Murder on the Second Floor

Summary

1939 BBC studio production of Frank Vosper’s thriller Murder on the Second Floor.

Theatre play

Murder on the Second Floor by Frank Vosper [more information]

Play synopsis

The action takes place in a Bloomsbury boarding house. A novelist imagines the murders of his fellow tenants.

Production history

Premiered at the Lyric Theatre on 21 June 1929 and in the United States on 11 September 1929 at New York’s Eltinge 42nd Street Theatre. The play was made into a 1932 British film directed by William C. McGann.

Date of transmission

Saturday 10 June 1939

Time

9.00-10.30pm

Channel

BBC Television

Production company

BBC

Credits

Producer

Stephen Harrison

Playwright

Frank Vosper

Cast

Muriel Aked	Miss Snell
Hendrik Baker	PC Williams
Kathleen Boutall	Mrs Armitage
Clifford Buckton	PC Roberts
Anthony Bushell	Hugh Bromilow
Walter Fitzgerald	Joseph Reynolds
Richard George	Inspector
Nancy Hornsby	Lucy Timson
Jenny [Jeannie?] Laird	Sylvia Armitage
Eliot Makeham	Mr Armitage
Olaf Olsen	Jam Singh
John Rae	PC Thomson

Additional details

Origination

Live from studio

Vision original

Monochrome

Later transmissions

Presented again at 3.00pm (duration 100 mins) on Tuesday 20 June 1939.

Notes

Four of the cast (Muriel Aked, Kathleen Boutall, Eliot Makeham and Olaf Olsen) played in Stephen Harrison’s post-war television production of the play in 1947.

Extant status

No archival copy is known to exist.

Play tags

murder; poetry and literature, as theme; thriller

Print sources

Title

Radio Times, 2 June 1939 (Magazine)

Linking notes

listing, p. 17