“…dedicated to man’s imagination…the theater of the mind…”

Those last four words have often served as shorthand to explain radio drama, both old-time and new—I’m uncertain as to where it originated; I’ve often believed that it was attributed to comedy writer Hal Kanter (a Savannah, Georgia native) who once cracked: “Radio is the theater of the mind, television is the theater of the mindless.” In any case, there can be little doubt that the phrase accurately describes and defines one of the finest programs of Radio’s Golden Age: The CBS Radio Workshop.

The program was pretty much an update (though there are those who believe it to be superior) of what is generally considered the father of experimental radio drama, CBS’ Columbia Workshop (1936-42, 1946-47). Here, noted playwrights like Archibald MacLeish and Norman Corwin were given free reign to build their reputations, on a program not only sustained by the network but encouraged to be as such. (CBS chairman William S. Paley believed that the series added a necessary touch of prestige to his network.) In the words of John Dunning, “Even in its failures, it was interesting—the people behind it seemed to know that to be good an artist must have the freedom to be bad.”

Nearly a decade after its cancellation, a decision was made to revive the concept under a new title, The CBS Radio Workshop. Radio was, by this time, on life support, and yet there was still a demand from its small, determined listening audience for serious, high-quality, adult drama. William Froug (who acknowledged that Norman Corwin was a “hero”), a vice-president at CBS, proposed the new show to his boss, Howard Barnes—who gave him a thumbs-up on the project. Froug’s idea for the show’s premiere broadcast (January 27, 1956) was to produce a two-part adaptation of Aldous Huxley’s classic 1932 novel, Brave New World—which I so conveniently listened to in this morning’s wee a.m. hours.

Froug arranged for Huxley to narrate the two-part broadcast, and I know there was some dissension in the ranks here at Thrilling Days of Yesteryear questioning the degree of Huxley’s participation. (In listening to both parts one and two, I agree that most of it is a dramatization but Huxley does break in from time to time with what I would certainly classify as “narration.” Dissenting opinions are always encouraged.) The show tells in unnerving detail of a futuristic society that demands conformity, prescribes a drug called “Soma” for unhappiness (Prozac, call your office), and replaces reproduction with an assembly-line “hatchery” that breeds and cultivates human beings artificially. The sound effect of the hatchery was created by blending and recording a ticking metronome, the beat of a tom-tom, bubbling water, an air hose, a cow mooing, repeated “boings,” and three different glasses clinking against one another—then playing it backward with a slight echo effect. It lasts only 30 seconds, but it required three sound men and an engineer to create the effect over a period of five hours.

Author Huxley begins the production with an effectively chilling narrative observation:

Brave New World is a fantastic parable about the dehumanization of human beings. In the negative utopia described in my story, man has been subordinated to his own inventions. Science, technology, social organization—these things have ceased to serve man; they have become his masters. A quarter of a century has passed since the book was published. In that time, our world has taken so many steps in the wrong direction that if I were writing today, I would date my story not 600 years in the future, but at the most, 200. The price of liberty, and even of common humanity, is eternal vigilance.

“Brave New World” is a simply superb production, produced, directed and adapted by Froug, with music by the one-and-only Bernard Herrmann. The supporting cast is a literal Who’s Who of radio acting: Parley Baer, Herb Butterfield, Sam Edwards, Gloria Henry, Bill Idelson, Byron Kane, Joseph Kearns, Jack Kruschen, Charlotte Lawrence, Vic Perrin, Doris Singleton, Lurene Tuttle and William Conrad—who also handled the series’ announcing chores.

The broadcast was indeed an auspicious debut for the series, but the best was yet to come, as producer Froug recalled: “Everybody on the second floor of CBS Radio at Columbia Square was excited about the show. Every day guys were coming to my office pitching ideas. Bill Conrad had a show idea; so did [composer] Jerry Goldsmith. I had never seen such excitement in my nine years at CBS.” This excitement soon spread to CBS’ studios in New York, as those staffers demanded the opportunity to participate as well (the program was initially broadcast from the West Coast). A rotating schedule was soon set up, alternating between East Coast (produced by Paul Roberts) and West Coast productions (Froug).

Once again, the directors behind these productions reads like yet another Who’s Who of old-time radio: William N. Robson, Jack Johnstone, Norman Macdonnell, Antony Ellis, and Elliott Lewis—who was told by a network vice president: “Do whatever you want. You have a half-hour.” Lewis took his advice and wrote, directed and starred in one of my favorite Workshop productions: “Nightmare” (5/5/57), about the terrible dreams of a man in a coma. (Director Antony Ellis also participated in another fave of mine, this time with a rare on-mike appearance in June 1, 1956’s “A Matter of Logic” with William Conrad.)

