BBC Radio 4, 20 September 2023 and on BBC Sounds

A solicitor’s firm moves into refurbished offices – but finds their new telephone line has problems…

Seventy-one years – almost to the day – since it was first broadcast, Bafflegab and Radio 4 present one of Nigel Kneale’s eeriest early works, taking older listeners back to the time of manned telephone exchanges and easily crossed lines. (You might think it’s a problem that’s gone in recent years, yet we still get calls at home for the people who had the number over 13 years ago…) It’s a very different world in all sorts of aspects, from the way in which society functions – as epitomised by the way that Reece Shearsmith’s solicitor and Dan Starkey’s client treat those they deem below them – to the technology involved.

Kneale was clearly aware that most people listening to his play wouldn’t be aware of the minutiae of how telephony operates, and we are introduced to the various engineers, switchboard operators, supervisors and others as their work is affected by what starts off initially seeming to be a crossed line (where you can hear another call going on simultaneously). I still remember them happening, and it usually caused a little embarrassment, particularly if you were saying something you believed was confidential… but that’s nothing to what Caroline Catyz’s lady caller can be heard saying here (earning herself a very unusual nickname).

Toby Jones’ Frank Wilson is at the heart of the story as he oversees the investigation, getting increasingly caught up in the problem, with Jessie Cave’s Miss Prentice carrying out her own enquiries and providing the evidence needed (reminding me somewhat of the way in which Barbara Judd looks into the past of Hob(b)’s Lane in Quatermass and the Pit). The tension in Kneale’s script is as present decades later as it must have been in 1952 and Simon Barnard’s direction tightens the screw on the listener. Charlie Brandon-King’s sound design can of course do more than was possible for the original, and I would strongly advise listening with headphones to get the full effect of that and Evelyn Sykes’ score.

There are plenty of themes present that echo and re-echo throughout Kneale’s writings over the next few decades; those who have come to his work other than through Quatermass may spot more references than I did. Full marks to Barnard and his team for reinvigorating this (particularly hot on the heels of the recent Quatermass Experiment performance at Alexandra Palace)… you could almost fancy Kneale himself sitting at the wireless back in 1952 hearing this version instead of the original…

Verdict: An excellent revival of one of Kneale’s earliest works. Highly recommended. 10/10

Paul Simpson