The Twelve Labours of Hercules (radio serial) explained
| The Twelve Labours of Hercules |
| Format: | drama serial |
| Runtime: | 30 mins |
| Start Time: | 8pm |
| End Time: | 8.30pm |
| Country: | Australia |
| Language: | English |
| Home Station: | 2BL |
| Syndicates: | ABC |
| Starring: | Neva Carr Glynn |
| Director: | Lawrence Cecil |
| Num Series: | 1 |
| Num Episodes: | 12 |
The Twelve Labours of Hercules is a 1938 Australian radio serial by Max Afford based on the legend of Hercules.[1]
The serial was popular and sold overseas.[2]
It was produced again in 1944, starting 29 May.
A copy of the script is at the Fryer Library at the University of Queensland.[3]
Premise
According to the press release, "it is the story of a capricious girl's "dare"to her suitor. Hector Cousins, nicknamed "Hercules," a name that fits him like, a glove. Aided by the superior intellect of his butler, Bartholomew Stubbins, Hector sets out to perform twelve "Labours of Hercules" at the behest of his lady love, who demands their performance as the price of her hand. Each labour constitutes the material of an "episode" of the serial. "[4]
Background
Afford said at the time:
The talkies have hopelesssly debunked’ the mystery-thriller with such films as The Thin Man, The Ex-Mrs. Bradford and the recent There's Always a Woman. And if radio entertainment is to keep in’ step, it must do the same. The old- fashioned thriller, with its dead bodies, secret trapdoors, sinister arch-villains, and frail, beautiful heroine, simply will not be accepted seriously by modem audiences. The newer type of entertainment presents these thrills, at the same time poking gentle fun at them. This I have attempted to do in The Labors of Hercules. Ihe dominant note is comedy... Although the adventures provide plenty of thrills, these are more than balanced by the humor of these two ill-assorted characters.
Episodes
- Prologue (3 Oct 1938) - According to Wireless Weekly "A young man, Hector Cousins... is in love with the daughter of a professor of Greek mythology. A madman leaves him £5OOO and a butler. The girl will marry him on one condition, and that is he must perform twelve tasks similar to those performed by Hercules of old. She will set a task each month."
- The First Task "The Hydra of Leona" (10 Oct 1938) - - According to a press release, "Hector Cousins, accompanied bv his man, Bartholomew, journey down to Jervis Bay to investigate the storv of a mysterious half-human creature that prowls the countryside after nightfall. Their investigations lead them into the house of Dr. Karl Sudermann, and it takes all Bartholo-mew’s ingenuity to get them out again. It is during this adventure, too, that they encounter Jean Moreland."
- The Second Task "The Girdle of Hippolyte" (17 Oct 1938) - according to a press release "When Frederick Potby got himself mixed up with Blackie Bentley’s gang and gave them his aunt’s diamond bracelet for hush-money it was to his friend Eleanor Holmes that he came for sympathy. The romantic Eleanor at once set Hector Cousins on the trad of the bracelet, and the mythological Hercules could have found the original task no more difficult than the one that confronted his twentieth century namesake."
- The Third Task: The Stag of Cerynea (24 Oct 1938) "When Eleanor Hclmes heard of the queer business of her uncle, Alexander Marston, she set Hector Cousins the almost impossible task of finding the truth behind the fantastic business. Cousins went among the eccentric Marsden family and encountered a nightmare."
- The Fourth Task "The Stymphalian Birds" (31 Oct) "When the N.S.W. Defence Department asked Hector Cousins to deliver the secret plans of a new aircraft to the Victorian Defence Department, he turned to Bartholomew for advice. And that gentleman, recalling the ancient legend of Hercules and the Stymphalian Birds, evolved an ingenious plan for outwitting their pursuers."
- The Fifth Task "The Hind of Keryneia" (7 Nov) - "When the wealthy and eccentric Mrs. Charles Irving gave a garden party in honor of the visiting film star, Miss April Joy, she little realised the trouble she was inviting. It was during thus party that the actress’s diamond disappeared completely and brought the entire house under suspicion."
- The Sixth Task "The Apples of Hesperides" (14 Nov) - "Eleanor Holmes had no difficulty in finding the sixth task for Hector Cousins to perform, since it was committed in her own household. A valuable ornament in the form of a cluster of golden apples disappeared from her father’s museum and vari- ous members of the household, including an Argentine Count and a rival collector, came under suspicion."
- The Seventh Task (21 Nov)
- The Eighth Task "The Erymanthian Boar" (28 Nov) "When Hector Cousins, was set the task of capturing the kidnappers of the wealthy Ronald van Reaper, he needed all his strength and cunning to complete the task."
- The ninth Task "The Augean Stables" (5 Dec) "When the Government invited tenders for the demolition of slum cot-tages in Surrey Hills, and the wealthy firm of Garson, Merrill, and Company put in a price so absurdly low that it aroused the suspicions of a prominent newspaper, Hector Cousins and Bartholomew were invited to clear up a mess easily comparable with the task of the ancient Hercules and the Augean Stables."
- The Tenth Task "The Creatan Bull" (12 Dec) "Hector Cousins and Joseph “Elackie” Bentley come to grips for the last time in this adventure, which tells of an ingenious confidence trick practised on a wealthy jeweller. Percival Old-meadow. As his hide-out, Bentley chooses a houseboat in a remote and deserted backwater of Sydney Harbor and in this lonely location the final battle of wits is fought."
- The Final Task (19 Dec) - "And so we come to the final labor of Hector Cousins, our twentieth century Hercules. And although it is rather different from the others, it is, as Bartholomew warns him, the most difficult of them all. It concerns a cruel trick played upon the young man by Eleanor Holmes and how Bartholomew. keeping in mind that desperate ills need desperate remedies, used his resourceful mind to help his master for the last time."
Reception
Reviewing the prologue "Sparrow" from Wireless Weekly said "The highlight of this prologue seemed to be Hector's friend, ‘‘Nobby.” His voice was new to me, and sounded fresh and interesting. I could not understand at times what Sparrow, the butler, was talking about."
Notes and References
- News: CHANGES PLANNED IN . . 1358 . Queensland, Australia . 7 January 1938 . 26 October 2023 . 13 . National Library of Australia.
- News: AUSTRALIAN RADIO PLAYS . . 13 . 3699 . Australian Capital Territory, Australia . 14 August 1939 . 26 October 2023 . 2 . National Library of Australia.
- https://manuscripts.library.uq.edu.au/index.php/h0042 The Twelve Labours of Hercules
- News: Radio Programmes . . 33 . 1691 . New South Wales, Australia . 14 October 1938 . 26 October 2023 . 6 . National Library of Australia.
