{"id":41244,"date":"2024-11-02T00:01:12","date_gmt":"2024-11-02T06:01:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/?p=41244"},"modified":"2024-11-01T07:36:37","modified_gmt":"2024-11-01T13:36:37","slug":"audio-drama-review-imagination-theatre-the-investigators-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/audio-drama-review-imagination-theatre-the-investigators-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Audio Drama Review: Imagination Theatre: The Investigators"},"content":{"rendered":"

A version<\/a> of this article was posted in 2019.<\/p>\n

The late Jim French is best remembered for his greatest creation, the Seattle-based, modern private eye Harry Nile. However, French produced many detective and crime shows during his remarkable four-decades-plus in radio. Imagination Theatre: The Investigators<\/a> (affiliate link) <\/em>from Radio Spirits is a sampler pack of nine different crime shows that French produced over the years as part of his Imagination Theatre<\/p>\n

The set kicks off with three episodes of\u00a0Harry Nile<\/em>. These shows come from 1999, towards the tail end of the run of Phil Harper (the original actor to play Harry Nile). We\u2019ve reviewed this series extensively before, but for those who haven\u2019t heard of it, Harry Nile\u00a0<\/em>is a period piece set in late 1939 through the late 1950s. Initially, the titular detective worked out of Los Angeles, but then he moved to Seattle, where French\u2019s research and attention to detail really shine. The episodes are superb. They\u2019re tailored to provide a complete, compelling mystery in just about twenty minutes.<\/p>\n

Next come three episodes of The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, <\/em>which isn\u2019t to be confused with the BBC Radio series of the same name. This stars John Patrick Lowrie as Holmes and Lawrence Albert as Watson. I\u2019d listened to one of these before and hadn\u2019t thought much of it. However, I did enjoy these. While they\u2019re not the greatest of the Holmes pastiches, and a few of the British accents are a bit iffy, the stories do have a Doyle-esque feel to them. While I wouldn\u2019t consider them in the same league as Big Finish\u2019s or the BBC interpretations, it\u2019s better than the 1947-49 radio version with John Stanley. If you enjoyed that take, you\u2019ll enjoy this one as well.<\/p>\n

Following that, we\u2019re treated to two episodes of\u00a0The Adventures of Dameron, <\/em>which I was happy about.\u00a0\u00a0Dameron\u00a0<\/em>was French\u2019s first radio detective. The episodes in this set aired in 1972 and were set in contemporary times. Dameron (Robert E. Lee Hardwick) is a freelance troubleshooter who takes on all sorts of cases. He\u2019s like a 1970s Frank Race, though generally with better production quality. There\u2019s a dearth of 1970s radio detectives, so the two in this set are a definite treat.\u00a0 We also get to hear actress Pat French, who later played the role of Harry Nile\u2019s secretary and partner, Murphy.<\/p>\n

We further get two episodes of\u00a0Mr. Darnborough Investigates, <\/em>starring David Natalie. These are cozy mysteries made in 2005 and 2015, but they could have been done in the Golden Age of Radio or over the BBC in the 1940s. Darnsborough is a gentleman detective who calls to mind Campion and Lord Peter Wimsey. If you enjoy those characters, you\u2019ll like Darnsborough.<\/p>\n

Then we get a couple episodes of\u00a0Kerides the Thinker.\u00a0<\/em>This series has a different setting for a mystery series: third century BC Alexandria, Egypt. Kerides (Ulrick Dihle) is a travelling Greek student who goes around solving mysteries, accompanied by Adria, a former slave girl (Sarah Schenkkhan), who was freed after Kerides revealed her former master is a murderer. On one hand, I love the idea for the setting and it\u2019s clear that the writers did their homework. On the other hand, the mysteries are so-so and the way Adria is written makes her seem insufferably whiny and unpleasant. Instead of being grateful for her freedom, she\u2019s upset that she has lost her place in the world and has no idea what to do. It\u2019s an interesting concept, but the way it\u2019s realized doesn\u2019t quite work for me.<\/p>\n

