Algiers - on the radio

[Obssessed_with_Orson]

does anyone know where i can find the book?

can't even request it from the library?

bye now!

[Jeff Wilson]

Look for the book Pepe le Moko, by Henri La Barthe. Algiers was the name of the movie made from that book, and in turn the Campbell broadcast.

[Wellesnet]

From an Amazon review by MG Watson (9/24/13):

Orson Welles was a great genius -- maybe the most talented actor of the 20th century -- but he didn't hit a home run every time at bat, and if I had to rate "Algiers" (and I am), I'd say it's a single that might be pushed to a double. Not bad fare, but not among the best of the shows produced by The Campbell Playhouse -- something surprising when you consider who wrote it.

"Algiers," which was co-written by a young James M. Cain, is the story of a jewel thief from New York named Pepe Le Moko who, having become an international fugitive, is now hiding out in the Casbah of Algiers. The Casbah is a sort of Switzerland for criminals, a city-within-a-city where the law is toothless, and so long as Pepe stays there he can avoid the various policemen looking to lock him up, including the wily French Inspector, Tremaine, and a blundering police Commissioner who has traveled from New York specifically to nab him. Unfortunately for Pepe, he soon runs into Gabrielle, a lovelessly engaged American tourist who makes him feel as if "he's been sleepwalking these last two years." The cunning Tremaine devises that Gabrielle may be the bait which can lure Pepe out of the Casbah and into irons, even as Gabby's fiance Richard begins to suspect that his fiance is interested in more about Algiers than the scenery.

"Algiers" is not a bad story. The pace is somewhat sluggish at first, and the entire enterprise is undermined by some confusion on the part of the writers as to whether the tale is a comedy or a tragedy. In electing to make it both, it ends up being neither, and I wish Cain and Lawson had tried harder to produce a less predictable outcome. On the other hand, among other virtues (such a a lovely reconstruction of the exotic, dangerous atmosphere of the Casbah, and a touchingly friendly relationship between Tremaine and Pepe) the vocal performance of Orson Welles is astonishing; in years of listening to Old Time Radio I've never encountered a man with a more diverse range of vocal talent. He seems to know instinctively what timbre, pitch and tone to use to create a vivid mental image of a character in the listener's ear, and he imbues Pepe with a mixture of believable criminality and lonely pathos that is truly impressive to hear. This story is worth a listen just for the banter between Pepe and Gabrielle alone.

"Algiers" was originally broadcast on October 8, 1939, and was written by John Howard Lawson and James M. Cain. It starred Orson Welles as Pepe Le Moko and Paulette Goddard as Gabrielle.

[Wich2]

>Orson Welles was a great genius -<

Okay, with you so far...

>- maybe the most talented actor of the 20th century<

...HOLD the PHONE!

No. Just, no.

-Craig

[Jeff Wilson]

"Algiers" was the source of some heated discussion between Diana Bourbon, the ad rep for CP, Ernest Chappell, and Welles after broadcast. Bourbon wrote to Chappell (sending Welles a copy as well) about what a disaster she thought the show was, describing it as "one of the worst we have done - entirely due to overproduction." She describes houseguests over while the show was on leaving the room en masse to escape what she called a "sound effects nightmare." She was also hot about the description of the episode as an "Orson Welles production," instead of a CP production, but that was a sponsor issue. Oh, and the discussion of the upcoming Chaplin movie with Goddard was considered excessive plugging. And that Ray Collins gave a "vile" performance (and not in a good way).

Welles responded with an eight page letter of his own, defending himself and the Mercury, and writing off the slightly shorter East coast performance as inferior to the later West coast performance. Her letter obviously bothered Welles, who went into point by point rebuttal of virtually everything she had written, defending what he saw as a strong episode and performance. Her response was to essentially defend the business side of things and let everything else go, which was probably for the best, as she noted such arguments could go on forever.

[Le Chiffre]

To me, the main difference between the two ALGIERS performances comes at the end when Welles is plugging next week's show, Galsworthy's ESCAPE. In one of them, Welles rushes through the plug easily, whereas in the other one he stumbles badly several times, pronouncing trout as "frowt", for example. Other than that, there's not a significant difference between the two performances, at least on a first comparison (I would like to see that 8-page memo to Bourbon, though). As for Welles's over elaborate sound design, it really exists only in one scene towards the beginning, with a kind of aural tracking shot through the Casbah. Other than that, the sound design sounded pretty normal. Maybe Campbell's really just objected to the third world setting.

[Terry]

All Diana cared about was the intended demographic of Housewives Who Make Soup. Poor Orson.

[Le Chiffre]

Yes, those housewives were probably not into third world settings either. Does anyone else think that the story bears at least a slight resemblance to THE THIRD MAN?

Anyway, here are the two performances of ALGIERS. Not sure which is the west coast and which is the east coast, but the alternate performance (found by Dan_UK) seems to have better sound:

IU/Lilly website:
https://orsonwelles.indiana.edu/items/show/1995

Alternate performance:
https://orsonwelles.indiana.edu/wowza4/ ... .high.m3u8

[Terry]

Your first link is the East Coast broadcast.

I can't play the second link. Tried VLC and Winamp.

[Le Chiffre]

I was able to play the second link on my phone and on one of my home computers, but not on the other one. It works on my VLC, but I guess maybe the success varies from computer to computer.

Thanks for clearing that up about the performances.

[Dan_UK]

Your first link is the East Coast broadcast.

I can't play the second link. Tried VLC and Winamp.

In VLC, in the Media menu choose the option "Open network stream", paste in the link then click Play, and after a 5 to 6 second pause it should start playing.

[Terry]

Thanks, Dan. I was clicking on the link and trying to play the downloaded file, thinking it would link to Lilly's file.

Instead I need to right click it, choose 'copy link address' and then paste that in VLC.

[Le Chiffre]

Good story about the ALGIERS broadcast in Wikipedia, taken from Leonard Maltin's book, THE GREAT BROADCAST:

After 20 shows, Campbell began to exercise more creative control over The Campbell Playhouse, and had complete control over story selection. Diana Bourbon, an account executive from the Ward Wheelock agency, was appointed as liaison between Welles and Campbell. Bourbon acted as de facto producer, and she and Welles frequently clashed over story and casting.[9] One notable dispute came after the broadcast of "Algiers", which employed a carefully crafted tapestry of sound to create the world of the Casbah. Challenged on why the background sounds were so loud, Welles responded, "Who told you it was the background?"

[Wich2]

Bourbon actually took over for Campbell's after Orson left.

The series hung on, at half an hour, for one more season. Still L.A., with film guests, but pop stuff rather than old or new classics. Houseman stayed as a writer, and some say ratings were actually better, but the show was too expensive.

- Craig

[Le Chiffre]

Interesting. I wonder if Bourbon had Houseman do a radio adaptation of her own story, ATLANTIC ADVENTURER, published in Hearst's Cosmopolitan in 1934, and then made into a movie the next year.