The CBS Radio Workshop was, I truly believe, radio drama at its zenith—a program that often served as a back-and-forth pendulum between the traditional and the offbeat: one week, an “interview” with Shakespeare; an adaptation of a Robert A. Heinlein story (“The Green Hills of Earth”) the next; a analysis of satire by Stan Freberg after that. Sadly, the series came to an end on September 22, 1957 after 87 episodes—all of which are apparently extant today in fine sound—of creative, cutting-edge radio drama. What continues to fascinate me is that it ever got on the air in the first place—as CBS’ Barnes remarked in an interview with Time magazine: “We’ll never get a sponsor anyway, so we might as well try anything.” Can you imagine anyone expressing a similar opinion in today’s broadcasting, where the bottom line is everything? Nope…I can’t, either.

“The House of Squibb presents…”

With the Oscars telecast approaching, I decided last night to listen to a pair of episodes from Academy Award®, a dramatic anthology that had a brief run on CBS from March 30-December 18, 1946. It’s pretty much in the Lux Radio Theatre-Screen Guild Players mold, though it did attempt to set itself apart from its siblings by limiting its radio adaptations to films that had either won or been nominated for an Oscar.

Academy Award® also used as many of the original film’s performers whenever possible, though in the first show I listened to—“Foreign Correspondent” (7/24/46)—it is explained that the male lead, Joel McCrea, had to be replaced by stalwart fill-in Joseph Cotten due to a scheduling conflict. The show is, of course, based on the 1940 Alfred Hitchcock film, and though the production and actors are first-rate I didn’t enjoy the listening experience all that much because, as I have stated previously, I’m no more than five or ten minutes into the thing before I’m saying to myself: “Why don’t I just watch the doggone movie?” (Foreign Correspondent is one of my all-time favorite Hitchcock films, and it’s a crying shame that it’s not available on DVD yet.) The second program is also based on a Hitchcock classic, “Shadow of a Doubt” (9/11/46), and though Cotten is back, it fits this time (he starred in the 1943 film). He’s joined by actress June Vincent (replacing the movie’s original actress, Teresa Wright) and although this broadcast is a little better, adaptation-wise, it’s still no substitute for the film (which is on DVD). The half-hour allotted for this adaptation is also insufficient, I think—for a really good radio version of Shadow of a Doubt, you should check out the November 9, 1950 broadcast of Screen Directors’ Playhouse, which features Cary Grant and Betsy Drake in the Cotten and Wright roles.

Academy Award® cost a pretty penny to produce every week—the Squibb people found themselves footing a bill that included $4,000 for the weekly star talent, plus a $1,600 kickback to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences for use of the title. After 39 episodes (all of which are extant today), the series threw in the towel when the tariff proved too hefty—so if you’re not turned off by radio adaptations of feature films, I think you’ll be entertained and impressed by the talent and quality involved.

First Person Singular

Before Citizen Kane, The Magnificent Ambersons, Touch of Evil, and all those other cinematic masterpieces—Orson Welles found a home…on radio. Welles had already established a celebrated career on stage, of course, before becoming a mainstay over the airwaves—performing with the legendary Katharine Cornell in productions of Romeo and Juliet and Candida in 1934, then teaming up with producer John Houseman in 1935 to form a stormy, intense three-year partnership that, according to OTR historian John Dunning, “created some of the most startling and talked-about theater New York had seen in decades.”

As for radio, Welles had joined the cast of The March of Time as a regular beginning in 1934, and was finishing his first season (1937-38) in the starring role of Mutual’s The Shadow when CBS Radio offered both he and Houseman the opportunity to bring much-talked-about Mercury Theater to the airwaves with a weekly one-hour dramatic program beginning July 11, 1938. Houseman was a little spooked by the whole prospect, realizing that the two of them had only two weeks to select a property, cast it, rehearse it…and perform it. Legend has it that after Welles scrapped what was to be their first broadcast—an adaptation of Treasure Island—less than a week before the show’s debut, he and Houseman worked for 17 hours straight at a 24-hour New York eatery putting the finishing touches on an adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Three days later, the show was broadcast as the premiere installment of what was finally titled The Mercury Theater On the Air.

The Mercury Theater was scheduled for a nine-week run over CBS, but the critical buzz and favorable press convinced the network to continue the series through the fall, moving it to Sunday nights beginning September 11. It is interesting to note that the program was sustained, which means that the network was footing the bill for nothing more than a little prestige. I’ve always been fascinated by how common it was for many radio shows of the 1930s to be put on the air (the Columbia Workshop and many of Norman Corwin’s works are good examples) without the network expecting any kind of financial recompense—a far cry from broadcasting today, where the bottom line is everything. Sustained programs were fortunate in that they could afford to be a little more daring, not having to deal with sponsors wondering if a script was going to offend listeners—and potential consumers—somewhere out in West Succotash. Programs that were sustained also encouraged experimentation, both in scripting and in sound effects—a Mercury Theater production of The Count of Monte Cristo (8/29/38) featured the story’s dungeon scenes being played from the floor of a CBS restroom, because the acoustics were ideal to recreate the subterranean reverberation. (A microphone was placed inside a toilet bowl with the stopper left open, allowing—as Houseman recounted—“a faithful rendering of the waves breaking against the walls of the Chateau d’If.”)

