SOURCE: Bassett, Kate. “Flying High, Falling Flat.” The Times, London (26 April 1995): 12.

In the following mixed review of the 1995 London revival, Bassett describes the circumstances surrounding the writing of Flare Path.

Terence Rattigan's drama depicting Air Force pilots and their anxious wives, where the chaps are sent on a dangerous raid the very night they had planned to catch up on their personal lives, has an adventurous history. Rattigan's own rough draft, I mean.

Advised by his psychiatrist to join the RAF to cure writer's block, Rattigan scribbled away between missions. Then, during a long flight to Africa, an engine failed Rattigan was about to throw his kit bag to the winds to lighten the load, when he remembered Flare Path was inside. Ripping out the pages of his exercise book, he stuffed them in his pocket, and put the finishing touches to the script in Freetown, surrounded by...