Portrait of a Gentleman (play)
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 Wireless Weekly 10 May 1941 | |
| Genre | drama play |
|---|---|
| Running time | 60 mins (8:00 pm – 9:00 pm) |
| Country of origin | Australia |
| Language | English |
| Syndicates | ABC |
| Written by | George Farwell |
| Recording studio | Sydney |
| Original release | 14 July 1940 |
Portrait of a Gentleman is a 1940 Australian radio play by George Farwell about Thomas Griffiths Wainewright. It was the first time Wainewright's life had been dramatised.[1]
It was subsequently adapted into a stage play.[2]
The original radio production was on the ABC.[3] It won first prize in a 1940 ABC radio play competition.[4] A 1941 article called it one of the most popular plays ever broadcast by the Commission.[5]
The radio play aired again in 1941 (starring Peter Finch), 1946,[6] 1951[7][8] 1952 and 1956.[9]
The play was published in a 1946 anthology of Australian radio plays edited by Leslie Rees.[10]
Hal Porter later adapted Wainewright's life into a radio play, called The Forger.
Farwell himself wrote that the theme was an inner conflict, the dual nature of Wainewright; put simply and melodramatically, good versus evil."[11]
ABC Weekly called it "no ordinary play. Mr. Farwell has got inside the character of Wainewright the Poisoner, and has presented the queer feeling such gentry have, that the world doesn’t understand them; that everything they do is right, and that, if the world only understood the circumstances, it would see that there was no other way for a Superior Person to act."[12]
Leslie Rees called it "a convincing and stylish hour-long radio drama, in which a bizarre character was strongly projected but kept believably human."[13]
The Melbourne Advocate said "This successful play has quality beyond question; but I think that it furnishes a misreading of Wainewright's character. Further, it is too long."[14]
ABC Weekly reviewed a 1946 production calling it "an expertly constructed and excellently written factual."[15]
The Bulletin said "remarks revealing the quirks of an abnormal character are the best portions of the play. The character itself, interesting enough, is static. Background good, but commonplace."[16]
Stage version
In 1941 Leslie Rees listed the play as among those radio dramas "clearly written for radio and could not, in their present shape, be used elsewhere."[17]
However a stage play version was announced in 1941 as a possible production at Alec Coppel's Whitehall Company in Sydney for 1942.[18] This production did not appear to take place.
The stage play was highly commended in a 1945 playwriting competition held by the Playwrights' Advisory Board.[19] However it appears to have not been produced.