Although producer Houseman was chiefly responsible for paring down the “fat Victorian monsters” that served as the material for much of the series’ plays (he later hired a young writer named Howard Koch to take over the scripting chores), and conductor Bernard Herrmann provided the excellent for Mercury Theater, there was very little doubt that the show was, “An Orson Welles Production.” That is to say, the wonder that was Welles accepted a good deal of the credit as both director and star. In listening to old broadcasts of the show, you can’t help but be a little awed by many of the productions, and even the lesser shows have a little “oomph” to them. I would be remiss, however, if I didn’t point out that Welles’ repertory cast—Martin Gabel, Ray Collins, George Coulouris, Everett Sloane, Alice Frost, Agnes Moorehead, to name only but a few—deserve every bit of the credit for the fine acting that permeates each and every show.

This evening, I put on the October 23, 1938 broadcast of “Around the World in Eighty Days,” based on the classic novel by Jules Verne. It tells, of course, the tale of Englishman Phileas Fogg (Welles), who has accepted a wager (£20,000) to travel around the world in the titular time period. Accompanied by his valet, Passepartout (Edgar Barrier), he is pursued throughout his journey by a detective named Fix (Collins), who is convinced that Fogg is responsible for the recent robbery of the Bank of England. It’s a wonderful production, and I think the hour-long length helps it tremendously, allowing it to move along at a breezy clip—unlike the bloated, three-hour-plus film version of 1956. Included in the supporting are Eustace Wyatt, Frank Readick, Stefan Schnabel, Al Swenson, William Alland, and Arlene Francis (Mrs. Martin Gabel).

Although I didn’t think about it before selecting this show, it is interesting to note that the following week (October 30) would bring about what would become the most famous—and in many ways, notorious—of all The Mercury Theater On the Air productions, “The War of the Worlds.” (That should ring a bell, I’m sure.) This celebrated broadcast put Welles and company on the map, making Orson a household word and securing the series a sponsor in Campbell Soups—which is why the show was rechristened The Campbell Playhouse beginning December 9, 1938. The first-class status awarded to the show by the sponsor's cash was both a blessing and a curse, however—the show's continued run may have been guaranteed but now, big-name stars would be lured to each broadcast, much in the style of The Lux Radio Theatre, and crowding out many of the Mercury supporting players. Campbell Playhouse continued as a weekly hour until March 31, 1940, scaling back to a half-hour in November of that year (and sans Welles, who had his hands full with Citizen Kane at that time) before ringing down the curtain June 13, 1941. The program experienced a brief revival in 1946 (June 7-September 13) as The Mercury Summer Theater, which reunited Welles with some of his former Mercury players like Barrier, Frost and Moorehead—and was sponsored by Pabst Beer. (And you thought Welles had sold out with Paul Masson wines.)

Orson Welles is considered by many to be a tragic figure—due immeasurably to the fact that since his first film was his finest, he had no other place to go afterward but down. But I’ve always been intrigued by this anecdote in Leonard Maltin’s The Great American Broadcast, related by Richard Wilson, on how radio really kept Orson's excesses in check:

Radio was the only medium that imposed a discipline that Orson would recognize, and that was the clock. When it came time for Mercury to go on the air, there was no denying it. I can’t think of one theater production…that was not postponed, but [in] radio, he knew every week that clock was ticking, that red light [would come] on and say “On the Air.” And good or bad, right or wrong, boy, that was it. It was the only discipline Orson was able ever to accept.

”Stories start in many different ways…”

Ever since I first began listening to old-time radio, there are some actors' voices that have become indelible to my ears, voices that are unmistakable and cause me to instantly react the way the family pet perks up when it hears the sound of food hitting its bowl. To illustrate this, one night I was watching an old Cary Grant movie, People Will Talk (1951), on AMC—except that I wasn’t technically watching it, I had it on in the background while performing some other task (reading or writing, I can’t remember which). Anyway, there’s a scene in the film where Grant’s character is purchasing a train set and as soon as the store’s salesman spoke to him, I immediately looked up and shouted “Parley Baer!” It was indeed Parley, and my enthusiasm at picking him out was somewhat tempered by the fact that there was no one else in the room to witness this, seriously calling my sanity into question.

William Conrad’s voice is another one I can recognize off the bat, although it’s pretty easy—Conrad often joked that he was “the man of a thousand voice.” But I think the most distinctive radio voice belongs to Frank Lovejoy; he’s always been one of my favorite radio actors despite the fact that I don’t recall him ever displaying the versatility of dialect one might expect from, say, Hans Conried. I emphasize Lovejoy’s radio acting because although he started show business on stage and later carved out a niche on the big and small screens as a well-known tough guy, radio was really Frank’s medium.

