"A good kidnapping story always has wide appeal."

If You Want to See Your Wife Again...
John Craig
London: Cassell, 1973
223 pages

Struggling writer Dan Cramer once had a good gig. He spent two years working on Women's Editor, a daytime soap starring "beautiful blonde Jill Mason." That good gig looked to be steady until department store scion and sponsor Richard Bannister came along, married Jill, and brought the soap to a sudden end.

No star, no show.

After cancellation, Dan devoted twelve months to a script that drew the attention of Hollywood – until it didn't. Casting director Laurel Plunkett went back to working on television commercials – until she assaulted an advertising executive with a box of Crunch 'n Crackle crackers. Women's Editor producer Josh Darwin did much better in landing the interview show Dialogue with Darwin, but he is not happy. A mover and shaker, ever eager for a new project, he shares his latest idea over drinks with Dan and Laurel. Josh wants to produce a movie – a really good movie (or maybe TV special) – about a kidnapping:

"For the sake of argument suppose the three of us kidnap Jill. Start from there and use your imagination. How would we do it? What would we do to throw the police off the track? What complications would arise?"

Josh suggests they meet the next week to hash out ideas over dinner, but Dan does one better in writing a complete screenplay. The producer is so impressed that he suggests the three act out the script for real.

The premise is sound. Dan is desperate for money, Laurel has started down the same path to poverty, and both share resentment toward Jill for up and marrying rich Richard. The scene in which they decide to go along with Josh is impressive in that it is so convincing. Craig has a real talent for dialogue, something recognized in contemporary reviews.

If You Want to See Your Wife Again... is a dark comedy. Being a charitable sort, I blame laughs that fall flat on the passage of time; it has, after all, been more than a half-century since publication. The distance brings new perspective and an appreciation of the novel as one documenting the years of swingers and sexy stewardesses. Its plot is reliant on the post, pay phones, newspapers, radio, and department stores. I was so caught up in the atmosphere that I did not anticipate the twist.

I should have.

I did anticipate the final page, which features a marriage proposal.

The laziest of endings, it is the most common in Canadian literature.

One day I'll make a list.  

Trivia (personal) I: If You Want to See Your Wife Again... follows Every Man for Himself (1920) and Die with Me Lady (1953) as the third novel I've read that takes place in part on the Toronto Islands.

Trivia (personal) II: After leaving university, my first writing job was for Time of Your Life, a cheap daytime soap aired on CTV. I was one of five writers. The most unbelievable thing about If You Want to See Your Wife Again... is the idea that Dan alone would write five episodes a week.

Trivia (impersonal) III: Adapted to the small screen in 1972 as Your Money or Your Life. a CBS Tuesday Night Movie starring  Ted Bessell, Elizabeth Ashley, and Jack Cassidy. You can watch it here on YouTube. I haven't yet been able to make it past the first four minutes, but will not be defeated!

About the author: John Craig is credited with over a dozen books. The author bio for If You Want to See Your Wife Again... is one of the most unusual I've ever read.

Paul Craig competed in the 1976 Montreal Olympics, but as not awarded a medal. Younger brother John qualified for the 1980 Moscow Olympics, but did not participate due to the boycott.

Object and Access: My first British edition appeared in stores two years after the true first, published in 1971 by Putnam. A Dell mass market paperback (above) followed in 1974, after which the novel fell out of print.

There have been four translations: French (La malle et la belle) German (Geschäft mit der Todesangst), Spanish (Quieres ver a tu mujer otra vez?), and Danish (Men i sm a sedler!), all published between 1972 and 1974. The French appears to have enjoyed at least two editions, one of which features this curious cover:

The only automobiles that figure in the novel are Laurel's beat-up MG (she's a horrible driver) and a VW Beetle. The artist seems to have been unfamiliar with North American pay phones.

Related posts:

A Foggy Night in Hogtown

Dope Rings in Canada! Oh, My!

The Naked, the Queer and the Starlost

A sharp-eyed friend sends this photo of The Queers of New York, spotted a few days ago in a Toronto used bookstore. Can't say I'm tempted – not at $50 – though I do appreciate the effort. Leo Orenstein's 1972 novel is, I believe, the most sought after Pocket Canadian Paperback Original. Easy to understand why. Who couldn't use a book that features both gay and Yiddish glossaries? For now, I'm happy just to see the cover, which Orenstein himself provided. Not bad.

When I first learned of this novel back in February, I made a bit too much of the fact that Orenstein directed Chekhov, Ibsen and Shaw – pretty much every director working in the early days of CBC television did much the same. The only film the man directed was Have Figure, Will Travel, a low-budget travelogue about three young women who sail a luxury yacht from staid Canada to nudist colonies in the United States.

Orenstein was far more active as a producer than a director, putting together one-off television dramas by names like Ted Allan, Hugh Garner and Arthur Hailey. For the most part, these appear to have been well-received, though this 25 May 1966 Globe and Mail review by Dennis Braithwaite is worthy of note:

I don't see how we can put all the blame on Barry Morse for what happened on Show of the Week Monday night. Morse is an actor and therefore by definition a ham: give any actor his head, free him from all directorial restraints, say to him. "Do as you like, have a ball." give him a plot so sketchy and inane that it can't possibly by hurt, turn him loose on the set with a make-up box and a drawing account on the wardrobe department, close your eyes and ears to the results, and – well, if you saw It's Murder, Cherie, you know what will happen. Leo Orenstein produced this show; I want that information prominently displayed.

Could it really have been as bad as all that? Does anyone remember? I ask because it wasn't long after this review that Orenstein stopped working as a producer for the CBC. In fact, this man who had been there right from the medium's earliest days seems to have left television entirely. He returned only briefly, directing two episodes of The Starlost, CTV's 1973 science fiction series. Here's the beginning of the first, "Lazarus from the Mist":

By Canadian standards it was a pretty big deal, though no one seems to have noticed. After the devastating 1966 Braithwaite review, Orenstein's name didn't appear again in our newspaper of record until he died in February of last year. He was eighty-nine.

An aside: An "audacious television concept" says star and pitch man Keir Dullea. Those with who bask in nostalgia and young folks wondering what all the fuss was about may find the Starlost promo to be of interest.

The screen captures of Have Figure, Will Travel come from Canuxploitation, which has an excellent write-up on the film.

Related posts:

Carroll's Canadian Originals

Figuring Out the Queers of New York