What happens
Screen Director's Playhouse presents Body and Soul, first broadcast on November 11, 1949, starring John Garfield. Charlie Davis, a young amateur boxer living in New York with his mother, wants to turn professional to earn money for his family. Against the wishes of his sweetheart Peg and his friend Shorty, he takes up with a fight manager, and his rise in the ring brings him into dealings with a hard-edged promoter named Roberts. Charlie's ambition and the pressures around him drive him deeper into the fight business and into conflict with the people he cares about.
New York City and the boxing world of the 1930s, including a neighborhood club, a family apartment and the ring.
Characters: Charlie Davis, Peg, Shorty, Mrs. Davis, Roberts, Quinn, Jackie Marlow, Ben Chaplin
Listen for: Charlie's arguments with Peg and Shorty about whether he should turn professional, and his dealings with the promoter Roberts.
Written from the episode itself; it never gives away the ending. Every recording is remastered for the stream: cleaned of rumble, hiss and mains hum (and the old TV whine where we found it), then levelled in two passes to steady broadcast loudness, so one show is never quieter than the next.