Play review - "The Big Knife" by Clifford Odets

Odets once again on the topic of selling out. A movie star is being offered a massive 14 year contract with script approval and plenty of time off. You might think "what's the problem?" but his wife doesn't want him to take it, he's sold out his career, he should go back to Broadway, etc. In 1949 these were considered serious issues - of course in hindsight we know he should have taken the money and ran. The emotional stuff about being a sell out really works, its just the mechanics to get there are a bit contrived. There is some good stuff where the wife gets the abortion, the movie star has a guilty secret which is exploited. Best characters are the rutheless Hollywood tycoon (Harry Cohn crossed with Louis B Mayer) and his equally deadly offsider (surely based on Eddie Mannix), plus the Hollywood blonde. The "good" characters - the wife and the writer (a recovering alcoholic who has found redemption) aren't very interesting. Plenty of hysterical high falutin' dialogue and heaving duty confrontations but it showed Odets was still an adept writer.