Picture This Playlist 119: All’s Fair in Love and War

Written by Wayne Cresser on February 16, 2026 and posted in Picture This: Film Music on the Radio .
(This program was broadcast Sunday, February 15th, from 6 to 8 PM on WRIU, Kingston, 90.3 FM, also streaming at wriu.org)
First hour of Picture This begins at 01:02:20 (below)

Second hour (below)

 

Author’s Note: The first known hint of the sentiment “all’s fair in love and war”  in English comes from the Elizabethan writer and courtier John Lyly’s and his  romantic novel, Euphues, the Anatomy of Wyt, 1578:

Anye impietie may lawfully be committed in love, which is lawlesse.

By 1620, Irish translator Thomas Shelton published an English version of Cervantes’ Don Quixote in 1620, with this sentiment therein:

Love and warre are all one and as in warre it is lawful to use sleights and stratagems to overcome the enemy: So in amorous strifes and competencies,

Almost a century later the same ideas become in William Taverner’s play, The Artful Husband, 1717,

All advantages are fair in Love and War.

And finally, in 1789, we get to the proverb in the form we now know – in the novel The Relapse, or Myrtle Bank:

Tho’ this was a confounded lie, my friend, ‘all is fair in love and war’.

Which is meant to be ironic, isn’t it? Because to my puny mind, nothing seems to be fair in either.

Here’s the Playlist
Coming Attractions from Matinee, composed by Jerry Goldsmith

THE PICTURE THIS “IT’S A MOVIE” SONG OF THE WEEK

Coming Attractions from Bright Screen Wide, composed by Mark Cutler and Scott Duhamel, performed by the Dino Club

THE SHOW

Oh! It’s a Lovely War from Oh! It’s a Lovely War (Volume 1), composed by J.P. Long and Maurice Scott performed by Cortland and Jeffries

Title Theme for 1917, composed by Thomas Newman

Remains and Title Theme from All Quiet on the Western Front, composed by  Volker Berttelmann

The Main Theme from The Great Escape, composed by Elmer Bernstein

Main Titles from Band of Brothers, composed by Michael Kamen

The River Kwai March, also known as Colonel Bogie’s March from Bridge on the River Kwai, composed by Lieutenant Kenneth J. Alford

Title Theme from Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,  composed by Ryuichi Sakamoto

Theme from King Rat, composed by John Barry

Title Theme from Unbroken, composed by Alexander Desplat

From Darkest Hour, all songs composed by Dario Marianelli

Prelude

One of Them

Just Before Dawn

Basecamp at Dawn from Catch-22, composed by Harry and Rupert Gregson-Williams

Torna a Surriento, or Return to the South (traditional Neapolitan) from Catch-22

Everyone’s Gone from Catch-22, composed by Harry and Rupert Gregson-Williams

Theme from Platoon, composed by Georges Delarue

Title Music from Hamburger Hill, composed by Philip Glass

Goodnight Bastard from The Hurt Locker, composed by Marco Beltrami

Farewell Amanda from Adam’s Rib, composed by Cole Porter for Adam’s Rib, performed by Guy Lombardo and his Royal Canadians

Cathy’s Theme from Wuthering Heights, composed by Alfred Newman

Unchained Melody from Unchained, composed by Alex North and Hy Zaret, performed by Alex North and the Hollywood Bowl Orchestra

I’m Through With Love from Some Like It Hot, composed by Gus Khan, Matty Malneck, and Fud Livingston, performed by Marilyn Monroe

Just One of Those Things from Jubilee, composed by Cole Porter, performed by Nat King Cole

The Roses Montage and Main Title Theme from The Age of Innocence, composed by Elmer Bernstein

I Will Remember You from The Brothers McMullen, composed by Seamus Egan with lyrics by Dave Merenda and Sarah McLachlan, performed by Sarah McLachlan

Blues in the Night from The Complete Recordings, composed by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer, performed by Peggy Lee

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