discusses with the peerless PD James.’ (Radio Times. London: Immediate Media Company, 5-11 October 2013.)

Lucy Worsley studied Ancient and Modern History at New College in the University of Oxford (England, UK), and was awarded a PhD by the University of Sussex (England, UK) for her research into the architectural patronage of William Cavendish, which research she published under the title Cavalier: A Tale of Passion, Chivalry and Great Houses (London: Faber and Faber, 2007). She is Chief Curator at Historic Royal Palaces, the independent charity which runs Kensington Palace State Apartments, Hampton Court Palace, the Tower of London, Kew Palace at Kew Gardens and the Banqueting House in Whitehall (London, UK).

‘The Golden Age’ will be screened again on BBC4 on Wednesday 9th October 2013, and is available for viewing or downloading on BBC iPlayer until 11.59pm (BST) on Wednesday 16th October 2013.

Cast

Presenter: Lucy Worsley

Creative Team

Director: Matthew Thomas

Executive Producer: Michael Poole
Producer: Matthew Thomas
Series Producer: Alastair Laurence

 

GGBT Creative Writing Awards Winners 2013

'The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes...

'and misted the seaward window...'

The Starting Point

In the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust Creative Writing Awards 2013 prose writers had to begin with the following words and to continue from there:

‘The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes and misted the seaward window…’

Screenplay writers and Playwrights had to embed this line somewhere in their texts.

The words of the Starting Point were taken from Graham Greene’s satirical novel of espionage, Our Man in Havana (1958), though as always there was no requirement to allude to the source nor to mimic Greene’s style.

Winners

Best Prose Fiction Writer: JD Casteel for ‘Corrosion’

Best Prose Thriller Writer: Peter Guttridge for ‘God’s Lonely Man’

Best Prose Travel Writer: Peter Guttridge for ‘One Day in Caracas’

Other Categories

Prizes were not awarded in the other categories.

Commended

Fergal Casey is commended for his entry ‘The Bungalows of Old Hollywood’ in the category of Playwright.

The Entry

In this international competition entries arrived from writers in England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Spain and USA, from as close as Greene’s home town of Berkhamsted and from as far away as San Francisco, California. The judges would like to thank all the entrants for their keen interest and good writing.

Best Entries

The best entries made good use of the Starting Point, which was made to seem an integral part of the writing, as opposed to an irrelevant opening (or middle) sentence, and these entries were well suited to the category for which they had been entered. They were written imaginatively and accurately, and they focused on an interesting and thoughtful situation. Some entries were free of error.

Less Successful Entries

Some less successful entries made little or no use of the Starting Point, or they were unfocused or tried to include too many ideas. Some entries would have benefitted from more consideration of the requirements or the disciplines of the category for which texts had been entered. Many entries needed more careful proof-reading and greater awareness of grammatical and syntactical conventions.

Prize Giving 2013

Prizes for this year’s Awards will be presented at the Graham Greene International Festival in Deans’ Hall (Berkhamsted School, Berkhamsted, England, UK) on Saturday 28th September 2013.

GGBT Creative Writing Awards 2014

The Starting Points and the Rules for the competitions in 2014 will be announced at the Prize Giving for the Awards 2013 (above).

Graham Greene's 'The Living Room': a four-star hit at Jermyn Street Theatre

Christopher Timothy and Tuppence Middleton

Christopher Timothy and Diane Fletcher

Christopher Timothy, Christopher Villiers and Tuppence Middleton

 

‘Graham Greene’s first play thrilled audiences when it premiered [in the UK] in 1953, succeeding because — as one critic put it — “There seems to be nothing we so much relish nowadays as a good, brisk chat about Evil,” wrote the London Evening Standard’s reviewer, Henry Hitchings, on 11th March 2013 about the first major revival of Greene’s The Living Room produced by Primavera in association with Jermyn Street Theatre, London.

THE LIVING ROOM

by Graham Greene

CAST AND CREATIVE TEAM

MICHAEL DENNIS: Christopher Villiers

ROSE PEMBERTON: Tuppence Middleton

MISS TERESA BROWNE: Caroline Blakiston

MISS HELEN BROWNE: Diane Fletcher

FATHER JAMES BROWNE: Christopher Timothy

MRS DENNIS: Emma Davies

Directed by Tom Littler

Set Design by Cherry Truluck

Lighting Design by Tim Bray

Sound Design by George Dennis

Costume Design by Emily Stuart

PERFORMANCES

Monday to Saturday 7.30pm; Saturday matinees 3.30pm.