Next up are three episodes of\u00a0Kincaid, the Strange Seeker, <\/em>starring Terry Rose. This one is a series about a TV reporter who investigates mysteries that always have a supernatural cause, such as bank robberies that turn out to be done by ghosts. I\u2019m not a fan of supernatural mysteries, and I also wasn\u2019t sure how to feel about these episodes. They aren\u2019t scary and they don\u2019t have a Twilight Zone-<\/em>style twist. The stories seem off-the-wall more than anything else. In addition, I was bothered by how Kincaid gets hit with unwarranted skepticism despite a solid track record. Other than that, the production values are still good. This just wasn\u2019t my thing.<\/p>\n

Following this, we\u2019re given\u00a0three episodes of\u00a0Raffles, the Gentleman Thief, <\/em>starring John Armstrong.\u00a0<\/em>These are based on the character of A.J. Raffles, a brilliant gentleman thief created by E.W. Hornung.\u00a0 These were popular in their time but have faded from public consciousness.\u00a0 The adaptation does a good job of capturing the spirit of the original stories with good acting and good effects. The first two episodes are adaptations of Hornung\u2019s original stories and the third is a solid pastiche. I\u2019m not a huge fan of Raffles, but I could appreciate the way they handled the character. My only complaint is that Raffles, particularly as portrayed in these stories, isn\u2019t an investigator of any sort, but plenty of people who enjoy detective fiction love Raffles. If you do, you will enjoy these stories.<\/p>\n

Then we have the\u00a0Hilary Caine Mysteries, <\/em>which is my second favorite thing that Jim French Productions put out. It features Australian actress Karen Heaven as Hilary Caine, an on-staff \u201cgirl detective\u201d for the British Tittle-Tattle Magazine.\u00a0<\/em>The series is set in the 1930s and finds Hilary stumbling into a crime scene being investigated by Inspector Finn (Randy Hoffmeyer). At first, she seems to be a bit silly, but ultimately she shows her cunning in solving the case. These are fun, light mysteries and Heaven is wonderful in the role of Hilary Caine.<\/p>\n

The collection rounds up with two episodes (including one double-length episode) of the Anthony Rathe Chronicles, <\/em>which is a modern British drama that follows the career of a guilt-ridden attorney who solves crimes to atone for a case he got wrong. It definitely has a modern BBC feel. It\u2019s a bit soapy for my tastes, but the mysteries are well-written.<\/p>\n

Overall, this was a fun mix of programs. While I liked some more than others, it was interesting to hear or re-listen to such a variety of detectives. It\u2019s great to have a chance to appreciate all the audio dramas Jim French put out over\u00a0nearly half a century, when most people thought audio drama was a thing of the past. I also think the success of this set may help Radio Spirits determine whether they release larger sets for Jim French series outside of the quite popular Harry Nile<\/em> and Sherlock Holmes<\/em> series.<\/p>\n

Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A version of this article was posted in 2019. The late Jim French is best remembered for his greatest creation, the Seattle-based, modern private eye Harry Nile. However, French produced many detective and crime shows during his remarkable four-decades-plus in radio. Imagination Theatre: The Investigators (affiliate link) from Radio Spirits is a sampler pack of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"none","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[132,123],"tags":[5673,5679,158,5672,5674,5675,5680,5678,5677,5676],"class_list":["post-41244","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-audio-drama-review","category-golden-age-article","tag-further-adventures-of-sherlock-holmes","tag-gentleman-thief","tag-harry-nile","tag-jim-french-productions","tag-kerides-the-thinker","tag-kincaid","tag-phil-harper","tag-raffles","tag-the-anthony-rathe-chronicles","tag-the-strange-seeker"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pECdK-aJe","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41244","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41244"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41244\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41268,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41244\/revisions\/41268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41244"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41244"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greatdetectives.net\/detectives\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41244"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}