Radio Drama · Old Time Radio Researchers · Mystery & crime · Comedy

A Case For Dr Morelle

Networks
BBC (as its archives name them)
Heard
1957
Episodes
13

A CASE FOR DR. MORELLE

More about it

A Case for Dr. Morelle was a 13-episode series which ran weekly in 1957 on the BBC Light Programme from April 23 to July 16. According to the author Ernest Dudley, the character began life in 1940 during World War Two air raids, as he was trying to think up a "different" kind of detective while also providing a comic role for the actress Jane Grahame, who was also his wife. The result, originally heard on the radio show Monday Night at Eight, involved the acerbic criminal psychologist Dr. Morelle and his eager-but-less-than-helpful secretary Miss Frayle. In the 1957 series, Dr. Morelle was played by the English comic actor Cecil Parker, and Sheila Sim played the long-suffering and devoted Miss Frayle. In addition to radio plays, Dudley wrote a stage play as well as a number of novels and short stories featuring these characters. Audiences loved the opinionated and eccentric Morelle, whose disdain for his loyal secretary was an extension of his general lack of regard for humanity. Unlike Sherlock Holmes, who based his analysis on physical clues left at the scene of the crime, Morelle generally conducted his investigations via a series of interviews, although he sometimes included physical evidence in his analysis. He used his knowledge of criminal psychology to determine which of the suspects fit the psychological profile of the criminal. Often during the story, Miss Frayle would irritate the doctor by interrupting him as he was conducting an…

Episodes, in broadcast order

  1. Alarm Call

    · No. 1 · 29 min

  2. Confession of Guilt

    · No. 2 · 28 min

  3. Threat to Kill

    · No. 3 · 30 min

  4. The Sleepwalker

    · No. 4 · 30 min

  5. The Blackmailer

    · No. 5 · 29 min

  6. Voice in the Night

    · No. 6 · 29 min

  7. The Will

    · No. 7 · 29 min

  8. Act of Violence

    · No. 8 · 29 min

  9. The Black Ruby

    · No. 9 · 28 min

  10. The Wedding Dress

    · No. 10 · 28 min

  11. The Gambler

    · No. 11 · 29 min

  12. Poisoned Air

    · No. 12 · 28 min

  13. Mr. X

    · No. 13 · 29 min

Where it comes from 1

The archive items its episodes are played from, best first, with each one’s rights as its archive states them. An episode two sets both hold is played from the first.

  1. A Case For Dr Morelle - Single Episodes

    Old Time Radio Researchers · Old Time Radio Researchers Group · 13 episodes here · archive.org

    the Internet Archive states no licence or rights for it.

A set by the Old Time Radio Researchers Group (otrr.org), at the Internet Archive's Old Time Radio collection.

More Mystery & crime

Radio drama, old-time radio and historic broadcasts from the Internet Archive (its Old Time Radio collection with the Old Time Radio Researchers' sets, WWII Era Audio Recordings, the Pacifica Radio Archives, the Radio Haiti Archive, German radio plays and listeners' uploads), Wikimedia Commons (with the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision's broadcasts) and the Library of Congress. Every episode plays from its archive, which this site does not copy; rights are as each archive states them. Nothing here is called public domain on this site's say-so. In the United States, sound recordings first fixed before 15 February 1972 have federal protection under the Music Modernization Act of 2018, for most until 2067 at the latest, so most American radio of the 1930s to the 1950s is not in the public domain there. Each set shows the licence, mark or statement its archive gives, and says whose it is. Horror, crime, war and westerns are for teenage and adult profiles, racist caricature for adults only, and children’s profiles hear what was made for children. More about these archives.