Counsel for the Defence - BBC Saturday Night Theater

Saturday Night Theatre was a long-running radio drama strand on BBC Radio 4. The strand showcased feature-length, middle-brow single plays on Saturday evenings for more than 50 years, having been launched in April 1943. The plays featured in the strand included stage plays, book adaptations and original dramatisations. For most of its history, programmes ran for 90 minutes and were largely entertainment-centred, such as thrillers, comedies and mysteries.
Saturday Night Theatre was noted as the major drama of the week on BBC Radio 4, until it was scrapped as a programme strand in 1996. Shorter plays continued to be broadcast on Radio 4 on Saturday evenings from 1996 until the relaunch of the channel's schedule in April 1998 by James Boyle, when single dramas were removed from the Saturday evening schedule. Since 1998, the main weekly play on the station has been The Saturday Play, a daytime programme that runs for 60-90 minutes.
There have since been campaigns to bring back Saturday Night Theatre, but in the context of BBC budget cuts, that have included the 2010 axing of Radio 4's Friday Play (established in 1998, when Saturday Night Theatre was abolished), any return looks unlikely.
Originally Broadcast 4/8/1961
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[@janeclarkson8471]

Ohh Carlton Hobbs was such a voice of BBC radio plays. Love, love, his voice. This is the best medium EVER! and never ever, a profanity. Thank you 🙏🏻 for bringing the golden days back!

[@ChestertonRadio]

Thank you for listening! We invite you to listen to more plays on our all-day live stream here: Listen.ChestertonRadio.com We also have a player with over 900 Saturday Night Theatre shows! Plays.ChestertonRadio.com

[@dsantamaria713]

Absolutely love these BC Radio plays! ❤ Can't get enough of them...

[@eastwood1941]

The unmistakable voice of Carleton Hobbs as the Judge. Brings back memories!

[@mckavitt13]

So does the unmistakable voice of Joan Hickson., voted not long ago as the best Miss Marple of all in the televised series. ***

[@susanhawkins5914]

Synopsis- A BBC Radio adaptation by Felix Felton of Jeffrey Ashford's novel. George Clover, a vicious gangster, has been arrested along with some of his gang and charged with bank robbery. Their trial is about to begin. Clover tries to get David Adams, an extremely capable attorney, to act as his Counsel for Defence, but Adams refuses. However, Clover is not the man to take no for an answer, so he has Adams' daughter kidnapped to force Adams to represent him. Gorge Clover ... James Kenney David Adams ... William Eedle William Brane ... Keith Williams Detective Inspector Dreasley ... Haydn Jones Gwen Adams ... Jane Tobin Jane Adams ... Anna Bentinck Mr. Casgo ... Norman Shelley Mr. Justice Leeming ... Carleton Hobbs Mr. Pride ... William Dexter Amelia Weston ... Joan Hickson Mrs. Brane ... Mary O'Farrell Mrs. Ash ... Diana Olsson Mr. McMenton ... Douglas Storm Broadcast on BBC Home Service 08 April 1961

[@olysvenson8464]

Thanks 👍

[@sailorsquatandhisseaman]

Thank you so much for the time to do this! ❤️☮️🙏🏽

[@Alan-ss3xp]

Very helpful. Like looking at the map before starting out on a journey. Yes I do use Sat Nav!

[@totoro9590]

New subscriber to your channel. Thanks for these great radio plays 👍👍

[@jenny45Bravo]

Excellent radio drama. Thank you so much. Newly subscribed.

[@sands7779]

enjoyed this thank you

[@decordobauk]

Thank you.

[@camelia9802]

Really good play, lots of twists and turns. Thanks for uploading.

[@kimberlykasimoff1447]

"Sit down. Here, smoke this." I'm surprised the husband didn't offer his wife a drink. Or a cuppa!

[@alanhughs461]

Was probably a spliff to shut her up 😮

[@chriscoughlan5221]

Nice twist at the end

[@jordsupp]

That hysterical wife ... pfft! She drove me nuts! But a great production. Thanks.

[@mrbazzabee4013]

My wife is also hysterical.....but she still does the Friday Shopping.

[@captainswing4487]

You should meet mine....I'd settle for hysterical.

[@pragatibhushan8697]

A mother going crazy for safety of her daughter is hysterical?

[@suenevin57]

@jordsupp Absolutely agree! She was a nightmare!

[@user-wc6rm3gf3l]

Excellent!

[@judikingsman6132]

Wonderful 😊❤

[@roxanavasilakis9435]

🕵️thank you

[@user-ux6fp5fy6n]

Brilliant drama .

[@opheliahamlet3508]

Excellent! I thought I heard Joan Hickson. Miss Marple to the rescue! Very good

[@elainepayne7047]

The unmistakable Joan Hickson (the only Miss Marple) as the car mad witness?

[@2msvalkyrie529]

Dr Syntax !!

[@alanhughs461]

Pity it wasn't the wife who was kidnapped 👋🥳could of done poor defence got them locked up and rid of her 🤫result

[@emcarver8983]

...could have...

[@mtsenskmtsensk5113]

Properly Saturday Night Theatre,. I nearly didn't bother with it, with the American theater spelling, which I suspected of being a cheap copy with loud music, old adverts, and voices trained to speak unnaturally, thankfully it was the BBC original!

[@TheAnthonyMarlowe]

But then you also spelled it theater instead of theatre 🙃😂

[@kayi9236]

I'm grateful that an American is posting these, and allow for our differences in spelling.

[@juliadean2473]

I think I might've clobbered the wife - thank goodness I could turn her off!

[@margaretisabellezerner4556]

What an awful wife. I'd divorce her promptly after

[@aussieagle]

Loved it but the wife was a pain in the a**e.