Australian TV Plays: Philip Albright and The Break (27 Feb 1962)

Phil Albright was an American who wrote for Australian TV in the late 1950s.

Career bio

*Dec 1949 appeared in Pirates at the Barn for Minerva

*1950 - in the cast of Dream Girl - review here - at Minerva

*June 1950 - Hobart article that he was company manager for Banvard Productions here

*July 1950 in Ah Wilderness for Minerva here

*Oct 1950 in Essie Lady Buckering for Minerva - here

*Oct 1951 he and David Netheim co wrote Hold High the Lamp see here

*April 1952 wrote radio drama Joe the Magnificent see here

*1952 appears in Radio play The Semblance of Death see here and wrote serial Jones Junior see here

*June 1954 wrote serires The Untold Story see here

*Jan 1958 wrote The Fiends see here
* adapted Sorry Wrong Number (18 June 1958) Lady in Danger (9 Sept 1959) The Skin of Our Teeth (25 Feb 1959)

*July 1959 - died

*Dinner with the Family (26 Aug 1959)

* Oct 1959 his play The Bust won equal second prize in Little Theatre Guild competition (first prize went to Burst of Summer) -see here

*Feb 27, 1962 - The Break appears at the Union Theatre, part of a trio of Australian plays presented by the Elizabethan Theatre Trust (along with Shipwreck)

Also wrote a play Tread Softly Or The Bust : A Play In Three Acts

The Break

Premise: A woman alcoholic lost her husband years ago. He returns to Australia determined to take their teenage son back with him.

Cast: Allan Trevor (Raoul), Terri Aldred (Laura), Grant Taylor (Tom), Dennis Carroll (Terry), Bruce Myles, Judith Arthy, . Directed by John Trasker.

Copy of script in Gordon Glenwright papers at State Library NSW see here

1949 article here

Philip Albright is a young New York newspaperman who has been living in Sydney for three months. He says: “Australia is definitely a man’s country. Look at the prevalence of all - male clubs. Notice how few men drink with their women- folk in Aus- tralian hotel lounges. Amer i c a n women demand more attention from their men than your women and they get it simply by raising hell if there’s slackness. “Australian husbands continue to see as much of their men friends after they are married as before. In America marriage alters all that because you rarely go out without your wife. She’d lift the roof if you stopped in for a few drinks on the way home the way Australians do.”

The play won third prize in the JC Williamson Little Theatre Competition of 1959 - won by Burst of Summer see here.

Play Synopsis

It takes place over one evening and the following morning at the Potts Point flat of Laura Masters. Laura is preparing the flat for the arrival of Raoul, her ex-husband and father of their 17 year old child, Terry. Raoul has been away for nine years, working in Europe. The marriage broke up because of Laura's drinking. Laura has a friend, Tom, a doctor who wants to marry her. Her neighbour Sybil goes to AA meetings with Laura, is married to Ed Collins, and has a son, Peter, who is friends with Terry.

Raoul arrives. He announces he has broken up with his second wife, Marilyn and would like to reconcile with Laura. He also wants to take Terry away on a trip. Terry is reluctant to leave his mother and talks a lot about his friend Peter.

Raoul asks Tom if Peter is "queer" and worries about Terry being raised by Laura "boys being raised by their mothers". Peter has arranged a date with a girl, Gloria, and wants Terry to date the friend. Peter alludes to Terry having never done anything with a girl but Terry wants to stay to be with his father.

Raoul and Laura discuss the past. It is implied they had an unsatisfactory sex life - Laura only liked it when drunk, and there is an allusion to Raoul having raped her. Raoul and Terry have a chat then Raoul heads out and Terry prepares to meet the girls.

Gloria turns up with her friend Bet. Peter wants to take Gloria to his family's shack at Narrabeen. He wants Terry to go with Bet but Terry is reluctant to leave his parents alone together. Gloria is attracted to Peter but when she asks why he doesn't get around with girls much he gets defensive. Gloria tells Terry about a boy Ollie who asked another boy down to "Palmer street" but the boy begged off because he was "spending time" with another boy. Terry knows Ollie was talking about them.

Laura refuses to let Raoul take Terry overseas, suggesting Raoul moves to Australia. He turns nasty, saying Tom is going to marry another girl, and that Tom suggested Terry and Peter are involved (both lies) due to a lack of masculine involvement in Terry's life. "Terry is a borderline case". They find a note from Terry saying he's gone to spend the night with Peter. Laura is tempted to have a drink and recites the AA prayer then calls Sybil for help. Raoul says he saw Peter with Terry and Laura starts drinking.

Terry and Peter come back having had sex with the girls to find Laura drunk. Terry thinks it's because his mother knows that he was with a girl, unaware it's because she thinks he's gay. Raoul suggests Terry go overseas with him. Peter suggests Terry go with his father. Tom arrives. Laura says Raoul told her Tom was engaged to someone else and Raoul denies it. Eventually Raoul's lies are exposed and Tom punches him. Terry tells his father to leave. Tom and Laura are united.

Thoughts on the play: long. Needed an edit. Full of drama. No one is gay. That's a cop out. Though maybe it implies that Peter is.

Reception

From 1962 review of The Break in The Bulletin - see here

Philip Albright’s “The Break” which finished the Elizabethan Theatre Trust’s season of three Australian plays at the Union Theatre was an appalling event. An earnest stupid play which piled in- credible situations on to even more unbelievable people, a setting which suggests a flat laid out on nightmarish lines, trite production filled with appropriate cliches of movement and gesture —even to the villain tapping an envelope significantly on his fingers—combined to provide one of the worst nights in recent theatre. How the Trust came to choose such a turkey as this —1 am informed that the play won second place in a recent major competition, which casts grave doubts on the judges ahead of many other local plays is just one more of those enticing mysteries that the Trust has been producing lately. Fine actors in Alan Trevor and Grant Taylor were quite wasted in this trash. KEVON KEMP

The SMH called it a "worthless piece of sensation mongering given an occasional sense of something better by John Tasker's direction of it... a talented company sets to work on a play about alcoholism which is also an illbred thriller. This is an unfortunate combination." The critic said Trevor "gives an admirably hateful performance" and that Taylor gives "another excellent performance of an impossibly one dimensional part."

Paul O'Loughlin said "the homosexual theme which runs through the play would make it unsuitable for ABC use."

Clement Semmler called it "a rather unsavoury play (for our purposes) which deals with homosexuality and alcoholism."