Word: signalman
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...role, although he has a few redeeming moments. James Putnam as Lt. Thomas Keefer, male-volent, sarcastic intellectual, shows some signs of having thought about his part, although he tends toward overacting. The same might be said of David Galloway who is quite engaging in his brief appearance as Signalman Urban. William Balchelder as the senior officer of the court martial proceedings has excellent delivery, albeit sepulchral, but no real acting demands are put upon him. Peter Kramer as Lt. Stephan Maryk is insipid, and John Dobbyn as Willie Keith is even more so, both inept and without any sense...
Actually, the varied fare proved less a virtue than a vice. By Dickens standards, too much of Williams' material was close to mediocre. The brief annals of Paul Dombey exposed Dickens' mawkish side; a little-known ghost story, The Signalman, raised no goose pimples. Surprisingly, the one real nonhumorous success was a dramatic pastiche from A Tale of Two Cities. Even much of the humor was secondbest. Williams did score a bull's-eye with a minor yarn, Mr. Chops. If a showman as gifted as Emlyn Williams ever goes to work on the great comic figures...