The production will run until 30th March 2013.

TICKETS

Tickets: £20.00 (or £16.00 for Concessions)

Box Office telephone: 0044-(0)-207-287-2875

VENUE

16b Jermyn Street

London, SW1Y 6ST

England, UK

Nearest underground railway station:

Piccadilly Circus

SYNOPSIS OF THE PLAY

Two elderly sisters, Theresa and Helen Browne, live together in their family home with their brother James, a crippled Catholic priest. James’ paralysis means that he can no longer perform his priestly duties. The sisters cannot abide the idea of sleeping in a room in which someone has died. The room in which all four scenes of the play are set is a bedroom converted into a living room. As the play opens, their niece, Rose, has just arrived from the funeral of her mother. She is accompanied by her legal executor, Michael Dennis.

Michael and Rose are lovers. Helen, the sharper of the sisters, guesses the truth. Rose and Michael plan to go away together, but Helen blocks this idea by forcing Theresa into a psychosomatic breakdown, knowing that Rose will agree to stay to look after her. Rose becomes an established part of this oppressive household. Each afternoon she slips away to a flat in Regal Court for an adulterous union with Michael, but the life of deceit takes its toll. Rose loses her bloom.

ROSE: ‘“Since my last confession three weeks ago I have committed adultery twenty-seven times.” That’s what Aunt Helen would like me to say, and, Father, it doesn’t mean a thing.’
The Living Room, Act 2, Scene 1, in Graham Greene, Collected Plays. London: Vintage, 2002. 47.

This synopsis draws on programme notes written by Dr Joe Spence for the dramatised reading of The Living Room at the Graham Greene International Festival on Friday 1st October 2010.

FIRST PRODUCTIONS

The Living Room was first performed in Stockholm (Sweden) in October 1952. One contemporary critic wrote, ‘The public who went to the play included the whole of literary Stockholm, [and] appreciated to the full incomparably the most fascinating production of the autumn season.[...]. When Graham Greene stepped on to the stage, I thought the applause would never stop. It was, perhaps, rather for one of the greatest novelists of our time, than for the dramatist, but either way, it was well-meant.’ (Svenska Dagbladet, 1st November 1952, quoted in Norman Sherry, The Life of Graham Greene, vol. 2: 1939-55. London: Random House, 1994. 452).

In the UK the play was performed in Edinburgh, Glasgow and Brighton, before it opened at Wyndham’s Theatre, London, on Thursday 16th April 1953 with the following cast:

MARY: Dorothy Dewhurst

MICHAEL DENNIS: John Robinson

ROSE PEMBERTON: Dorothy Tutin

MISS TERESA BROWNE: Mary Jerrold

MISS HELEN BROWNE: Violet Farebrother

FATHER JAMES BROWNE: Eric Portman

MRS DENNIS: Valerie Taylor

The production was directed by Peter Glenville with settings by Leslie Hurry.

DRAMATISED READING AT THE FESTIVAL 2010

At the Graham Greene International Festival in Berkhamsted (Hertfordshire, UK) on Friday 1st October 2010 there was a shortened dramatised reading of The Living Room with the following cast:



Eliza Boyd

Sally Knyvette

 

Eve Matheson



Philip Battley




Isabel Pollen

MICHAEL DENNIS: Michael Palmer

ROSE PEMBERTON: Eliza Boyd

MISS TERESA BROWNE: Sally Knyvette

MISS HELEN BROWNE: Eve Matheson

FATHER JAMES BROWNE: Philip Battley

MRS DENNIS: Isabel Pollen

Dr Joe Spence (Master of Dulwich College)

The reading was introduced and directed by Joe Spence.

MICHAEL BILLINGTON ON GREENE THE PLAYWRIGHT

Michael Billington (theatre critic, The Guardian) gave a talk titled 'Graham Greene in the Theatre' at the Graham Greene International Festival on Saturday 3rd October 2009. He developed the talk into his chapter 'The Plays of Graham Greene' in Dangerous Edges of Graham Greene (editors, Dermot Gilvary and Darren J.N. Middleton. Continuum: London and New York, 2011).

