NBC University Theater

The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber

English · Dramatic Readings, Short Stories

NBC University Theater presents a radio adaptation of Ernest Hemingway’s story The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber. Set on an African safari, the story follows Francis Macomber, his wife Margot, and their professional hunter, Robert Wilson, as a dangerous encounter with a lion exposes tensions among them.

The program brings literary fiction to radio through dramatic performance and sound, translating Hemingway’s spare prose and shifting relationships into a listening experience shaped by dialogue, narration, and atmosphere. The story’s safari setting and moments of danger frame a close examination of courage, fear, pride, and power.

Rather than offering a simple adventure, the drama turns on the characters’ changing balance of confidence and control. Hemingway’s restrained style gives the emotional conflict room to emerge, making this adaptation a tense, psychologically focused piece of literary radio.

This recording is part of the Old Time Radio collection.