The play was originally devised for radio. Mortimer was a barrister and got the idea for the play from the real-life practice of the Dock Brief, where criminals could pick a barrister to defend them. Mortimer wrote "I wanted to say something about the lawyer's almost pathetic dependence on the criminal classes, without whom he would be unemployed, and I wanted to find a criminal who would be sorrier for his luckless advocate than he was for himself."[1]
Mortimer enjoyed writing the play for actors "at a new level of reality, one that was two feet above the ground."[2] Mortimer said he had no trouble writing for the barrister but struggled writing the criminal until the director Nesta Pain said the criminal was the sort of person who would "never use one word when six could do".[3]
The play was first performed as a radio play on the BBC on 16 May 1957 for the Third Programme. Michael Hordern played Morganhall and David Kossoff played Fowle.[4]
The play was well received. Mortimer says the BBC awarded him a bonus of £20.[5]
Following on from the success of the radio adaptation, the BBC produced a version for television. It aired in September 1957 and again featured Hordern as Morganhall.[6][7]
The Manchester Guardian called it "a masterpiece".[8]
A stage play version was performed in 1958 on a double bill with another Mortimer play, What Shall We Tell Caroline?.[9] The play was popular; it did not have a long run but it launched Mortimer as a playwright and led to offers to write screenplays.[10]
^BROADCASTING PROGRAMMES: RADIO EIREANN
The Irish Times 16 May 1957: 8.
^CRIME N AND THE LAW: TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN Moving theme of a masterly play: Moving theme of a masterly play B.B.C. Television.
By Bernard Levin. The Manchester Guardian 21 Sep 1957: 3.
^The Working Hypothesis
Tynan, Kenneth. The Observer 13 Apr 1958: 15.