Lovejoy started out in radio at Cincinnati’s WLW in 1934, choosing that particular career path while he was waiting around to join a stock company in that city. He was featured in more than 4,000 radio shows during his long career, among them The Shadow, Mr. District Attorney, Inner Sanctum, and too many soap operas to list here. He co-starred as Lt. Bill Weigand on Mr. and Mrs. North, and starred in the 1940 radio serial The Blue Beetle and as “fiction’s most famous criminal lawyer” John J. Malone on Murder and Mr. Malone (1947-49). But the series for which he’s best-remembered is Nightbeat, a woefully short-lived but nevertheless splendid drama that did a two-and-a-half year stretch on NBC beginning in 1950.

“Hi, this is Randy Stone—I cover the night beat for the Chicago-Star,” Lovejoy would announce after the program’s unforgettable bass drum fanfare. Randy Stone (who was originally tagged “Lucky” Stone in the show’s January 13, 1950 audition—and “Hank Mitchell” in an even earlier audition in 1949 with Edmond O’Brien) was a reporter who wrote stories with a human interest angle, making Nightbeat more than just a run-of-the-mill crime drama. William Nadel, in a fine essay in The Big Book of Noir, labeled the series “radio noir,” stating:

More detective than reporter, Stone solved crimes with a flair and panache than few so-called “gritty” shows had. Each night Stone would roam the streets of Chicago looking for that special story. Usually it was one of crime or great tragedy, and always it would be tagged with a memorable closing monologue about the people of “his” city.

I would place Nightbeat firmly among by top ten old-time radio show favorites; I fell in love with it ever since the first time I heard it on WOUB’s Monday Night at the Radio back in the 1970s. One of my favorite episodes is an July 31, 1950 entry, “City at Your Fingertips,” in which Randy playfully starts dialing random digits on his telephone, only to stumble onto a situation in which a desperate woman is about to be murdered by her insane husband. Great stuff!

This evening, I listened to two Nightbeat episodes, the first originally broadcast November 3, 1950 (it’s the second-to-last show from the series’ original February 6-November 10, 1950 run). In “The Black Cat,” a man named Nick Corbi goes out for a walk with the titular pet and ends up robbed and killed. Randy has quite a few suspects to choose from—his wife (Lurene Tuttle), a demented handyman/caretaker (Will Geer), and Mrs. Corbi’s lover, a drunken musician (Tudor Owen—shades of Jocko Madigan!). It’s a refreshingly offbeat story, with fine support from Ken Christy, June Foray, Lamont Johnson and Lou Krugman. The second show was “Big John McMasters,” which kicked off the series’ second run from March 4, 1951 to September 25, 1952, and stars William Conrad as a former bootlegger who’s just been released from prison—and who is shot at not long after. I really enjoyed this rather poignant entry, which was scripted by E. Jack Neuman and John Michael Hayes (a talented radio scribe who later went on to pen the screenplays for Hitchcock’s Rear Window, To Catch a Thief, and The Trouble With Harry). It’s an unpardonable sin that such a well-written and well-acted show went down in flames so quickly, though the usual suspects of poor scheduling and lack of sponsor interest were probably to blame.

As I mentioned earlier, Frank Lovejoy had a fruitful career in film and television and while I mean no disrespect to his talents, he wasn’t too particularly effective in those two venues, having a tendency to come off a bit stiff. You can see it in his performances in cult fave House of Wax (1953) (in which it’s hard to distinguish him from the wax mannequins) and the trash classic Shack Out on 101 (1955). (Let me just reiterate that I dearly love both of these films.) If we apply my patented Blind Squirrel Film Theory™ (so designated because “even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then”) to his role in Try and Get Me! (1950), then he definitely coulda been a contenda; he’s positively aces in that noir classic. (I’ll even concede that he provides fine support for Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame in 1950s In a Lonely Place.)

Sometime back, NBC aired an equally short-lived but fine series called Midnight Caller (1988-91), which starred Gary Cole as an ex-cop-turned-all-night-radio-jock who often got involved in some of his listeners’ personal lives. I was a big fan of that one, since it reminded me so much of Nightbeat. I’ve often mused that a Nightbeat-like series would do pretty well today, though you’d probably have to do it as a period piece, since most reporters sit in front of computers and word processors as opposed to roaming the streets of Chicago at night. But while I’m waiting for someone to pitch that concept to the networks, I rejoice in the fact that close to 100 episodes of the original still exist for me to enjoy today. I guess that’s the three-oh mark, then…copyboy!

