Radio review: Brothers

Drama starring Tom Burke and Jack Lowdon

BBC Radio 4, Saturday, 2:30 pm

Perhaps best know for his career writing films including winning an Oscar for All the President's Men William Goldmen also had a career as novelist. Without a doubt the most famous of these being Marathon Man which was turned into a film starring Dustin Hoffman, Laurence Oliver and Roy Schider. In 1986 Goldman wrote a sequel called Brothers which featured the supposedly dead character of Doc (Schider in Marathon Man) coming back from exile. Following a radio version of Marathon Man being broadcast last weekend, Brothers was broadcast. Now some might dismiss it as a standard airport thriller about world peace being threatened by terrorist attacks but Brothers has a satirical edge to it. One example being the description of the then US President as a celebrity is probably just as apt now, while other I do not what to disclose for fear of giving away the plot.The production has a very hard boiled feel to it, a case in point being the some what amplified sound effects used during the fight scenes. Tom Burke as Doc gives a suitable world weary performance that fits the material. Brothers is a production that keeps twisting and turning until the end.

You can hear Brothers on the BBC website for month