Dr Finlay Disengaged

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31768, 27 August 1968, Page 8

Dr Finlay Disengaged

(By

GARRY ARTHUR)

Female viewers throughout Channel 3’s area must have had their hearts in their mouths on Sunday night. For one fatal moment Dr Allan Finlay wore his heart on his sleeve.

In an excess of pity—brought on by the plight of his former sweetheart near to death—he said the binding words “I love you.”

We were all witnesses to it, and by the rules of the game in Dr Finlay’s time those words were enough to sustain .any breach of promise suit Of course for the sake of the series he . had to escape, and the cunning, almost underhand way in which he did so added' a new dimension to his television character.

As portrayed by the actor with the almost unbelievably prosaic name of Bill Simpson, Dr Finlay comes through as a slightly dour young doctor of integrity, compassion and humanity. But he is a realist, and in his own affair of the heart he was obviously more than happy to profit by the results of Dr Cameron's philosophy of letting nature take its course. Now he is condemned to

bachelorhood. The matrimonial musical chairs of Peyton Place have no place in Tannochbrae—in spite of Janet’s wistful look when Cousin Aggie talks of what might have been between her and the crusty Dr Cameron. We can speculate witn Janet on the catastrophe that would have resulted if Dr Finlay had been held to his promise of marriage. Would an Alfred Zigsby have been a fitting replacement? Could he have said “bairn" and “burn” with enough r’s to set the decanters vibrating on the sideboard? Never-r-r. That the practical Dr Finlay should And himself in the role of faith-healer is yet another example of the wide range of controversial topics encountered in this programme, however superficially. Not that the question of the Roman Catholic church’s attitude to contraception, dealt with in an earlier episode, was approached lightly —far from it.

The latest episode showed conclusively that the scriptwriters for Dr Finlay’s Casebook are craftsmen of the first order. In disentangling the reluctant bridegroom from his impulsive commitment, they also managed to reveal in him a very human weakness—barefaced' enjoyment of undeserved sympathy.