DEVIL'S GARDEN

Writer Ace Atkins and narrator Dick Hill tell a story inspired by the 1920s "Fatty" Arbuckle trial. Arbuckle was an overweight silent screen star charged with the rape and manslaughter of a starlet. The trial was a sensation—the O.J. trial of its time. In Atkins’s version, real-life writer Dashiell Hammett serves as a Pinkerton investigator for the defense. Atkins gives the listener pause as Arbuckle's career and fortune are destroyed by the media circus led by William Randolph Hearst. Hill gives the narration the flavor of the ‘20s, the grittiness of Hammett's character, the glitz of the showgirls, the naïveté and arrogance of Arbuckle, and the larger-than-life characterizations of William Randolph Hearst and actresses Marion Davies and Minta Durfee. When writer and reader are done, the sadness remains. A.L.H. © AudioFile 2009, Portland, Maine [Published: AUGUST 2009]