"A Little Piece of Rope" stars Lucille Ball in the fourth of her six appearances on Suspense. It is a peculiar tale about a baby-faced actress in Hollywood named Isabelle who turns to a life of crime. Her youthful appearance and acting skills worked against her as a professional actress, but as a thief they serve her well. Isabelle's criminal inspiration came from an article she had once read in a Victorian-era Police Gazette. It had described "vicious females" who dressed as schoolgirls in order to "entice and trap unwary gentlemen."
Isabelle modernizes the scam and carves out a profitable niche for herself by passing herself off as a schoolgirl. She frequents the areas around high schools, where older men trolling for young girls are to be found, and when one offers her a ride, she accepts. Later, she clubs him with her blackjack and takes off with his cash.
Things are going well but one day she gets into a car with a dangerous man. Isabelle soon discovers that he is the strangler that the police are looking for but how can she prove it to them without exposing her own criminal activity?
"A Little Piece of Rope" was written by Virginia Cross. Anton M. Leader produced and directed. Lucille Ball played Isabelle and Berry Kroeger played the strangler. At the time she appeared on this episode of Suspense, Lucille Ball was promoting her own CBS radio show, My Favorite Husband as well as the movie Sorrowful Jones. This episode aired October 14, 1948.
. Download Suspense_1948.10.14_Little_Piece_of_Rope.mp3
(Image of Lucille Ball from Wikimedia Commons)
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