Radio review - Lux - "The Westerner" (1940) ***1/2

Maybe Walter Brennan wasn't a great actor but he was a great personality, and never more effectively cast than as Judge Roy Bean, the ruthless, Lily Langtry-worshipping law West of the Pecos who is hoodwinked by horse thief Gary Cooper, which makes Bean surprisingly sympathetic - even when later on Cooper picks up the cause of the homesteaders against Bean. Doris Davenport repeats her film role too as the woman who basically spots Cooper as good husband material and sets about converting him. Cooper later whinged that Brennan's part outshone him, which it does, but the fact his character is initially a bit duplicitous makes him a lot more interesting than usual.