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English critic, broadcaster and playwright From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Lionel Ramsay Hale (26 October 1909 – 1 January 1977) was an English critic, broadcaster and playwright.
Hale was born in Beckenham, Kent.
In the 1940s, Hale presented the radio quiz Transatlantic Quiz[1] and an early television quiz show called Quiz with Hale. He made regular appearances on Panorama between 1953 and 1955 as a theatre critic,[2] and was featured as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme Desert Island Discs on 3 January 1958.[3] One of Hale's plays, These Two, ran for a short time (eight days) on Broadway in May, 1934. These Two was a three-act drama set in a flat in London.[4] He was also a frequent contributor to Punch, the British humour magazine.
His wife, Betty Taylor, died in 1952. Their son was the publisher and literary agent James Hale (1946-2003).[5] Lionel subsequently married Crystal Pudney, the daughter of A. P. Herbert.[5]