Sorry, Wrong Number

Sorry, Wrong Number, a suspenseful noir-thriller play by Lucille Fletcher, was originally produced as a 30-minute radio broadcast in 1943 on the popular golden-age radio show, Suspense. The radio drama starred Agnes Moorehead as Mrs. Stevenson, an isolated woman with disabilities who, while trying to phone her husband, accidentally overhears the plotting of her own murder. The play was reprised on the air seven times, last airing in 1960. The drama was published in 1946 as a one-act play with specific instructions for directors wishing to recreate the original radio drama, and for those planning a staged production. In 1948, the play was adapted into a thriller film noir, directed by Anatole Litvak and starring Barbara Stanwyck (who earned an Academy Award nomination for her performance). Famed film director Orson Welles notably called Sorry, Wrong Number “the greatest single radio script ever written,” and in 2015, the play was deemed culturally significant enough to earn a spot in the Library of Congress’ National Recording Registry. The edition used for this guide is the Dramatists Play Service Inc. Acting Edition, a volume which includes both Sorry, Wrong Number and The Hitch-Hiker, also by Lucille Fletcher.

Content Warnings: This play depicts murder and uses the offensive term “invalid” to refer to a person with disabilities.

Plot Summary

Lucille Fletcher’s Sorry, Wrong Number is a one-act play and radio drama concerning Mrs. Stevenson, a housewife who experiences extreme anxiety and must remain in bed. Mrs. Stevenson never leaves the house, and the only people she sees are her husband, Elbert, and her maid, Eloise. The play takes place in 1940’s New York City over the course of a single night, and most of the action occurs in Mrs. Stevenson’s bedroom.

Mrs. Stevenson’s only means of contacting the outside world is her telephone. One night, her on a crossed telephone connection, she accidentally overhears two men plotting a murder while trying to call her husband. The two men (who cannot hear her) were hired to stab a woman and make it look like a robbery. She grows even more concerned when the men discuss specific details that indicate the murder could happen in her own neighborhood. The men plan to enter the house of the victim at eleven o’clock at night, when the private patrolman goes around the corner to a bar on Second Avenue. At 11:15, the noise from a nearby train will conceal the woman’s screams as she is stabbed. Mrs. Stevenson is disconnected from the call and must decide what to do with this information.

The unnamed victim, like Mrs. Stevenson, sounds to be alone and vulnerable. Mrs. Stevenson decides it’s her duty to do what she can to prevent the crime. She dials the operator numerous times, but at every turn she faces barriers to reporting what she overheard. The police, too, tell her there is nothing to be done to prevent so vague a plan. The policeman on the phone, Sergeant Duffy, says Mrs. Stevenson shouldn’t worry herself unless she fears for her own safety. Mrs. Stevenson insists that it isn’t possible that someone wants her dead, since she never leaves the house and only sees her maid and her husband at home. Sergeant Duffy ends the phone call and bids Mrs. Stevenson a good night.

Mrs. Stevenson grows more panicked as the night gets closer to eleven o’clock. She frantically tries to call her husband again, but repeatedly gets a busy signal. At last, she hears from him, but the news isn’t what she wants to hear. He sends a message to her via Western Union that he has been trying to reach her on the phone all night but has been unable to get through to her. He must go to Boston unexpectedly for business and will be traveling there at eleven that night. He will not be back until the next afternoon, leaving Mrs. Stevenson alone all night. The message heightens Mrs. Stevenson’s anxiety, as she becomes more and more convinced that she is in fact the intended victim of the murder.

Her next phone call is to Henchley Hospital. She attempts to hire a nurse to stay with her through the night, but they are short-staffed and only send out nurses that have been assigned by a doctor. Mrs. Stevenson pleads with the receptionist to send a nurse, since it’s almost eleven o’clock. The receptionist tells Mrs. Stevenson eleven o'clock has already passed, and it’s now 11:14. Mrs. Stevenson realizes with horror that her clock has stopped, and she has lost track of the time.

Mrs. Stevenson notices a strange sound on the phone and realizes someone is listening to their conversation. She hangs up, then cautiously calls the operator one last time. In a hushed voice, she asks to be put through to the police. The operator can’t understand her, and she repeats herself. However, it is too late by then. The killer comes into the room just as Mrs. Stevenson throws the phone across the bedside table, knocking over the lamp. The stage is completely dark as a strange figure stabs Mrs. Stevenson. Her screams are covered up by the roaring of the train. Finally, Mrs. Stevenson’s hand falls limply off the bed. The murderer, one of the men on the phone at the beginning of the play, picks up the phone by Mrs. Stevenson’s bed. The police ask him to name his emergency. Instead of answering, he tells the police that he called the wrong number and hangs up.