ORIGINAL REVIEWERS' COMMENTS ON THE LIVING ROOM (1953)

'The best first play of its generation,' wrote Kenneth Tynan. Dorothy Tutin was 'masterly: the very nakedness of acting. In her greatest sorrow, she blazes like a diamond in a mine.' The critic for The Illustrated London News commented on the character of Rose: 'This is a part for an ingenue that is much ado about something; Miss Tutin sustains it with a beautiful certainty.' In the Daily Mail Cecil Wilson wrote that Dorothy Tutin gave 'a performance of heartrending simplicity which is at once childlike and mature in its emotional force'.

REVIEWS OF THIS PRODUCTION (2013)

Henry Hitchings in the London Evening Standard (11th March 2013)

Philip Fisher in the British Theatre Guide (March 2013)

Michael Billington in The Guardian (13th March 2013)

Paul Taylor in The Independent (12th March 2013)

Charles Spencer in The Daily Telegraph (12th March 2013)

PRIMAVERA

Primavera and director Tom Littler return to Jermyn Street Theatre after acclaimed sell-out revivals of Bloody Poetry, Anyone Can Whistle and Saturday Night.

The company has assembled an outstanding all-star cast for this revival.

Christopher Timothy, well known for his roles as James Herriot in All Creatures Great and Small and Mac McGuire in Doctors, plays Father James Browne, Rose's uncle.

Her aunts Teresa and Helen are played by distinguished actresses Caroline Blakiston (Brass and, previously at Jermyn Street Theatre, Black Bread and Cucumber) and Diane Fletcher (House of Cards).

Rising star Tuppence Middleton (Tormented, Cleanskin, and the BBC's The Lady Vanishes) makes her theatre debut as Rose.

Mr and Mrs Dennis are played by Christopher Villiers and Emma Davies; both are widely known for their extensive television and stage work.

GREENE’S THE POTTING SHED

Svetlana Dimčović (theatre director) gave a talk titled 'Backstage with Greene' at the Graham Greene International Festival on Saturday 2nd October 2010, when she discussed her production of Greene’s play The Potting Shed at the Finborough Theatre (Earl’s Court, London) in 2010. The show was given an extended run in January 2011.
 

Cast: Charlie Roe, Zoe Thorne, Cate Debenham-Taylor, Eileen Battye, Malcolm James, Paul Cawley, David Gooderson, Carl Ferguson, Janet Hargreaves, Lorna Jones and Martin Wimbush.

Design: Kate Guinness. Lighting: Jessica Glaisher. Sound: Simon Perkin. Direction: Svetlana Dimčović.

Best playwright: new category for creative writing awards 2013

The Potting Shed, Finborough Theatre (London), January 2011

 

Best playwright for theatre is a new category for entries to the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust’s Creative Writing Awards 2013.

This category recognises Greene’s contribution to twentieth-century theatre, and offers further scope to enthusiastic writers to express their talents.

 

In their entries to the competition screenplay writers and playwrights must embed the following words somewhere in their dialogue:

“The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes and misted the seaward window....”

Prose writers must begin with the following words, and continue from there:

“The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes and misted the seaward window....”

The new full list of eight categories is:

(1) best prose fiction writer;

(2) best prose thriller writer;

(3) best prose travel writer;

(4) best screenplay writer;

(5) best playwright (for theatre);

(6) best writer of prose, screenplay or play under the age of twenty-one years on 1st April 2013;

(7) best Berkhamstedianwriter of prose, screenplay or play (i.e. a writer who is a pupil at Berkhamsted School on 1st April 2013);

(8) best Old Berkhamstedian writer of prose, screenplay or play (i.e. a writer who is a former pupil atBerkhamsted School on 1st April 2013).

Each entry shall be written mostly in the English language and shall have a title; each prose entry shall be no more than 800 words; each screenplay and play (for theatre) entry shall be typed on no more than four sides of A4 paper in a normal font size (e.g. Times New Roman 11pt).

Full details of the rules and practices for the awards may be seen on the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust’s website.