”…RCA Victor, world leader in radio…first in recorded music, first in television…”

Radio added another big-time Hollywood dramatic anthology to its glut of similar programs in 1949 with The Screen Directors’ Playhouse, which debuted over NBC Radio as a sustained half-hour series January 9. OTR historian John Dunning is laudatory in his On the Air entry for the show, praising its writing and commenting: “Though the material had a familiar sound, it was made fresh.” Though I agree that the show was better written than some of its radio cousins, I don’t believe the show is anything that will set the world on fire. Admittedly, programs that dramatize Hollywood movies are among my least favorites—it’s not that they’re not well-done, it’s just that I prefer watching the original source material instead.

Screen Directors’ Playhouse picked up a sponsor in July 1949 with Pabst Blue Ribbon Beer, which paid the tab until September; it was later sponsored by RCA Victor, Anacin, and Chesterfield. The program’s half-hour format sort of handicapped the show at first—by having to shoehorn the movie adaptations into a thirty-minute time frame, the productions lost a great deal of their nuance. I once listened to a Playhouse presentation of It’s a Wonderful Life (courtesy of Victor Ives and The Golden Age of Radio Theater) that zipped by so fast I thought Jimmy Stewart’s character had married Evelyn Wood instead of Donna Reed.

Screen Directors’ Playhouse expanded to a full hour beginning November 9, 1950 and it improved the series considerably; last night’s listen to the November 16, 1950 broadcast of Alfred Hitchcock’s 1944 film Lifeboat is a pretty good example, since the original movie relies more on dialogue rather than visuals. It features Tallulah Bankhead, who reprises her starring role as reporter Constance (Connie) Porter, and Jeff Chandler as Kovac (played by John Hodiak in the original), telling the tale of a group of survivors whose ship has sank after being attacked by a German U-boat. The production eliminates one of the movie’s characters, “Sparks,” (played by Hume Cronyn) but otherwise remains faithful to the film, and features a capable supporting cast in Wilms Herbert, Anne Diamond, Henry Roland, Barbara Eiler, Sheldon Leonard, and Roy Glenn.

At the time of this broadcast, Chandler was just beginning to make noise on the silver screen as a big box-office draw—the show’s announcer, Jimmy Wallington, even plugs his latest release, Deported (1950), during the program’s end. Chandler was a long-time radio veteran, often performing under his real name, Ira Grossel and appearing on programs like Suspense and Lux Radio Theatre. Chandler was immortalized in OTR as the “bashful biologist” Philip Boynton in the hit situation comedy Our Miss Brooks, which allowed his previously hidden comedic talents to shine. He's also remembered by old radio fans for a syndicated series in which he played Michael Shayne, the fictional detective created by author Brett Halliday.

Lifeboat’s leading lady, Tallulah Bankhead, was also burning up the airwaves as the “mistress of ceremonies” of NBC’s The Big Show, a Sunday night big-budget variety spectacular (it was estimated that the show cost around $300 a minute). It debuted November 5, 1950 and despite a top-flight guest roster (Jimmy Durante, Fred Allen, Ethel Merman) it limped along for two years, never managing to make a dent in its competition on CBS (which included The Jack Benny Program). Both The Big Show and The Screen Directors’ Playhouse were examples of the hard-working efforts of radio at this time to stay viable as its audience dwindled, falling under the seductive, hypnotic spell of the boob tube. Had Playhouse premiered earlier during Radio’s Golden Age, it might have shared the longevity of programs like The Lux Radio Theatre and The Screen Guild Players, but instead it made a graceful exit at curtain on September 28, 1951.

I did notice one curious thing while listening to this broadcast—a plug for 20th Century-Fox’s All About Eve starring Bette Davis. Curious in that Bankhead made no secret of her disdain for the picture (she nicknamed it “All About Me”) because she felt that much of the movie was cribbed from her fascinating history of her many years on the stage. I’d be interested to know as to how she felt about the plug at the end of the show.

”Aren’t we devils?”

Day 10 of "Twenty Days Well-Calculated to Keep You in Suspense."

Ghost Hunt

Hip disc jockey Smiley Smith (Ralph Edwards) has made arrangements to spend the night in a “haunted house” (notorious for four suicides committed within the last decade) as a publicity stunt. Joining him is Dr. Clarence Reed (Wilms Hilbert), a scientist with a passion for investigating psychic phenomena. The morning after, the house’s owner and the real estate agent arrive at the house to pick the two men up—and find Reed covered with blood and Smith…disappeared. The explanation for the disturbing events lies in a surviving wire recording made for Smith’s audience…

About fifty years before The Blair Witch Project hit movie screens, Suspense did the same story in the span of thirty minutes—but much more effectively and without the nausea-inducing camerawork of the 1999 hit film, either. Adapted by Walter Brown from a story written especially for Suspense by Herbert Russell Wakefield (known to many as “the father of the ghost story”), “Ghost Hunt,” originally broadcast over CBS June 23, 1949, follows on the heels of the previous week’s “The Trap” to score another one-two punch for the classic radio drama series.

