{
  "title": "FRIDAY THE THIRTEENTH",
  "category": "[MOTION-PICTURE]",
  "article": "Radio version of a 1933 Gaumont-British omnibus (no pun intended) film…\n[Emlyn] Met with producer Angus MacPhail, then director Victor Saville described: “…taken\nfrom somebody’s ‘treatment’, and I was to furnish the dialogue. A London bus, see, has a handful\nof passengers when a crane crashes on it and kills some and not others, see? Open with the\naccident, flash back to the separate lives, who’s going to die and who isn’t, and lead back to\naccident at end, all-star cast led by Jessie as a chorus girl…”\n“ ‘What about your part Emmer-lun?’ I suggested a smooth young blackmailer who follows his\nvictim into a hotel lounge.”\nMacPhail referred to the concept as “The Bus of San Luis Rey.” The movie cast included\nEdmund Gwenn, Emlyn Williams, Frank Lawton, Martita Hunt, and Ralph Richardson.\n[Britmovies] “Successful omnibus film created by writer Sidny Gilliat combining the true story\nof a bomb landing on a Piccadilly hotel, with a bus documentary. At one minute to midnight on\nFriday the 13th, lightning strikes a crane in London and, swerving to avoid it, a bus crashes into a\nshop, killing two passengers. The film flashes-back 24 hours and tells stories both dramatic and\nhumorous about six people—all passengers on the bus. The characters include a chorus girl en\nroute to a date with a man she doesn’t love; a henpecked husband whose wife was cheating on\nhim; a blackmailer who’d been bleeding an unfortunate young man dry; a wise-guy crook who\nwas about to be caught by a nasty detective; and so on. Ultimately we discover which two die.”\n“…13 characters who were on the bus getting their recent lives explored in intricate detail…”\n“…lapsed photography of Big Ben winding back, to symbolize what events occurred thirteen\nhours ago, up until the bus crash.”\n[SYNOPSIS] “When a bolt of lightning hits a crane on Friday 13th, a bus full of passengers\ncrashes into a shop. We follow the events in the lives of the passengers prior to the accident.\nBus conductor Alf and his driver Fred spend the day at the Derby and Alf expresses his\nforebodings about working on Friday the 13th. One of the horses they back is a winner, which\nmakes Alf think perhaps the day won't be so bad after all.\nMr Jackson plans to take his wife on a surprise cruise to celebrate their wedding anniversary.\nHe boards the bus after working late, little knowing that his wife has left him that very day for a\nsleazy fellow named Max.\nCockney market trader Joe is being pursued by a detective, who believes he has stolen a valuable\nchina statue. Two Americans pose as antique dealers from New York City and they travel with\nhim, towards his lockup, on the bus.\nReceiving a tip for a stock market certainty, Mr Wakefield asks his wife to hand deliver a letter\nto his brokers. Afraid to admit to her husband that she has forgotten, Flora Wakefield slips out of\nthe house late at night, and catches the bus towards Wimbledon Common.\nBlake is blackmailing a young couple, Frank and Mary, and is travelling on the bus with a\ncheque for £100 they have given him to keep their secret. Blake knew Frank from a stint in prison\nand is threatening to tell Frank's employers about his past.\nHenpecked husband Ralph meets Dolly in a park. They flirt and kiss. When he takes the bus\nhome he discovers she has stolen his wallet. Smugly, the blackmailer Blake pays his fare for him.\nChorus girl Millie argues with her jealous fiancé, Horace, who insists that she give up her stage\ncareer when they marry. When Horace fails to meet Millie at the stage door after work she boards\nthe bus intending to take up a variety agent's offer of supper at his house.\nThe aftermath of the accident. The bus driver and Alf are in hospital beds. Alf receives attention\nfrom a glamorous nurse. Market trader Joe has also survived the crash. He enjoys watching the\ndetective and the two Americans searching through the wreckage of the china shop, which\nincludes the stolen statue he was carrying on the bus. Mrs Wakefield and her stock-investing\nhusband laugh with relief about her forgetfulness, which has saved them from financial ruin.\nHenpecked Ralph's wife makes a great fuss of him as he has been injured in the crash; they are\nreconciled. Chorus girl Millie and her beau are happily reunited. She has sprained her ankle in the\ncrash, so cannot dance for a while. Blake's blackmail victims receive a visit from a policeman who\ninforms them that he was killed in the crash, releasing them from worry. The cuckolded Mr\nJackson did not survive the accident.\nMrs Twigg and her nephew read about the crash in a newspaper. She observes that they were\nextremely lucky to have got off the bus just before the crash. The, nephew, however wisely notes\nthat if the bus hadn't stopped to let them off, the crash would never have happened.",
  "origination": "National Programme and Regional Programme, London (BBC).",
  "duration": "September 11 and 13, 1935.",
  "personnel": "Lance Sieveking (scriptwriter, producer).\nCAST: A. Neal Arden, Frank Atkinson, Marjorie Clayton, Edward Craven, Barry Ferguson, John Gabriel,\nEdward Gathorne-Hardy, Lance George, Beatrice Gilbert, Hugh Hare, Johanna Hayes, Lauri Lupino Lane,\nEliot Makeham, Leslie Perrins, Henry Peterson, Mary Sheridan, Anne Twigg, Allan Wade, Deering Wells,\nBertha Woolcote",
  "extant_recordings": "None.\n[PROGRAM LOG]\n(NATIONAL PROGRAMME, LONDON)\n[Wednesday—8:30-9:40 PM]\nSeptember 11, 1935\n“Friday the Thirteenth”\n(REGIONAL PROGRAMME, LONDON)\n[Friday—8:00-9:10 PM]\nSeptember 13, 1935\n“Friday the Thirteenth”",
  "chronology": "",
  "sources": "",
  "gallery": "",
  "images": []
}