At recent meetings of the Graham Greene International Festival in Berkhamsted (England, UK) Greene’s work as a playwright was the subject of events led by:

(i) Michael Billington (theatre critic, The Guardian) in a talk titled “Graham Greene in the Theatre” given on Saturday 3rd October 2009, which developed into his chapter “The Plays of Graham Greene” in Dangerous Edges of Graham Greene (editors, Dermot Gilvary and Darren J.N. Middleton; Continuum: London and New York, 2011);

(ii) Dr Joe Spence (historian and Master of Dulwich College) in a talk titled “In and Beyond The Living Room: The Art and Scope of Graham Greene, Dramatist” and in rehearsed readings mainly from The Potting Shed and The Complaisant Lover performed by a company of professional actors on Friday 1st October 2010; the acting company was Sally Knyvette, Philip Battley, Jessica Boyd, Eve Matheson, Isabel Pollen, Michael Palmer, Oliver Norton-Smith and Joe Spence;

(iii) Svetlana Dimčović (theatre director) in a talk titled “Backstage with Greene” given on Saturday 2nd October 2010, when she discussed her production of Greene’s play The Potting Shed at the Finborough Theatre (Earl’s Court, London) in 2010. The show was given an extended run in January 2011, and reviewed in The Guardian by Michael Billington. Cast: Charlie Roe, Zoe Thorne, Cate Debenham-Taylor, Eileen Battye, Malcolm James, Paul Cawley, David Gooderson, Carl Ferguson, Janet Hargreaves, Lorna Jones and Martin Wimbush. Design: Kate Guinness. Lighting: Jessica Glaisher. Sound: Simon Perkin. Direction: Svetlana Dimčović. The production photograph (above) was taken by Tristram Kenton, and shows a scene between Sara (Cate Debenham-Taylor) and James Callifer (Paul Cawley).

Winners of Creative Writing Awards 2012 & Starting points for Competitions 2013



Prof Peter Evans (left) congratulates Fergal Casey.

Christina Hyun, outside Deans' Hall, Berkhamsted School

Prof Peter Evans (left) presents an Award to Jonathan Langley.

Starting points for Awards in 2013

The starting points for the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust’s Creative Writing Awards 2013 were announced at the Graham Greene InternationalFestival 2012.

 

Prose writers must begin with the following words, and continue from there:

 

The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes and misted the seaward window....

 

Screenplay writers must embed these words somewhere in their dialogue:

 

The wind rocked the car, and spray broke across the traffic-lanes and misted the seaward window....

 

The Graham Greene Birthplace Trust’s Creative Writing Awards 2013 are offered in the following categories:

 

(i) best prose fiction writer;

 

(ii) best prose thriller writer;

 

(iii) best prose travel writer;

 

(iv) best screenplay writer;

 

(v) best (prose or screenplay) writer under the age of twenty-one years on 1st April 2013;

 

(vi) best (prose or screenplay) Berkhamstedian writer (i.e. a writer who is a pupil at Berkhamsted School on 1st April 2013);

 

(vii) best (prose or screenplay) Old Berkhamstedian writer (i.e. a writer who is a former pupil at Berkhamsted School on 1st April 2013).

 

The closing dates for entries will be 1st April 2013. Each entry shall be written mostly in the English language and shall have a title. Each entry will be a complete work in itself. Each prose text shall be no more than 800 words; each screenplay text shall be written on no more than four sides of A4 paper in a normal font size (e.g. Times New Roman 11pt).

 

Full details and rules may be seen at:

 

http://www.grahamgreenefestival.org/Pages/awards.php

Winners of Awards in 2012

At the Festival 2012, prizes were presented by Prof Peter Evans (Queen Mary, University of London, UK) and Prof Neil Sinyard (University of Hull, UK) to the following winners of the Graham Greene Birthplace Trust’s Creative Writing Awards 2012:

Fergal Casey (above, top image) (Ballinteer, County Dublin, Ireland) for Best Fiction and Best Screenplay

Christina Hyun (above, middle image) (Issaquah, Washington, USA) for Best Thriller

Jonathan Langley (above, lower image) (South Africa and Oxfordshire, UK) for Best Travel writing

Aimée Boggins (Hertfordshire, England, UK) for Best Berkhamstedian writer.