| Ralph Rashleigh and the Bushrangers | |
| Format: | drama play |
| Runtime: | 60 mins[1] |
| Start Time: | 8pm |
| End Time: | 9pm |
| Country: | Australia |
| Language: | English |
| Home Station: | 2FC |
| Syndicates: | ABC |
| Creator: | James Tucker |
| Director: | Eric Johns |
| Record Location: | Sydney |
Ralph Rashleigh and the Bushrangers is a 1953 Australian radio play by Edmund Barclay based on an 1840s novel by James Tucker.[2]
The novel had been republished in 1952, edited by Colin Roderick who claimed that he discovered James Tucker was the author. This event ignited a great deal of public interest in the novel which would be adapted for radio three times over a two-year period: twice by the ABC, and once by commercial radio.[3] [4]
There was another ABC radio adaptation of a Tucker work, Jemmy Green in Australia.
The October 1953 adaptation did not cover all the novel by focused on Ralph Rashleigh's adventures with bushranger Foxley.
According to ABC Weekly "Edmund Barclay takes up Ralph’s story when he is tramping to Campbelltown. He has been assigned as convict labour to “Lunnon Bob” Arlack. His heart is light, for he is walking away from two bitter-bad years served at the Government agricultural settlement, Emu Plains: two years of the whip and the bludgeon, two years of shackles and shame. But though Ralph is optimistic, further troubles are waiting close round the bend. Hair-raising experiences are the result of his entanglement with Poxley and a desperate gang of bushrangers."
According to the Adelaide Mail "The rather ponderous narration was irritating at first, but after a while the elaborate language... had the effect of adding to Roxley's enormities and giving them a kind of Dickensian grotesqueness. The burning of the constables, the attack on the farm while a party was in progress, the terrible scene when Foxley captured McGuffin. a former overseer — all these gave a pic ture of savagery andbrutality that must for ever be an ugly smear on Australia's early history."[5]
The novel had already been adapted as a serial for ABC radio starting in November 1952, adapted by Colin Roderick. Episodes went for fifteen minutes and the show was broadcast at 8.45am. Alistair Duncan read out the novel.
In January 1953 it was announced Fidelty, an Australian company, bought the rights to serialise the novel for commercial radio. Coral Lansbury did the adaptation. Lasbury married radio producer George Edwards in February 1953 while working on the serial.[6] [7]
Episodes went for sixty minutes and broadcast for 60 minutes on Sunday nights on 2UW.
The Sydney Daily Telegraph said Lansbury "is making a neat, workmanlike job of the adaptation. However, if you happen to be interested in Mr. Rashleigh's heliotrope period you will most probably enjoy this serial. The actors seem to have given more thought than usual to its characters, who are drawn with quite a compelling sympathy for the crude comradeship, of the period."[8]