{
  "title": "BLACK VENGEANCE",
  "category": "[RADIO-SCRIPT]",
  "article": "“Introduced with ‘inward trepidation’ and with a warning to the nervous, the\nelderly, the invalid, and even to those living alone…”\n[BBC title card] “A century before, Sir George Fellowes’ grandfather interfered\nwith black magic practised by negro slaves on his West Indian settlement. The\nsudden appearance of a black man in Sir George’s house makes him realise that\nafter all this time they still mean to have their vengeance and he eventually dies\nof terror.”\nThis “tale of fear” was, as far as can be determined, the sole radio play written by\nMrs. St. Loe Strachey, widow of the late editor of The ???, lifelong advocate of\nchildren’s welfare, and the author of several novels and memoirs.\n[Manchester Guardian, September 4, 1935] “Mr. Peter Creswell, the producer,\nshould have plenty of opportunities for proving the elasticity of the microphone\ntonight.”\n[K. H., Manchester Guardian, September 5, 1935] “It is a pity from the\ndramatic point of view that the conscience of the B.B.C. dictates these solemn\nwarnings, for they have the effect of bracing the listener’s nerves before the play\nbegins, and instead of horror creeping upon him as the story proceeds the nerves\nslowly relax. Prepared for the worst in horror and terror, he finds invariably that\nthe worst is by no means as bad as he had anticipated, and by the end of the play\nhe is feeling quite pleased with the way he has faced the ordeal.\n“ ‘Black Vengeance’ was an interesting play, and produced from the actors some\nfine studies of fear, varying from uneasiness to terror, but in the Yorkshire\nsequence the author’s purpose was defeated by the use of sound effects in what\nshould have been an eerie and frightening silence. The drums which were\nsupposed to be heard by one man—and he referred to them only obliquely,--and\nto others were a mere vibration, were altogether too loud and real. When the\nalleged silence was lifted and the natural sounds of the country could be heard\neffects once more were responsible for a relaxing of tension; the twitter of birds,\nthe cuckoo’s note, and the barking of dogs, though doubtless accurate recordings,\nhad an artificial and even faintly comical sound. Left in the hands of the actors,\nwithout so many effects, the play would have been far more telling.”\n[Program information]",
  "origination": "National and Regional Programmes, London (BBC).",
  "duration": "September 4-5, 1935.",
  "personnel": "Peter Creswell (producer), Mrs. St. Loe Strachey (scriptwriter).\nCAST: Lindesay Baxter, Nigel Clarke, Malcolm Graeme, Carleton Hobbs, Ethel\nLodge, Charles Maunsell, Cyril Nash, Leon Quartermaine, George Sanders, Philip\nThornton, D. A. Ward",
  "extant_recordings": "None.\n[Program log]\n(NATIONAL PROGRAMME, LONDON)\n[Wednesday—8:00-8:50 PM]\nSeptember 4, 1935 “Black Vengeance”\n[“…described as a ‘tale of fear’… Mrs. St. Loe Strachey, who\nhas written it for Broadcasting, has based it, we are told, ‘on\nthe dark mysteries of Voodoo, the occult power that the\noppressed slaves\nof the West Indies brought with them from Africa as their\nsole weapon against their tyrants… The black man’s\nvengeance pursues the great- grandson of a planter who got\ninvolved with Voodoo more than 100 years ago. The action\nstarts in London, travels to Yorkshire, and then flashes back\nto the shadows of a sugar plantation in the West Indies over\na hundred years ago before returning to Yorkshire…”]\n(REGIONAL PROGRAMME, LONDON)\n[Thursday—9:10-10:00 PM]\nSeptember 5, 1935 “Black Vengeance”",
  "chronology": "",
  "sources": "",
  "gallery": "",
  "images": []
}