As with the novelty of featuring Jim and Marian Jordan (a.k.a. “Fibber McGee & Molly”) in “Backseat Driver,” “Ghost Hunt” relies on some unusual casting in that the part of Smith is played by Ralph Edwards, host of two popular shows during the Golden Age of Radio (and later transplanted to television)—Truth or Consequences and This is Your Life. Edwards is truly a marvel in a role admittedly tailor-made for him; however, he reveals a previously undisclosed flair for the buskin, particularly in how his character’s mood changes from a sort of whistling-in-the-dark (“Where ghosts are concerned, I say live and let live…”) to outright hysteria and terror at the events happening around him. A top-notch episode from beginning to end, “Ghost Hunt” is definitely one that remains in the memory.

The Search For Isabel

Mild-mannered bank clerk Dick Brown (Red Skelton) no sooner has his new phone installed in his apartment when he begins to receive phone calls from various men asking to speak to Isabel LaRue. Brown starts to become obsessed with Isabel (Cathy Lewis), even to the point of dreaming about her—and sets out to track the elusive woman down.

MGM’s star comedian Red Skelton steps up to the Suspense microphone to display his dramatic talents in “The Search For Isabel,” originally broadcast on November 3, 1949—about a month after Red moved to CBS after a lengthy stint on NBC. Skelton was reported as saying that he was “terrified” at the prospect, but he turns in a respectable performance. The problem is, Skelton’s appearance is really the only thing the episode has to offer—the story is one of those weak, seriocomic pieces that Suspense had a tendency to slip into from time to time. (This handicap would later crop up, for example, in the episodes that Jack Benny did for the series; although I bow to no one in my admiration for Benny, his Suspense episodes are among my least favorites.)

“The Search For Isabel” was written by Richard Bodra, who originally had his script broadcast as an episode of The Clock (on April 22, 1948). The Clock (1946-48) was a short-lived anthology series on ABC Radio that was very similar to Suspense; in fact, when the program moved to the West Coast in 1948 (after a season on the East Coast) it regularly featured Suspense players like Lurene Tuttle, William Conrad, Jeanette Nolan and Elliott and Cathy Lewis. William Spier directed this series before returning to Suspense, and no doubt remembered this story when it came to choosing a proper vehicle for Skelton.

Bah humbug!

It’s perhaps the most familiar of all Christmas-themed stories—the tale of a cold, unfeeling miser (whose last name has become synonymous with any individual demonstrating negative feelings toward the holiday season) who repents and changes his grasping ways after being visited by three spirits on Christmas Eve. Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol has provided material for movies, television—and especially old-time radio, where during Radio’s Golden Age it became what author John Dunning calls “radio’s best-loved single program.” Many actors have taken at turn at portraying Ebenezer Scrooge on radio—among them Edmund Gwenn, Ronald Coleman, and Basil Rathbone—but no actor became more identified with the role than Lionel Barrymore.

Barrymore was practically a Christmas staple as the radio version of Dickens’ famous miser from 1934-53, in many different lengths and formats: dramatic anthologies, variety shows and specials, and even his own starring program, Mayor of the Town. The broadcast that I tuned in to last night showcased his appearance on the Campbell Playhouse from December 24, 1939. It’s a stupendous production, aided immeasurably by Campbell Playhouse star Orson Welles’ narration (Welles had played Scrooge the previous year in Barrymore’s absence) and the wonderful Mercury Theatre company of players: Frank Readick, Everett Sloane, George Coulouris—even a young Bea Benaderet, who plays a small dramatic role that is a far cry from her more familiar work with Burns & Allen and Jack Benny.

But it’s truly Barrymore’s show—he creates an indelible impression as Scrooge, and I can’t help but think that his association with the character influenced Frank Capra’s decision to cast Lionel as the Scrooge-like Mr. Potter in It’s a Wonderful Life (1946). I particularly enjoyed how Barrymore captures the character’s sadness and melancholy that is more responsible for Scrooge's current condition than any ingrown evil or greed; he's definitely a three-dimensional character. (I should probably point out that while Barrymore is fantastic, the yardstick by which I measure the role still belongs to Alastair Sim in the classic 1951 film version.)

I probably don’t need to summarize the plot of A Christmas Carol since I’m sure everyone knows it by heart—it’s such a great story that even if Dickens had never written anything else he’d still be as revered as he is today. The story even proved to be flexibly serviceable as fodder for other OTR broadcasts—from comedies like Blondie (12/25/39) and Duffy’s Tavern (12/21/45) to dramas like Richard Diamond, Private Detective (12/24/49) and The Six Shooter (12/20/53). Speaking for myself, it’s a timeless story that I never get tired of hearing, whether it’s the original or a variation of such. I think this one passage really hits home:

FRED: There are many things from which I derive good by which I have not profited materially, I dare say, Uncle…Christmas among the rest…But I have always thought of Christmas as a good time—a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time—and therefore, Uncle…though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe it has done me good and will do me good…and I say, “God bless us.”

