The Fryer Library has a excellent collection of papers from Max and Thelma Afford. He was one of the leading radio writers of his day, Thelma one of the leading designers.
Max Afford got me into TV plays. I once thought of doing - may still do - a paper about Lady in Danger, one of the first Australian plays to have a run on Broadway. I was doing some casual research and came across an item in Leslie Rees' book on Australian drama which mentioned the play was filmed for Australian television in the 1950s. I had no idea we made TV then so did some research...
I didn't go through all the papers just the ones relevant to Lady in Danger. There were copies of contracts for the plays with Alexander Kirkland, who rewrote the play for Broadway.
There were press clippings about Afford. He got a lot of publicity in his Adelaide days - he was a handsome dude, often with a cigarette. One article said he would go through 60 cigarettes a day. Sixty! The photos from the 1940s show a man who aged - his hair went grey. He died when he was 48. His wife outlived him by over forty years.
Afford was very successful in his day - there's a lot more he could have accomplished. (Based on the career trajectories of fellow radio writers Sumner Locke Elliott, Morris West, Rex Rienits, nd Peter Yeldham, I'm guessing this would have involved long stints overseas and best selling novels.)
Don't smoke!
The papers included a radio adaptation of Lady in Danger which I tried listening to but the quality of the recording was not good. This play is easy to access though - the original I mean - because it is, I believe, in the pubic domain in Australia - http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks12/1203991.txt
I'm surprised they didn't adapt more Max Afford plays for Australian TV - Mischief in the Air, etc. Possibly he was considered too lightweight.
Oh and a Thelma Afford interview is on line here.
Some Afford documents - letter from Neil Hutchison.
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| NAA Neil Hutchison |
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| NAA Neil Hutchison |
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