AustLit

Originally written as a television play for the BBC in 1950 and subsequently filmed for cinematic release by Anglo-Amalgamated Films in 1951, Assassin for Hire aired as a radio play in Australia in 1952, where it aired on the General Motors Hour.

The radio play followed the same plot as its predecessors. A contemporary reviewer summarises the plot as follows:

'During the day Tony operated as a respectable stamp dealer, but at nights he was prepared, for suitable monetary compensation, to knock off people who for various reasons were in other people's hair.

'The gendarmerie has a fair idea of what Tony's game was, but could never pin him down.

'But it so happened that Tony had a young brother, Seppi, whom he intended to turn into a violinist in the Menuhin class. A nice lad Seppi, even though he did turn out to be Tony's Achilles' heel.

'For in his final murder the police convinced Tony that, through a horrible mistake, he had killed Seppi, whereupon he confessed all, only to find that his brother was very much alive.

'The whole thing was neatly done and the trick ending came most effectively–but I do feel that any police inspector who framed a prisoner in that was, murderer or not, would have been cashiered on the spot or demoted to actor junior constable in the Anti-Peanut Smuggling Squad'.

Source: 'John Quinn's Radio Round-up', The Mail (Adelaide), Saturday 25 October 1952, p.54.