I’m going to be taking a week off to spend some time with my family in North Georgia, so I guess this means Thrilling Days of Yesteryear will be taking a hiatus until December 27th. Until then, I want to wish each and every one of you best wishes for the season—Happy Holidays and Merry Christmas, everybody!

”The family that prays together stays together.”

Family Theater, an anthology drama created by Father Patrick Peyton of the Holy Cross Fathers as an effort to promote family prayer, made its debut over Mutual Radio (“the world’s largest network”) on February 13, 1947 and left the airwaves after an eight-year-run on July 4, 1956. Family Theater, despite its religious affiliation (strictly non-denominational, of course), was virtually indistinguishable from many of the other dramatic anthologies prevalent on radio at that time.

The program attracted much of Hollywood's big-name talent—Gary Cooper, Gregory Peck, Jack Benny, and Shirley Temple, to name a few—all freely donating their time, thus eliminating the need for hefty star salaries. It would have been difficult to pay all those performers, anyway—the show featured no commercials, only a weekly appeal touting the power of prayer. (“Family Theater…brought to you by PrayerCo…”)

The show frequently began with a famous quote by Alfred Lloyd Tennyson: “More things are wrought by prayer than this world dreams of.” Other taglines associated with the program include “A world at prayer is a world at peace” and “The family that prays together, stays together.” Both of these slogans were created by a man named Al Scalpone.

Loretta Young is probably the most well-known Hollywood performer associated with Family Theater, appearing on not only the show’s debut broadcast but making twenty-nine additional appearances as well (easily the program’s record). I tuned in to one of those performances last night, as Loretta was the narrator of “The Littlest Angel,” a pleasant semi-dramatization of the Charles Taswell story about a misfit cherub whose simple birthday gift to the Christ Child is more valuable than any of the other gifts offered by his angelic brethren and sistern. The program was originally broadcast December 21, 1949, and includes some gorgeous-to-hear choral numbers (“Carol of the Bells,” “What Child is This?”) orchestrated by Harry Zimmerman.

I enjoyed “Angel” so much that I listened to a second Family Theater afterward, a December 15, 1948 broadcast entitled “A Daddy For Christmas.” Hosted by Shirley Temple, it tells a sweetly simple story of a boy (Bobby Driscoll) who desperately wants a father as a Christmas gift. The story kicks off as he and his mother (Linda Johnson) are at a department store—the young boy sees Santa Claus and remembers there’s something important he needs to ask him:

STEVIE: Santa Claus?

SANTA: Well, well, well, well…what a nice little boy…come here and tell Santa what you want for Christmas…

STEVIE: You know…

SANTA: Huh?

STEVIE: I’m Steven Hunt…you know what I want…

MARY: Uh, Santa…you took his list when you were across the street in Wilson’s department store…

SANTA: Oh! Oh yes, that’s right…I remember now…I was getting you all mixed up with another nice little boy I know…

STEVIE; Mommy calls me a little scamp…

SANTA: Oh ho ho…but you’re a nice little scamp…I’ll tell you what, son…I left my notebook across the street…so, uh…how about you giving me that list of all the things all over again…first, what’s your address…?

STEVIE: Steven Hunt…2228 Elm Street…

SANTA: All right, Steven…now, what do you want for Christmas?

STEVIE: Well, I want the sled…

SANTA: Mm-hmm…

STEVIE: A bicycle…

SANTA: With two wheels?

STEVIE: With three wheels…

SANTA: Oh, that’s a tricycle…

STEVIE: I don’t want a tricycle…I want a bicycle…

SANTA: With three wheels?

STEVIE: Uh-huh…

SANTA: Mmm…one bicycle with three wheels…I get it…

STEVIE: …and I want a scooter…a pony…a wagon…and I want a Daddy…

SANTA: A Daddy…?

MARY: His Daddy didn’t come back from the war…I don’t think Stevie remembers him, but…

SANTA (understanding): …but all his friends have daddies…

STEVIE: And I want a Daddy, too!

Later that Christmas Eve, Stevie waits for Santa’s arrival:

MARY: All right, Stevie…off to bed (pause) I said to bed, not to the window…

STEVIE: I’m looking for Santa Claus!

MARY: Now, get to bed…Santa will come after you’re asleep…

STEVIE: There he is now!

MARY: There who is?

STEVIE: Santa Claus! He’s coming up the drive with a great big bag!

MARY: What???

STEVIE: Here he comes, here he comes!

MARY: Stevie, what on earth…

(SFX: door knock, walking, door opens)

SANTA: Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!!! (SFX: door closes)

STEVIE: Santa Claus! Santa Claus! I told Mommy it was you! Whadja bring me?

MARY: It is Santa Claus!

SANTA: Oh please, lady…don’t tell me you don’t believe in Santa Claus!

MARY: I’ll…I’ll believe anything now…

STEVE: Whadja bring me, whadja bring me?

SANTA: Well, now wait—let me put my bag down first…

MARY: Wh-What are you doing here?

SANTA: Hmm? Well, I was just flying by on my reindeer…my sleigh…when I saw what a nice Christmas tree you had and decided to drop in…well, I couldn’t find a chimney on this side of the house so I decided to use the door…

STEVIE: Where’s your reindeer?

SANTA: Hmm? Oh, my reindeer! Oh, I sent them back to the North Pole to pick up some more toys!

STEVIE: Whadja bring me?

SANTA: Well, let’s open my bag here…and see what we’ve got for Steven (SFX: bag rustling, metal sounds) Well! A bicycle with three wheels!

STEVIE: Oh, Mommy, look! Santa Claus remembered! Can I ride it? Can I? (SFX: bicycle bell) It’s got a bell! It’s got a bell! Mommy…Mommy, what’s the matter?

MARY (through tears): Nothing, honey…I’m just happy…because…because Santa Claus remembered…

The Santa turns out to be a young man named Joe Regan (played by acting vet Pat O’Brien) who bought Stevie the bike because the boy’s request for a father was stuck so firmly in his mind. Joe and Mary eventually marry later on, and while their attempts to carry out a normal family life are promising at first, things begin to hit a snag. Mary wants Joe to have a prosperous career, and talks him out of quitting his furniture factory job to take a sales position at a hardware store.

But Joe isn’t cut out to be a salesman; he loses the job and finds it difficult to locate another—especially since Mary doesn’t want him to settle for a job in which there’s no ambition involved. Mary finally ends up having to go back to work so that they can make ends meet, and Joe, devastated by this, leaves Mary and Stevie, convinced that he’s a failure.

Mary continues on in Joe’s absence, and tries to tell herself that the two of them will be better off without Joe, especially since he has no ambition. It’s only after a discussion with Stevie’s young friend Jimmy that she realizes that Joe isn’t cut out for that type of work—Jimmy extols Joe’s virtues, telling Mary that he spends quality time with the kids, showing them how to throw a baseball and how to hold a bat.

Mary now knows that Joe has been giving Stevie not material things, but the most precious thing a father can offer—attention. When Christmas Eve rolls around again, Mary begins to pray for Joe’s return:

STEVIE: Do you think Santa will come, Mom?

MARY (sobbing) I hope so, Stevie…I hope so (to herself) But if he were going to…he’d be here by now…it would be like Joe to come back tonight for Stevie…maybe if he comes back for Stevie I can get him to stay for me…oh, Joe…

STEVIE: Mommy, what’s the matter?

MARY: Nothing, honey…nothing at all…okay…it’s off to bed with you…

STEVIE: Are you crying ‘cause Santa Claus didn’t come?

MARY: Never mind…it’s time…(SFX: door knock) I’ll get it…

(SFX: walking to door, door open)

JOE (as Santa): Merry Christmas! Merry Christmas!

(SFX: door closes)

MARY (crying) Darling…I knew you’d come…I knew it…

STEVIE: It’s Santa Claus! Santa Claus!

JOE (in a low voice) Mary…uh oh, watch it…my beard…

STEVIE: Santa Claus’ whiskers are coming off (surprise gasp) It’s Daddy! Daddy! Daddy!

JOE: Hello, son…

STEVIE: Mommy, Daddy’s Santa Claus!

MARY (still crying) Yes, dear…Daddy’s Santa Claus…you’re back to stay, aren’t you, Joe…?

JOE: Yes, I’m back…and Mary…I’m sorry I left the way I did…I was a coward…from now on, I’ll try to be the kind of a guy you want…

MARY: No, dear…from now on just be yourself…that’s the kind of guy I want…

JOE: Oh, Mary…oh, enough of this mush stuff…I gotta go about my business…Stevie been a good boy?

MARY: Perfect…just like his daddy…

JOE: Really? That’s too bad…well, let’s see what we’ve got here (SFX: bag opening, more metal sounds)

STEVIE: Oooooh…a Racer!

MARY: With big rubber tires!

STEVIE: Thank you, Santa…Daddy! Daddy?

JOE: What is it, fella?

STEVIE: I know where you’ve been…

JOE: You do?

STEVIE: You’ve been up at the North Pole, making toys!

JOE: You know…I couldn’t have thought of a better explanation…

MARY: That’s the only one I ever want to hear…

“A Daddy For Christmas” is entertaining radio drama, albeit a little on the schmaltzy side. (Also, I'm not sure how old Stevie is supposed to be, but he comes off a bit of a brat.) Family Theater may no longer grace the airwaves but its influence can be heard on the modern day program Unshackled, an award-winning religious drama that originates from the Pacific Garden Mission in Chicago—in fact, not only is it the longest-running drama in radio history but it's still on the air as of this posting.